The Thinkulum thinkulu_mw1 https://www.thinkulum.net/wiki/Main_Page MediaWiki 1.37.1 first-letter Media Special Talk User User talk Thinkulum Thinkulum talk File File talk MediaWiki MediaWiki talk Template Template talk Help Help talk Category Category talk 0 17 34 2005-03-20T00:00:00Z Andy Culbertson 1 Imported from WordPress. wikitext text/x-wiki 3-20-2005 Here is a picture of me: <center>[[File:me2.png]]</center> Yeah, I wear dress clothes all the time because I’m too lazy to change when I get home. I bought the wall hanging from some Kenyan librarians my boss hosted when I worked at the college library. 1cd867e81015f1631e0388163d5cb5d6e199bd19 0 18 36 2005-03-20T00:00:00Z Andy Culbertson 1 Imported from WordPress. wikitext text/x-wiki This is an index page from an old version of this site. [[Aesthetics Introduction]] [http://del.icio.us/thinkulum/aesthetics Aesthetics links] === Music === === Writing === === Art === === Comics === === Games === === Mass media === === Humor === a83af3b73d3059769dc91c215b24283ed785cdc8 0 20 40 2005-03-20T00:00:00Z Andy Culbertson 1 Imported from WordPress. wikitext text/x-wiki Version 1.0, 3-20-05 Apologetics came to my attention very early as a part of my attempt to be comprehensive in evangelism. I wanted to know how to evangelize ''everyone''; and if I got right down to basics and found out how to convince atheists, I thought I could cover all my bases. There was a more practical reason for my study of apologetics, and that was that I really was trying to evangelize atheists. I was friends with at least a couple of them and also a Mormon. I spent most of my junior high and high school years trying to persuade them and got basically nowhere, but at least it helped me. Studying apologetics taught me a lot about critical thinking, Christianity, the Bible, philosophy, science, and scholarship in general. It also taught me that the world is very complicated. Not only do people not simply convert just because of a few arguments, but the truth is not always a simple matter to uncover. Things are not always as they appear. At first I read popular apologists because they were readily available and I wasn’t aware of anything else. But the libraries I visited did have a few books on the academic level; and once I discovered them, those were the authors I gravitated towards. Two notable examples were William Lane Craig and Michael Martin. The first Craig book I picked up was ''The Son Rises'', a popular-level treatment of his arguments for the resurrection. The resurrection had been the subject of one of Craig’s doctorates. I was immediately impressed. Michael Martin was not an apologist (not for Christianity anyway), but his book ''Atheism: A Philosophical Justification'' gave me my first major dose of analytic philosophy. As I wandered deeper into the world of academic apologetics, it bothered me that there was not more material like this available to the general Christian public. The average churchgoer was not going to walk into the local university library and make a beeline for the ''British Journal for the Philosophy of Science''. But this information was important, at least to people who wanted to talk meaningfully with the skeptics in their lives. Bridging that gap, I decided, was one of my life goals. Since then I have noticed a trend in that direction in Christian publishing, for which I am glad. In that first round of apologetic study, I concentrated on evolution, Mormonism, the cosmological argument, and the resurrection. Evolution was first, probably because it’s the most visible apologetic issue. I studied Mormonism because my best friend was Mormon, and we spent about two years straight debating religion over lunch. The cosmological argument came along because I wanted to study apologetics systematically, and the creation of the universe seemed like a natural place to start. The resurrection entered the scene with Craig’s book, and it stuck because it was just such a fascinating topic and, of course, so central to Christianity. I came out of that period thinking that a) the creation-evolution debate is hopelessly complex and not very important anyway; b) Mormonism is unfounded but not easy for its adherents to walk away from; c) the cosmological argument probably works but proves very little; and d) among Christian historical evidences, the arguments for the resurrection are uniquely compelling, both in their force and in their implications. Through an apologetics listserv I subscribed to, I was also introduced briefly to presuppositionalism. My study of apologetics was interrupted at the end of high school by my [[Spirituality Introduction|personal revival]], and during my college and grad school years I neglected apologetics almost completely. Too many other pressing issues were weighing on me. I did learn a lot more about presuppositionalism in my study of Reformed theology, and I considered myself a presuppositionalist for a while; but as with most things, my mounting pile of questions overcame my commitment to the position, and I ended up agnostic on the subject. I also took a short graduate course on apologetics which added some important elements to my thinking about the existential, human side of apologetics. But mostly I was occupied by other things. During this non-apologetic period, questions settled like dust on my mind. These came from both my studies and my independent reading and reflection. Despite being an evangelical school, Wheaton was still a good place to collect troubling questions about one’s faith. I found that my professors in the biblical studies program did a good job of exposing us to non-evangelical scholarship and of training us in evangelical methods of interpretation, but they did an uneven job of refuting their opponents’ viewpoints. I suppose you can’t do everything. But I did gain the tools to answer many of these questions myself. These questions nudged me back toward apologetics, and they had help. My professors and other influences inspired me to develop my research and critical thinking skills further. This resolve was strengthened when I became irrationally alarmed by some conspiracy theories just before the Iraq war. After I recovered from my brief paranoia, I concluded that I was too gullible and that the solution was to learn to use critical thought more consistently. Somewhat unexpectedly, I realized that if I was going to be a critically thinking person in general, I couldn’t leave religion out. I had to think critically about that as well. My reasoning was that each person is born into the world in circumstances that they didn’t choose, and these circumstances include one’s religious environment. People are accustomed to taking the religion they grew up in to be true. But if not all religions are basically the same, then letting your circumstances choose your religion amounts to rolling dice to decide on your spiritual condition, perhaps your eternal destiny. It would be wiser to make an informed choice. And I was not exempt. So the nudge back to apologetics became a shove. I knew the need for critical thought about religion from my earlier expeditions into apologetics, but during that period I took it for granted that Christianity had solid foundations. I probably gave lip service to evaluating one’s faith; but Christianity was my starting point, and as far as I was concerned it only needed rational defence, not evaluation. Non-Christians were the ones who really needed to evaluate their viewpoints. But once I acquired this more critical approach to life, I believed that Christianity had to be examined along with everything else. I didn’t want it ''fail'', but a serious test seemed necessary. So that’s where I find myself now. This section is not for the faint of heart. I ask difficult questions, and I don’t settle for easy answers. If you’re a believer and you easily careen into anxiety and doubt, maybe you would do better to go somewhere else. Check out my apologetics links. These guys will take care of you. I can promise you no such thing. 905b2670bfb2f5a26312d436eaa6d001705ba798 0 22 44 2005-03-20T00:00:00Z Andy Culbertson 1 Imported from WordPress. wikitext text/x-wiki This is an index page from an old version of this site. [[Christianity Introduction]] [http://del.icio.us/thinkulum/Christianity Christianity links] [[On Being an Agnostic Christian]] (added 5-13-06)<br/><br/>A long essay on the current state of my faith, mostly dealing with the conflict between belief and doubt. It provides a context for much of what will happen in this section. [[On Being an Agnostic Christian: The Severely Abridged Version|OBAC: The Severely Abridged Version]] (added 6-6-06)<br/><br/>If you don’t have time to read the original, try this one. === Spirituality === [[Spirituality Introduction]] === Apologetics === [[Apologetics Introduction]] === Evangelism === [[Evangelism Introduction]] === Hermeneutics === [[Hermeneutics Introduction]] === Theology === [[Theology Introduction]] [[My Current Theology]] (added 7-17-05) 56164d62db62c2e641289c877a3ae756a5cc9939 0 23 46 2005-03-20T00:00:00Z Andy Culbertson 1 Imported from WordPress. wikitext text/x-wiki Version 1.0, 3-20-05 Ever since I was about ten, religion has been overall the most important thing in my life. I had grown up with Christianity all around me, and I was baptized at seven, but ten was the year that religion somehow became magnetic north to me. Some people, when they say, “Religion is the most important thing in my life,” mean something like, “I am totally in love with Jesus, and I would do anything for him.” When I say it, I mean just that I can’t avoid taking it seriously. Sometimes that has meant I’m excited about Jesus, and sometimes it’s meant he utterly baffles me, but it always means that I see religious issues as the fundamental issues in life and that they are something I have to deal with in whatever way seems necessary at the time. Thus, the prominent position of this section on this site. Over the years, my interest in Christian things has settled into five main areas: evangelism, apologetics, spirituality, theology, and hermeneutics. Here’s the quick run-through. You can read the subsection intros for more. I think I was a miniature [[Evangelism Introduction|evangelist]] even in elementary school, in my low key way, but in junior high that phase really kicked in. And since I was trying to evangelize my skeptical friends, evangelism led into [[Apologetics Introduction|apologetics]]. Apologetics was very distracting, and in the process of studying God, I forgot about ''talking'' to him, which led me into a vexing spiritual dry spell. Not to fear, however, for I had a spiritual reawakening at the end of high school and became super-enthusiastic about spiritual growth and the idea of a personal, conversational relationship with God. This was also when I began my habit of journaling. Then I went off to Wheaton College and entered The Crisis, which you can read about in the [[Spirituality Introduction|spirituality intro]]. It basically involved hearing opposing accounts from two different Christian groups of how Christianity is supposed to be lived. The effect of this crisis was to teach me that the world is more complicated than I thought and that I really didn’t know how to be the kind of Christian I wanted to be. It also reaffirmed for me that if you want something done right, you have to do it yourself. I was confused, and no one I talked to had answers that satisfied me, so I concluded I had to find my own. During this time my journal developed into my more organized “thoughts pages” as part of this effort. Other things happened at Wheaton. For one thing, I began working through my [[Theology Introduction|theology]]. This came partly as a result of discovering Reformed theology my freshman year. I was also involved in an Internet evangelism ministry, which kept evangelistic issues churning in my mind. And working at the Billy Graham Center library gave me exposure to various evangelism and missions movements. My church was another influence, of course. Teaching Sunday school there made me aware of ministry issues, as did watching the church dissolve. The process of sorting through my questions was aided by grad school. I did my masters at Wheaton in biblical exegesis, and it fed my latent interest in [[Hermeneutics Introduction|hermeneutics]], which is the theory of interpretation. And as is usual in higher education, I learned a lot but came out with even more questions than I had going in. My last year of grad school, all of these puzzles and others convinced me that it was time to work on my critical thinking and research skills. (Most of that project will appear in the [[Philosophy|philosophy]] section.) One side effect of this decision was to bring apologetics back to my attention, this time as much for myself as for anyone else. In my quest to figure out the world, Christianity certainly gives me the most to think about. It even infiltrates my other subjects of interest. I like to integrate ideas anyway, but Christianity is a special case. I see it as a basic perspective from which to look at everything in life. So there are Christian views of art, money, politics, work, play, computers, and pretty much anything else you can think of. Similarly, there are Christian uses for all these things; and conversely, insights from other areas can inform our understanding of Christianity. I didn’t come up with this idea of integrating Christianity with the rest of life, but it’s one that to me just seems right. 92e8214de3b825db89edff7ec4efb5d372d3baac 0 24 48 2005-03-20T00:00:00Z Andy Culbertson 1 Imported from WordPress. wikitext text/x-wiki This is an index page from an old version of this site. [[Computers Introduction]] [http://del.icio.us/thinkulum/computers Computers links] === Internet === === Programming === === Software === === Troubleshooting === === Tech culture === === Math, science, and technology === 14df1f558d08dafec52173983d0a294513144122 0 26 52 2005-03-20T00:00:00Z Andy Culbertson 1 Imported from WordPress. wikitext text/x-wiki Version 1.0, 3-20-05 Evangelism is a controversial topic these days. Not everyone thinks we should do it. It tends to offend people who are of a pluralist persuasion or a private nature. When I was young, around junior high, I didn’t know any of that. I was just discovering how significant my Christian faith was to me, and I had a hefty sense of mission for someone my age. I wasn’t preaching on street corners, but I did make “projects” out of several of my non-Christian friends, and I tried to persuade other Christians to make evangelism a habit as well. I was even working on a book (which fell by the wayside once I got into apologetics). It was going to be a ''Complete Guide to Soul-Winning'', and I spent hours and hours compiling notes from other books on the subject. I was a devoted kid. It all seemed so simple in the beginning. Just show unbelievers the Roman Road or the Four Spiritual Laws, maybe make an appeal to their emotional turmoil, lead them in the prayer, and they’d rush right into the fold. And if they were skeptics or followers of other religions, well, it seemed simple enough to prove them wrong and guide them to the truth. Only it didn’t work out that way. I had three fairly quick converts, but I wasn’t very good at follow-up, so I don’t know how they turned out or even if their conversions were genuine. The others just wouldn’t be persuaded. I talked to some of them for years, and at least one of them got fed up with my attempts. Fortunately she didn’t give up on my friendship as well. Evangelism was just getting more and more complicated, and gradually it faded into the background because I had a growing sense that I didn’t know what I was doing. It was still important; it had just moved itself from the list of “ways I direct my activities” to the list of “life problems to solve.” The more I explored the issue, the more complications I found. I didn’t know how to introduce the Gospel into my conversations. I didn’t know how to connect the Gospel effectively to people’s lives. I wasn’t even sure what the Gospel included. Is the Gospel about justification only or also things like physical healing? And how do faith and works fit together anyway? People have answers to these questions, of course, but these people don’t all agree, and a lot of their solutions seem unsatisfactory to me anyway. To put it another way, I think of evangelism as a great World-Saving Machine, kind of like a tank, sitting in a clearing in the middle of a forest. Now, I ''would'' hop in the driver’s seat and barrel across the countryside, using the machine’s magic to scatter people’s delusions and pull their lives together … only the machine seems to be broken. In fact, it’s ''very'' broken. Some of the parts are missing, there’s very little fuel, vines are growing all over it. This thing isn’t going ''anywhere''. Now, to judge from the stories, other people’s World-Saving Machines are humming along just fine … or at least certain other people’s. I suspect I’m not the only one scratching his head. So I’m in a muddle. Now, I do have a few definite opinions. If the Bible is true (as I believe it is), then evangelism is important. The most obvious reason is that the majority of the human race is lost and on its way to hell, to put it bluntly. This is not a flattering view of humanity, and maybe that’s behind a lot of people’s objections to the practice. But if you’re a Christian and you can get yourself to view things so starkly, evangelism becomes a frantic rescue mission. The panic involved is tempered by other considerations, such as the gentleness and patience of God, but the urgency is still there in the background. But while impending doom is a persuasive factor for me, at a more fundamental level I am driven to do evangelism (or at this point, just to figure it out) simply because to me, conversion is a part of one’s personal growth. Human beings were created to be like God, to embody his character, and in our current state that is impossible. Being recreated by Christ is the crucial ingredient, and that involves conversion, and that involves evangelism. I am interested in the whole process of becoming like Christ, from the initial unbelief and first contact with the Gospel, to the point of belief, to the process of sanctification after. I want to know how that journey works and how I can be involved in it, both for myself and for other people. It’s a large part of what drives my life. So evangelism is a big deal to me. As I said before, evangelism is controversial. I’m interested in the controversies, too. How can evangelism be a justifiable activity in today’s enlightened, pluralistic culture? Are there “anonymous Christians,” or must people believe in Jesus ''by name'' to be saved? And if there are such people, is evangelism really that urgent? I think of evangelism as sort of a meta-issue or an organizing principle. It has its own issues to be worked through, but I think some of the major difficulties will be cleared up as I deal with other issues, especially apologetics and spiritual formation. It ties together many aspects of Christianity nicely, which makes evangelism itself a good spiritual discipline. Evangelism isn’t the ''end goal'' of being a Christian, but it is a significant piece. 351395ba1599fefc66d4bfac73dcce536020287e 0 27 54 2005-03-20T00:00:00Z Andy Culbertson 1 Imported from WordPress. wikitext text/x-wiki Version 1.0, 3-20-05 My senior year of college I started an accelerated masters program at Wheaton in New Testament, which I exchanged for their new Biblical Exegesis program a couple of years later because that program also covered the Old Testament. I thought I wanted to end up working in some branch of practical theology, but that’s not where I wanted to start. Being a thorough sort of person, I believed that the large-scale ideas of theology have to be built on the tiny details of the biblical text. This called for interpretation, or the more technical term, exegesis. Hermeneutics, as I use the word, is a more general term for the theory of interpretation, while exegesis is the process of interpretation itself or the end result of that process. I had already been thinking about interpretative methods for a few years. I didn’t do much Bible study growing up, but when I got to college and became interested in theology, I thought Bible study would be a good thing to get into. My wandering attempts to do this received a boost when I planted myself at Trinity Baptist Church. Our pastor was really into expositional preaching, and Bible study was the major activity of the church as a whole, so I was exposed to a lot of it. Gradually I got an idea of how it worked. And as with everything, it got me asking questions. Why did we ask ''this'' question of the text and not this other one? Why did we zero in on these particular features? Why do we assume the writer laid out the book ''this'' way? And so on. While my graduate program did teach me the tools of exegesis, there’s only so much you can learn in a class. In these courses we were hard at work learning the exegetical techniques of our professors. These techniques belonged to an interpretative approach called the historical-grammatical method. Historical-grammatical interpretation analyzes the language of the text and tries to understand the text based on its historical context. This method seemed like a perfectly natural way to interpret things, but I wanted to know more about … ''the others''. In our biblical criticism classes, we learned about other methods of biblical interpretation, both current and past. As it was explained to us, critical interpretation of the Scripture began around the Enlightenment (“critical” in the sense of “involving careful judgment,” usually judgment about things like the historical circumstances of the work and how it was composed). Thinkers of the time were throwing off the shackles of human institutions, all institutions, including the church. Their goal was to submit only to the authority of reason. Thus, they decided that the Bible was ''just another human book'', not a divinely inspired one. Instead of simply believing it, therefore, they began evaluating it to sort out the true from the false. The idea was that once they knew how the Bible had come to be written and which parts were true, they would know how to interpret it and make it useful for modern society. In the process they came up with a succession of critical approaches to biblical interpretation, each one gaining acceptance and then giving way to a new approach as the old one’s flaws became evident. These critical approaches were obviously unacceptable to many conservative Christians, who attacked them vigorously, especially in the early twentieth century. Evangelicals today do use these critical methods but typically in modified forms that are more friendly toward inerrancy. These days the big deal is reader-response criticism, which is actually an outgrowth of postmodernism rather than modernism. While the earlier methods were a problem, at least as they were originally conceived, reader-response seemed to be public enemy number one for my evangelical professors. The main question in this debate is whether we can know what the “authorial intent” of the text was–what the author meant by what he wrote–and whether it’s important in the first place. The historical-grammatical critics say we ''can'' know it and it’s ''very'' important, and the postmodern critics say we can’t and it isn’t. Well, I’m all for the historical-grammatical method, but it seems strange to me that when it came to interpreting any particular passage, not only was there no consensus in my classes, but there was no agreement among the professional commentators either. Don’t take that too far, by the way. I don’t mean each commentator had a totally different opinion on every little point, only that I was surprised at the number of places they disagreed and how widely their interpretations could differ. It made the text seem very unclear. So I’m curious about these “heretical” interpretative methods, both modern and postmodern. What can be said for and against them? Our discussions in the exegesis program were good, but the theoretical courses covered too much ground to deal with everything to my satisfaction, and the practical courses were less concerned with these questions. So I am left to my own devices, which is what I prefer anyway. 6c796bb218e8894fa672fb7024b28e14b762dcee 0 28 56 2005-03-20T00:00:00Z Andy Culbertson 1 Imported from WordPress. wikitext text/x-wiki This is the home page from an old version of this site. [http://www.thinkulum.net/blog/ Blog] Site updates, life updates, random thoughts, people [[Christianity]] Spirituality, apologetics, evangelism, hermeneutics, theology [[Philosophy]] Epistemology, metaphysics, aesthetics, ethics, politics [[Psychology]] Psychotherapy, personality, education, cognitive, interpersonal, social science [[Aesthetics]] Music, writing, art, comics, games, mass media, humor [[Computers]] Internet, programming, software, troubleshooting, tech culture, science [[Weird Stuff]] Paranormal phenomena, alternative science, conspiracy theories, urban legends [[Life Maintenance]] Food, clothes, shelter, etc. 4f155fef6368f5145d8f4dc8e4583a13fea0ded6 0 30 60 2005-03-20T00:00:00Z Andy Culbertson 1 Imported from WordPress. wikitext text/x-wiki This is an index page from an old version of this site. [[Life Maintenance Introduction]] [http://del.icio.us/thinkulum/life-maintenance Life Maintenance links] 259b2cfe29de6dbdc36ef35ef740409c91af9e2b 0 31 62 2005-03-20T00:00:00Z Andy Culbertson 1 Imported from WordPress. wikitext text/x-wiki Version 1.0, 5-1-05 I could do without the real world. I am essentially a lazy person. And besides, the world of ideas is so much more fun. Unfortunately, in order to keep living and to do it conveniently, you have to expend a certain amount of energy. It probably takes less in the US than in a primitive, tribal society, but still it takes some. So here I will share with you some of the things I’ve found that have made my life a little easier to maintain. Because we all have better things to do. Of course, many people make their living out of the things on this page. They actually enjoy doing things like managing finances or selling clothes or designing exercise plans. I consider such things to be necessary evils, and I take great pleasure in marginalizing these people’s whole careers. I figure if they’re going to enjoy making my life more complicated, I might as well retaliate by denigrating their chosen occupations. This page will be dedicated to the good people who make these necessary evils more invisible. These people clean up the mess created by the overenthusiastic people of the last paragraph so that I don’t have to deal with it. The less I have to think about, say, buying a car, the better. So if someone tells me exactly what I need to know to do that, they have just improved the world by holding back the evil that desires to encroach upon my life. And if no one is doing that, I’ll just have to do it myself and save both myself and other people time in the future. Hence you’ll find a few of my own stress-saving creations here too. When my mom told me to get my head out of the clouds when I was growing up, I don’t think she quite meant this … 27ee0e7e9d64dcfba9768dc17f46af22b0fa7fe3 0 32 64 2005-03-20T00:00:00Z Andy Culbertson 1 Imported from WordPress. wikitext text/x-wiki This is an index page from an old version of this site. [[Philosophy Introduction]] [http://del.icio.us/thinkulum/philosophy Philosophy links] === Epistemology === === Metaphysics === === Aesthetics === === Ethics === === Politics === e179734233d0240185ea8fd200828a4ee7b6e6dd 0 34 68 2005-03-20T00:00:00Z Andy Culbertson 1 Imported from WordPress. wikitext text/x-wiki This is an index page from an old version of this site. [[Psychology Introduction]] [http://del.icio.us/thinkulum/psychology Psychology links] === Psychotherapy === === Personality === ==== Scanners ==== [[Reflections on Barbara Sher's Refuse to Choose|Reflections on Barbara Sher’s Refuse to Choose]] (added 4-29-07)<br/><br/>A rambling review of Barbara Sher’s book on Scanners, who are people who have many interests and an inner compulsion to follow them all. They tend to have trouble settling down into one career. Sher says they don’t have to! [[The Annotated Scanner's Toolbox|The Annotated Scanner’s Toolbox]] (added 5-12-07)<br/><br/>A modified version of the tools index in ''Refuse to Choose''. I added descriptions of the reasons you might use each tool. === Education === === Cognitive === === Interpersonal === === Social science === 8c5ecb6689b4dbaee500447cb866ac28068af212 0 35 70 2005-03-20T00:00:00Z Andy Culbertson 1 Imported from WordPress. wikitext text/x-wiki Version 1.0, 3-20-05 The summer after my junior year in high school, our church youth group went to a week-long camp in North Carolina with about five other youth groups. Youth camp happened every summer, but this was the first time the camp had included other churches. Maybe they felt the need to regroup, or maybe it was their practice to begin with, but whatever the reason, early in the week a few of our guys started meeting together at night to talk about what was going on in their lives and how they were doing spiritually. A day or two into it, I was invited. I had never seen anything like it. Certainly I had never been involved in such a thing. I had always been withdrawn, and I’m surprised I even had the kind of friendships that would get me there in the first place. But instead of feeling threatened by all the openness, I was enlivened by it. It wasn’t, as one friend suggested, that I was glad to see that other people’s problems were worse than mine. It was that people were gathering to share something that was somehow of vital importance to me–their inner lives. Eventually the gathering became co-ed and grew to about forty people (we had a large youth group). My fascination only grew as the group did. The more the merrier, to me! Thus was my interest in psychology sparked. I am never content just to experience things like the communal self-disclosure of those meetings. Anything that so engages me I have to study. So the human mind became something to explore. By coincidence I was already signed up for a high school psychology class the next year, which was also fascinating, and I decided to major in it in college. That changed to Christian education the next year, however, though I kept psychology as a minor. There were a couple of reasons for the switch. One was that I could see myself in a church setting more readily than in a counselor’s office. The other was that I didn’t entirely trust psychology. I had been reading Christians who believed that our guide to human nature was supposed to be the Bible and that psychology was intruding on Scripture’s territory. There was something compelling to me about their arguments, and it is an issue I’m still wrestling with. Nevertheless, psychology still has a huge draw for me, and I do see a lot of benefit in it. Several topics in psychology capture my attention. One is psychotherapy, which is basically what drew me to psychology in the first place. Sitting in those youth camp meetings, I felt impelled to help the people who revealed their personal struggles, even though I had no idea how. Helping people is what I had in mind as a psychology major and even when I switched to Christian Education, although it would be a somewhat different format for my helping role. Psychotherapy was also my main point of tension with psychology. Christianity and psychology seemed to have competing ideas about what was wrong with people and how they could be helped. As I said, I’m still exploring this question. Many of the topics that fit under psychotherapy could fit just as well under spirituality or philosophy, so my categorization of some of these essays will be somewhat arbitrary. The psychology of personality has been one of my central tools in understanding human nature and in relating to the people around me. One of my friends got me into the Myers-Briggs personality theory our senior year in high school, and it was a major obsession of mine for the next year. Fortunately, the obsession was temporary. Myers-Briggs is helpful, but it isn’t everything. In any case, I am also intrigued by the Enneagram and am generally willing to try out any personality theory that comes along. The thing I like about these personality theories is that they represent systems of values and strategies for dealing with life. As you will no doubt discover if you keep reading this site, I am enthralled by systems, values, and strategies. Other facets of individual differences also interest me, like birth order and gender. The psychology of education grabbed me in the middle of my sophomore year in college when I got fed up with the anxiety of exams and decided to analyze what made school so stressful. That began a process of discovering how I learned and worked and what practices made a teacher helpful or unhelpful. But my interest in education is broader than a concern for my own stress levels. Personal growth is what engages me, both my own and other people’s. It’s an occupation that penetrates to the bedrock of my life and sends out tendrils to every part of it. One means of growth is education–growth by knowledge and interaction, two of my other pervasive concerns. I suppose this means I’m destined to become a teacher. Then there are a few other topics that wander through my mind. One is cognitive psychology, which has a natural tie-in to epistemology. Another is interpersonal psychology, which includes things like friendship and conversation (and personality, but I separate that one out). And then there’s linguistics, which isn’t psychology but is a social science, and I don’t have a better place to put it. I have a passing interest in other areas of social science as well, like anthropology. But even though psychology is one of my major interests, as with philosophy, I don’t know that much about it yet. 75509e99bfe078fdd6810988e4c3da77f43f7127 0 36 72 2005-03-20T00:00:00Z Andy Culbertson 1 Imported from WordPress. wikitext text/x-wiki Version 1.0, 3-20-05 There are many kinds of spirituality floating around out there–New Age spirituality, Buddhist spirituality, Hindu, Wiccan. You can even mix and match. Since I am a Christian (and a conservative one), the Christian variety is the kind that I pursue, so that is what you will find here. But even ''Christian'' spirituality comes in a wide array, and this fact is what has launched me on my current voyage. When I was young, I didn’t think about spirituality as a thing in itself. I just went about my business of going to church and listening to Christian radio and evangelizing my friends, and my spiritual life went rather well, at least by my standards then. But over time things fell apart. In high school my evangelistic activities took me into apologetics, which was so absorbing that I forgot all about basic things like praying and reading the Bible and, to some degree, even evangelism. Spiritually I dried up. I suppose my spiritual life was dependent on all the evangelism I was doing. Once that dropped off, prayer got boring, and the Bible no longer seemed relevant. I still cared about God; my relationship with him had just lost its earlier vitality. The groundwork for my spiritual reawakening was laid at [[Psychology Introduction|youth camp]] the summer after my junior year in high school, but my renewal really began halfway through my senior year. By a sort of accident I began corresponding with one of my friends at school, and she and I were able to encourage each other in some areas of insecurity. After two or three weeks of this, she wrote in one of her letters that she thought this accidental correspondence was “meant to be.” The idea intrigued me, so I started looking for other things that might have been “meant to be.” And I found them. This started me on an amazing, spiritual roller coaster ride. God became the Great, Good Conspirator controlling my circumstances behind the scenes to build me up and give me opportunities to minister to those around me. My relationship with God became more conversational. My prayers were now a matter of listening as well as talking. That is, I paid attention to what God might be saying through my thoughts and circumstances. I even began to read the Bible much more regularly and with an enthusiasm that had always been lacking, though my interpretation of the Bible was very subjective. Then began the Crisis. In the fall I went off to Wheaton, where I continued the same pattern of interaction with God. This was also the time I was introduced to Reformed theology. I had read a little about Calvinism two years earlier on the Internet, but that semester I had ''Theology of Culture'' with R. Scott Clark. He showed us not only the doctrine of election but also bits and pieces of the rest of Reformed theology. I never knew you could fall in love with a theological system, but I did. That class sent my thinking in a whole new direction; and like many converts to Calvinism, I felt like my theology had suddenly matured. That summer I read a lot of Reformed theology on the Internet. While doing a web search for Scott Clark, I found a group called the [http://www.alliancenet.org/ Alliance of Confessing Evangelicals]. He had written an article in their journal, ''Modern Reformation''. They were Reformed, of course, so I listened to them. Their main focus was not on theological instruction, however, but on cultural commentary, specifically commentary on the state of the evangelical church. It turned out there was not much about the contemporary evangelical movement that they liked. Contemporary worship music, listening prayer, “felt needs” evangelism, in fact anything that smacked of subjectivity was suspect. Christian spirituality, they said, was about the objective, historical, physical, earthy reality of Christ’s atoning work on the Cross, communicated through words, water, bread, and wine. And since at that point I implicitly trusted Reformed theologians, I adopted their critique. I can’t say their denunciation of subjectivity came as a complete shock. I had been questioning it myself. In my conversational relationship with God, I tried to be very sensitive to the Holy Spirit and listened very carefully to every little thought I had that sounded like a promise or a command. And I tried to have conversations with God during my quiet times. But I was never sure if the thoughts I heard were God or my mind’s own random productions; and in my conversations with God, my side of the conversation was a lot louder and clearer than God’s. After about a year and a half of trying to listen to God, I gave up and decided that if God was speaking to me, I couldn’t hear him very well. So when I came back to Wheaton, I had much to complain about, and I didn’t mind sharing. But still I was frustrated and confused. I couldn’t support any of the restrictive claims and criticisms I was making. I could only cite my Reformed teachers, and their arguments were curiously lacking in Scriptural argumentation. Essentially my new beliefs were just as subjective as my old ones, based only on the authority of the modern Reformers and the new values I had picked up from them. This threw me into an agonized confusion. I didn’t know how to be a Christian anymore, and I was no longer sure anyone else around me knew either. My confusion itself astonished me. I never expected to find so much diversity of opinion within Christianity. I was used to having my beliefs unsettled by atheists. But here were two ''Christian'' groups with diametrically opposed ideas about how believers should be carrying out their spiritual lives and ministry. Who was I supposed to believe? I wasn’t just going to leave it at that. No one I talked to had answers that satisfied me, so I concluded I had to find them myself. During Christmas break, I decided to put all of these issues together and figure out this question of Christian growth and experience. So I set to work cataloging my questions and recording my reflections in a notebook. It was sort of an extension of my journal and a precursor to my thoughts pages. Over the next many months I worked very hard at defining the differences between the “objectivists” and the “subjectivists,” as I called them. I also tried to define my own reactions to the issues, to lay out the possible answers, and to reason out what the Bible had to say about these things. Now at last I was getting somewhere! By the end of that summer, my confusion had begun to settle. While I hadn’t answered my questions completely, I had developed opinions I could live with, at least for the time being. I concluded that my Reformed friends had in many ways been too hard on evangelicalism. In some cases I thought they were too restrictive. In others I thought they were out of touch with the movement, at least its best sides. And in the case of my central struggle, listening prayer, I began to have doubts about my doubts. My argument against listening prayer was that since the source of inner voices was so uncertain, God wouldn’t use thoughts to convey information. Upon reflection, this struck me as a fairly shabby argument. And besides, some people simply had convincing experiences of hearing God speak to them through their thoughts! I was open to the possibility, then, that these other people’s experiences were valid and I was just too immature to discern God’s voice clearly. Since then my thoughts have been percolating, and my spirit of independent inquiry has been growing. My questions have changed, too. Since I had some provisional answers to the dilemmas from my crisis, my thoughts shifted to the general question of how one grows spiritually. I spent quite a long time at first fretting over the fact that I was not a very spiritual person. But over time I came to several decisions. First, since I didn’t even know how to become a spiritual person, worrying about it all the time was a waste of energy. I wasn’t about to give up on the idea of being a devoted Christian, but I figured (and hoped) that God was at least as patient with me as I could be with myself. Second, I wasn’t going to obligate myself to anyone and everyone’s ideas about what was spiritual, though I did listen more carefully to certain people. Third, it would be better to be somewhat systematic and purposeful in my investigations than to make desperate, haphazard guesses. Some of my more productive thoughts have revolved around certain other concepts that Wheaton introduced me to during my prior years of confusion. The main thrust of these ideas is that the church has a wealth of wisdom about the spiritual life hidden in the works of its ancient devotional writers. These were people who carefully observed the behavior of the soul and who seriously trained themselves to be godly by means of spiritual disciplines in a way that is rarely seen today. These writers aren’t the Bible, of course. Strictly speaking, they are only interpreters. But as people who have been shaped by Scripture’s values, they speak with some authority, both about Scripture and about human spiritual experience in matters that Scripture doesn’t directly address. They deserve careful consideration. So do many modern teachers, of course. I don’t think that wisdom passed from the earth with the eighteenth or nineteenth century. My penultimate goal is to develop a system for spirituality, as far as I’m able, and my ultimate goal is to live it. I don’t mean I want to “put God in a box.” I’m aware of that danger, and I believe it can be avoided. I hope so anyway. I thrive on systems. I also don’t think I have to have the whole system worked out before I begin to put it into practice. That would be disastrous because in a sense the system is never finished. The best course is to develop both theory and practice at the same time. But the point is that the theory serves the practice and not the other way around. 2e346a04005f05b1d4f08dd63049b8b4dc7b67fa 0 37 74 2005-03-20T00:00:00Z Andy Culbertson 1 Imported from WordPress. wikitext text/x-wiki Version 1.0, 3-20-05 Theology has gone on mostly in the background of my life. It’s not endlessly fascinating to me like other topics, but I still consider it important. I first noticed theology in high school when I read some discussions about Calvinism on an apologetics mailing list. I had grown up in a tacitly Arminian, Southern Baptist church, and Calvinism seemed rather repugnant to me. Still, when I read certain parts of the Bible, they did sound suspiciously Calvinist. So I got myself to the point of at least not ''minding'' Calvinist doctrines and then sat myself squarely on the fence. My first semester at college, in the midst of various discussions with my friends, I drifted off the fence and down onto the Reformed side of the lawn. By a happy coincidence, my professor for Theology of Culture happened to be ''very'' Reformed, and through his lectures I was introduced to the wonder of Reformed theology. Reformed theology inspired me. Its God was ''huge''. He was sovereign without limit, able to bring about all his purposes, utterly worthy of worship. Someone once observed that people who come into Reformed theology from other realms often describe their experience in terms of a second conversion. That’s certainly the way it was for me. The summer after that school year I didn’t find a job, so most of that free time was spent reading. There’s a cornucopia of Reformed theology on the web, and I just devoured it. One of my key sources was the [http://www.alliancenet.org/ Alliance of Confessing Evangelicals]. They were very helpful because they contrasted Reformed teachings with the kinds of ideas I had grown up with (and contrast is one helpful way to achieve clarity!). At my friend’s Presbyterian church there was a saying: “There’s no one more obnoxious than a newly converted Calvinist.” All through that next year I could have been a poster child for the Obnoxious Baby Calvinists’ Guild. I criticized Arminianism right and left. But I can never stay committed to any point of view for too long; I just think too much. So over time I mellowed out, partly because I came to believe that Calvinism wasn’t quite so earth-shatteringly important and partly because I was entering a more questioning period in general. Everything was up for review. Not all at once, however, so the opinions that had to wait in line, such as Calvinism, only got very quiet. That, in fact, is the situation I am in now. I still have my beliefs, but I also believe that true knowledge, especially theological knowledge, is pretty hard to come by. A lot of people are very confident that they have it, but confidence alone isn’t a very good argument. Yet despite the difficulty, I still hold on to the thought that the truth is findable and that it is important. So I will keep searching. d16555612c665f44818ef768b7b6e08f5cd0599a 0 38 76 2005-03-20T00:00:00Z Andy Culbertson 1 Imported from WordPress. wikitext text/x-wiki This is an index page from an old version of this site. [[Weird Stuff Introduction]] [http://del.icio.us/thinkulum/weird Weird Stuff links] === Paranormal phenomena === === Alternative science and spirituality === === Conspiracy theories === === Hoaxes, urban legends, and strange human behavior === 30917004f816e6b88db914f88a546d641e3ada8e 0 39 78 2005-03-20T00:00:00Z Andy Culbertson 1 Imported from WordPress. wikitext text/x-wiki Version 1.0, 3-20-05 I ''would'' spend all my time in the normal world of everyday experience, but it’s too boring. Sometimes I need a bit of strangeness injected into my life. Hence, this section. “Weird Stuff.” If anyone can think of a better name for it, please let me know. I’ve never had a paranormal experience, and I hope to keep it that way. I just like reading and hearing about it. Books and the Internet help with the first of those, and the radio helps with the second. As a child I would often end up in the paranormal section of the library, inspecting the picture of the Brown Lady or walking out happily with the Loch Ness Monster tucked under my arm. In my early teen years I listened to Bob Larson, a controversial Christian radio talk show host who dealt with these kinds of weird things. Occasionally he even talked to demons on the air when someone called in who was possessed, if you can believe that. I got my first doses of conspiracy mania from Marlin Maddoux on his radio show ''Point of View''. In high school I dropped everything for apologetics, but in college a friend brought me back by periodically alerting me to current events in paranormalia, such as the Hale-Bopp controversy. Then I discovered Art Bell while driving home after my late night job one summer. Art Bell hosted (and still does on the weekends) the popular paranormal radio talk show ''Coast to Coast AM''. This was also the summer I discovered ''Politics and Religion'', a talk show about the end times and associated conspiracies. Since then I’ve wandered through all kinds of weird territory, mostly on the web, picking up bizarrities here and there. I also took a class at Wheaton called ''Psychology and Contemporary Mysticism'', which dealt with a lot of these topics from a scientific and Christian perspective. Needless to say, I was fascinated. It was one of my favorite classes ever, and it has greatly influenced my thinking on the subject. I explore these strange stories and ideas partly for entertainment, partly to exercise my critical thinking skills, and partly to ponder the implications, if any of it is true. These purposes take different forms depending on the topic. === Paranormal phenomena === My views on the paranormal are somewhat complicated. I’m alternately skeptical and credulous. I do think that weird things go on in the world; I’m unwilling to discount ''everything'' I hear. But I am trying to learn to be more careful in my reasoning. My general rule of thumb is that paranormal believers conclude too much from the evidence, and skeptics don’t take enough of the evidence into account. This subject is also a theological obstacle course. The aspects of paranormality that I do accept I struggle to fit into my Christian world view. I don’t completely buy the explanation that all unusual experiences are demonic. But in any case, I compare the paranormal to science fiction or fantasy. Even if it’s not real, sometimes it’s fun to consider the possibilities. === Alternative science === Any realm of science you can think of has a fringe element. The nice name for this is “alternative science.” A couple of different things go on in this arena. One is the formation of alternate theories to explain established scientific data, like the “reciprocal system of theory,” an explanation of subatomic physics. Another is the investigation of anomalous phenomena or technologies, like antigravity and free energy machines. The nice thing about alternative science is that it purports to be science. Thus, you can subject it to scientific evaluation. On the other hand, I don’t know how much of this scientific evaluation actually goes on, since most scientists seem to think they have better things to do than addressing fringe claims. Whether the alternative researchers are right or wrong, this seems like a fruitful field of study for understanding the nature and culture of science. Alternative science also tends to be very hopeful. The knowledge and technologies many of these researchers are pursuing would have a profound and positive impact on human society. If they’re on the right track, I say more power to them. === Conspiracy theories === The conspiracy theories I’m especially interested in are the global kind. I don’t really care how the CIA is involved with drugs or who shot Kennedy. The future world dictators are the ones that pique my interest (more of my fascination with the fundamental). These theories usually involve organizations like the UN and the Trilateral Commission and groups like the international bankers. I’m ambivalent toward conspiracy theories. I tend to discount them out of hand, but I’m not sure whether I like them even as entertainment. It’s intriguing to think about the idea of secret decisions being made by high-powered men to alter world events. But conspiracy theories are pretty nasty things, when you think about it. These aren’t fictional characters the theorists are accusing; they’re real people. If the theory isn’t true, it’s tantamount to slander. When the conspiracy ''is'' fictional, however, I love it. ''The X-Files'' is one of my favorite shows, and I liked ''Nowhere Man'', too, the few episodes I saw. I should probably read some Robert Ludlum novels. === Hoaxes and urban legends === Hoaxes are an especially good critical thinking builder because they represent falsehoods that have already been discredited. There’s a lot to be learned from both hoaxers and the people who discredit them, as well as from the people who get sucked in. The topic of urban legends is pretty straightforward and uncontroversial. But urban legends do tend to be unusual, which is why they get circulated. Whenever I get e-mails about suspicious sounding stories, I always go straight to the Internet and see if it’s been recognized as an urban legend. Usually they’ve been debunked, but a few urban legends are true. Of course, there is a more serious side to all this. Some people are terrorized by their strange experiences, and some are slaves to paranoia. And from a Christian standpoint, spiritual deception in this domain is rampant. But to be honest, while I sympathize with the plight of such people, I think that freeing them is someone else’s ministry. I don’t have the spiritual or psychological fortitude for it. My service is to inform. … (Now watch me eat my words!) 4571d35c1d96ed55aad03242fdf585b408e68c71 0 19 38 2005-05-01T00:00:00Z Andy Culbertson 1 Imported from WordPress. wikitext text/x-wiki Version 1.1, 5-1-05 “Aesthetics” is a strange title. Why don’t I just call it “Entertainment” or “Art”? Well, I would, but “entertainment” is too superficial for what I have in mind, and “art” sounds too highbrow; some of what’s here ''is'' just entertainment. But I am at heart a philosopher rather than an artist or entertainer or even a consumer, so I’ve called it something philosophical, “Aesthetics.” I do like immersing myself in the experience of fun, beautiful, or profound things, but I am equally (or more) interested in the ideas they represent and in what ''makes'' them fun, beautiful, or profound. You’ll notice I also have an aesthetics section on the philosophy page. I’ll try to put my more theoretical discussions of aesthetics there. I guess you could call the subject of this page “applied aesthetics.” My general aesthetic theory is that people have different emotional or intellectual desires in life, and they use art to help fulfill them. This leads them into different realms of artistic taste. For instance, I like to use music to create an environment for me to live in, so I don’t listen to music that takes a lot of concentration to appreciate. I tend to listen to new age or ambient music, sometimes classical. I like art that I can “get” at a glance but which also has deeper layers of structure and meaning that I can uncover over time. Additionally, my favorite genres of just about everything are science fiction and fantasy. This is due to the fact that the real world is boring. Before I get started on the subsections, a note on my links: I link to websites I like, but I don’t necessarily approve of everything on those sites. This is true whenever anybody links to anything on the web, but I just want to say to my more conservative readers that while I try to associate myself with wholesome things, sometimes the things I like about a work are accompanied by other things I could do without (usually it’s language and violence). I try to overlook those and just enjoy the parts I do like. I hope my aesthetic and other values will become evident to you as you read through my site. === Music === I’ve been a musician since I was three. I took violin lessons from three till first grade, piano first through twelfth, French horn in band sixth grade through high school, and church choir the whole time. By the end of high school, my musical activities had proliferated so much that I was tired of music altogether. Except for band. Band, I can honestly say, was the best thing I did in school, and I loved it the whole way through. I still kind of miss the French horn. I’ll probably pick it up again someday. When I went to college, I dropped music entirely for a couple of years, after which I helped out with the music at church until our little church closed. Performing is fun (when I’m not doing too much of it), but what I really want to do is compose. This is what I unconsciously wished I was doing whenever I’d sit down at the piano to practice. And I did compose some, though it wasn’t much and not that good. But what I really wanted my teachers couldn’t give me, which was formal training in composition. I did take a music theory class in high school, but that was about it. Wheaton offers a major in composition, but I had other priorities. You can’t major in everything. So now I plan to teach myself. I want to start with tonal harmony and counterpoint and then get into digital music. And of course, I listen to music, too. I don’t connect with most styles of popular music. As I mentioned earlier, mostly I listen to new age, ambient, and other electronic music, some classical, and a few movie and game soundtracks. I used to listen to a lot of Christian music, but these days I don’t connect well with Contemporary Christian Music. I do like hymns. But in general I’m an instrumental person. Vocal music just doesn’t do much for me, with a few exceptions. This section is called “Music,” but other auditory things will likely appear here as well, like sound effects and instrument samples. === Writing === Writing. Yes, I read as well as write. But “literature,” again, sounds too highbrow. I occasionally read high art literature but not that much. I would use “narrative,” but I’m interested in other kinds of writing as well. So I’ll just call the whole thing writing because really, when I’m analyzing other people’s writing, my goal is to know how to write better myself. I read almost no fiction while I was a teenager, except for the stuff we were forced to read in school. I read a lot of fiction when I was younger, but once I hit my teenage years my analytical mind took over, and I read mainly apologetics. What brought me back was a video game. I never played them growing up, but my senior year of college I was introduced to ''Chrono Trigger'', and I was hooked. ''Chrono Trigger'' was an RPG for the Super Nintendo that came out in 1995. I played it for hours at a time, and instead of feeling brain-dead like I did after playing other video games, I always came out of it feeling exhilarated. As I looked for other games like it, I realized that what I liked most about it was the plot, and of course, I could get that from literature. So I broke my narrative fast and picked up ''The Hobbit'', a book I had tried to read twice before and had dropped in the middle of Mirkwood each time. This time I finished it and moved on to ''The Lord of the Rings''. And my fiction consumption has just snowballed from there. Usually I read science fiction and fantasy. And I mostly listen to audiobooks because it lets me do other things at the same time. Despite all this fiction I’m reading, I haven’t been writing any stories like I did when I was little. I have these huge mental blocks that keep me from getting very far with … well, anything, but especially creative writing. My writing is all of a more expositional nature. This is something I hope to overcome. Narrative really fascinates me, and I have this impulse to create that so rarely gets channeled into anything productive. Poetry rarely does anything for me, usually because I find it hard to understand, but I strongly prefer metrical, rhyming poetry over freeverse. I especially appreciate meter-and-rhyme when it occurs in music, though I am also impressed when someone can set prose to a melody and not sound like they’re rambling musically. === Art === I’m including in this category anything visual, such as architecture. I know even less about visual art than the other areas of aesthetics, and my tastes here are even more limited. I’m pretty much at the level of pop culture. Art museums bore me about as much as the average person. I don’t typically care about any art produced before the twentieth century, and the avant garde types of modern art are nonsensical to me or at least uninteresting. My favorite kinds of art are nature photography, fantasy art, and surrealism. Then I have other miscellaneous visual interests, mostly having to do with computers and publishing, like fonts and tiling images. Sometime I want to explore the ins and outs of computer graphics. === Comics === Comics, along with video games, were one of those things I wished I could get into when I was young but didn’t because they cost too much. I did grow up on comic-related TV shows and movies, however. I watched ''Superfriends'', ''The Incredible Hulk'', ''Spider-Man'', ''Wonder Woman'', ''Batman''. Superman and Wonder Woman were at the top of my list of superheros, though they’ve now been supplanted by Spider-Man. There’s something about comics that’s just ''cool'' (not a word I use often, but here it fits). To some degree it depends on the comic, but partly it’s the medium itself that intrigues me. The first comic book I actually read was volume one of Neil Gaiman’s ''The Sandman''. Kind of a dark one to start out on, but that’s what I picked up. Anyway, that launched me into comic books. But one comic medium I had already discovered was ''webcomics''! What a great way to pass the time. I occasionally have the urge to try drawing my own, but who knows if that will happen. I can’t do ''everything''. I have to keep reminding myself of that (if you don’t know what I mean, take a look around this site!). I also dabble in anime and manga, which I like because they are weird and because they are character-driven. And for the record, ''Calvin and Hobbes'' is the best comic strip in the universe. The best webcomic in the universe is [http://www.gpf-comics.com/ General Protection Fault]. === Games === In a sense, games are the centerpiece of my aesthetic interests, specifically what I call “narrative games.” These are any games that revolve around stories. My primary focus is on computer games, like text adventures and computer RPGs. Narrative games bring together two topics that are deeply fascinating to me: narrative and interaction. Why they are so intriguing to me is a mystery I haven’t yet explored. Of course, most people wouldn’t explore it at all. Those people are normal. As I mentioned in the writing section, the game that got me started was ''Chrono Trigger'', which I played about six years after it came out. I love that game. To a certain degree it has become the model by which I evaluate many of the other games I play, at least the RPGs. Since then I’ve been playing a fairly steady stream of RPGs and adventure games, both commercial and freeware. One of my goals in life is to write at least one or two of these games. I want to write at least one text adventure and one graphical adventure. There are other kinds of games I want to create, too–games that are mindless but rewarding. I mean, really. I play games to relax, not to challenge myself. Most games take too much thought or skill. === Mass media === I don’t watch much TV or many movies, but I listen to the radio a lot. I used to alternate between talk and music in phases, but now my musical tastes have drifted away from the kinds of things that get played on the radio, so I listen to talk radio almost exclusively. And even though I pay very little attention to mass culture, in this category goes one of the few things I can genuinely say I’m a fan of, and that’s ''Star Trek''. ''The X-Files'' comes in second. ''Star Wars'' is growing on me, along with one or two others. === Humor === Humor is necessary for my survival. I am addicted to it. And to go along with my philosopher tendencies, I also analyze it. Everything else in this section will be a surprise. a0e99f40036f69a63e4a6995479ff66e20234ff9 0 21 42 2005-05-01T00:00:00Z Andy Culbertson 1 Imported from WordPress. wikitext text/x-wiki Version 1.1, 5-1-05 Welcome to my web journal and site updates page. And now, a history lesson. Many eons ago I ran across an online diary on somebody’s Geocities site. I didn’t think much of it and didn’t even bookmark it (which is strange for me), but I filed it away in my memory and moved on. A couple of years later a random person read my website and recommended Xanga to me. I registered and then completely forgot about it for a long time. I didn’t actually pay attention to things like online diaries and weblogs until a few days after September 11th, when I Googled my way into a message board for online diarists. In one thread they had been discussing the attacks while they were happening. The transparency and emotional energy of their posts gripped me. But still I moved on. A few months later I was looking up ''Choose Your Own Adventure'' books on Google and wandered into an entry from a diary called [http://urbanality.diaryland.com/ urbanality]. This time it stuck. The entry was so inviting that I had to read the whole thing. I read all the archives, and I discovered once again something I often forget, that people can be utterly fascinating–as individuals, not just as abstractions. Online diarying looked so fun that I had to try it myself. So I signed up with [http://www.diaryland.com/ Diaryland], urbanality’s host, and typed away. I called it ''Taran, Assistant Pig-Keeper'' because I had just read the ''Prydain Chronicles'' by Lloyd Alexander. Then my friend at work [http://www.xanga.com/home.aspx?user=thisismyfathersworld April] started a weblog at Xanga. This brought my attention to the large number of Wheaton students who had Xanga blogs. An online community of which I could be a part! So I revived my neglected Xanga account. I like the blog format better than the diary format because the entries in a blog are more accessible, but I don’t like the way most people keep their archives. Blogs are typically arranged in reverse chronological order so that the most recent entry is at the top. This makes sense if you’re a visitor checking for the latest happenings. It does not make sense if you’re a visitor reading through the whole series of them from the beginning. You have to read backwards. Therefore, ''my'' archives will be arranged in chronological order! You may feel perfectly free to start at the top of the page like a normal reader of English. As I stated at the beginning of this intro, this blog is a combination web journal and site updates page. That keeps things simple, and simplicity is something this site can always use more of! I may keep my other blogs going for now, and if so, I’ll keep everything unified by posting links to those entries in the ''Thinkulum'' blog. Also, you should notice in my blog’s navigation links that I have a page for links to other people’s sites. There you will find some terrific people I know online and off who have websites. When you want to read about somebody’s life but get tired of mine, you can visit ''them''. :) Enjoy! 20a85cd79614a7ec42b9551d90602af34e933658 0 25 50 2005-05-01T00:00:00Z Andy Culbertson 1 Imported from WordPress. wikitext text/x-wiki Version 1.1, 5-1-05 I grew up on computers. My dad is an electrical engineer, so we’ve had at least one computer in the house since I was little. The first family computer we had was an Osborne 1. Yes, I know, you’ve never heard of it. To me it was the best thing since sliced bread, which I had only discovered a few years earlier. My dad taught me how to program in BASIC, and for a while that was my major pastime. My brother Michael is the one who really picked it up, however. He is one of my chief sources of computer information, so his name will probably make frequent appearances in this section. I dropped programming in junior high for other things, and I regret it in some ways. The tech world is very interesting to me, and I have some friends in that sphere, but the learning curve for being conversant in computer science is pretty steep and I haven’t kept up with it, so I’m sort of at a disadvantage. But oh well, you can’t do everything. I keep up with programming and computer technology in my own small way, and it’s usually enough for me. After not having programmed for about ten years, I started learning Perl at my brother’s recommendation. It is not an easy language to learn because it can be very cryptic. But I rediscovered what I love about programming. It boils down to two things: puzzles and power. Power because when you know how to program, you can get the computer to do what ''you'' want it to do. You’re not limited to what other people’s programs will allow you to do. And puzzles because programming is a process of problem solving, and it can be surprisingly engrossing. I can sit there for hours, totally absorbed in working out the right code to achieve my goal. But I do have limits. I don’t naturally think like a computer, and contorting my mind into those patterns is taxing. So as with everything else but more so in this case, my attention to the subject comes and goes in phases. There are many other things about the world of computers that interest me, from artificial intelligence to the open source movement to the OS wars. I am fascinated, too, by the philosophical and methodological insights that can be drawn from computer science and applied to other areas. As for hardware, I bought a laptop in 1996, my freshman year of college. It was a Toshiba Satellite 205CDS, a P100 that had about 780M of hard drive space, an 11.5″ screen, and 24M of RAM. This was fine for a few years, but it took a noticeable dive in performance as the software I was trying to run began to surpass it. I also had to clear off hard drive space all the time to have room for my puttering. Eventually I’d had enough and started saving for a new laptop, this time one that would hopefully stay ahead of the software for a while longer. It took me two years to save for it, but finally I got a Sager 5690 at 3.2GHz with a 60GB hard drive, a gigabyte of RAM, and a 15″ screen. That’s a bit better than my old computer. In fact, so much better that it’s way more than I need, so I named it after my favorite overpowered starship Petey, the [http://www.schlockmercenary.com/d/20010325.html Tausennigan] [http://www.schlockmercenary.com/d/20010513.html Thunderhead] [http://www.schlockmercenary.com/d/20010518.html Superfortress] from the webcomic [http://www.schlockmercenary.com/ Schlock Mercenary]! I partitioned the hard drive down the middle so I could dual boot with Windows XP and Linux. So that is what I am currently operating off of, just to give you a frame of reference. Now, about this math, science, and technology section. I’m following the pattern I started when I stuffed the rest of the social sciences into a corner of the psychology page. Basically these are side interests of mine that I needed a place to put, and the computer page seemed the most natural place. My dad is an electrical engineer. I would never be an electrical engineer. But his interest in things technical extends into related fields like physics, math, and astronomy, and that is one thing I did pick up from him. In fact, in junior high I thought I might want to be a scientist when I grew up. Then one year I worked in a lab for a science fair project, and I was cured. But my interest remains. What I like about science is that it amazes me, and I like to be amazed. The natural world is a strange and incredible place. Mainly I’m into the astronomical-physical end of the science spectrum, since that’s what up with I grew. And when you apply science to practical problems, you get technology. I like to be impressed by people’s engineering creativity and the power we can wield over the physical world. That’s one of the main reasons I like Star Trek. As Arthur C. Clarke pointed out, technology is like magic. So every once in a while I’ll point you to some new bit of technological wizardry I’ve been gaping at. Math I flirt with occasionally, and I do mean occasionally. It was always my weakest subject in school, but it still intrigues me in some ways. It’s good training for logical thinking, and the philosophy of mathematics asks some interesting questions. So I’ll dip into math here every once in a while too. a262f7d7d9bf2299466e8c1ade921b2c9352d0d4 0 40 80 2005-07-17T00:00:00Z Andy Culbertson 1 Imported from WordPress. wikitext text/x-wiki Version 1.0, 7-17-05 Here are some of my current theological positions. This outline comes from a book by Gregory Boyd and Paul Eddy called ''Across the Spectrum: Understanding Issues in Evangelical Theology'' and the online appendix to it ([http://www.gregboyd.org/ www.gregboyd.org]; see the “Books and Essays” section). I’ve rearranged the issues to follow the traditional categories of systematic theology. My purpose in writing this is to give theologically-minded people a quick overview of my distinctive beliefs. Thus I’m assuming you already know what most of these terms mean or where to find out, and I’m not covering the standard details that all Christians or all evangelicals believe. Even though I consider this my theology, most of these positions don’t have the status of a full belief. They’re more like unsettled opinions. I arrived at them either by upbringing or by a minimal to moderate amount of investigation or simply by subjective preference. They will all be up for review at some time in the future. Broadly speaking, I classify myself as an evangelical Protestant. More specifically, I’m a Reformed Baptist. That label ties together a number of views that are scattered throughout this list. === Prolegomena === ==== Theological method ==== # Deriving propositional truth from scripture (the traditional model) # Understanding the Bible’s story through the lens of modern-day culture (the postfoundationalist model) The traditional model. ==== Inspiration ==== # Without error of any kind (the inerrantist view) # Infallible in matters of faith and practice (the infallibilist view) Hmm, toughie. I’ve always believed in inerrancy, but now I believe the biblical writers held the same basic cosmology as their Ancient Near East neighbors, which might put me in the infallibilist camp, unless that’s considered accommodation. Whether there are actual errors in the Bible, wellll, I’ll say no, for now … === Theology proper === ==== Models of the Trinity ==== # The Trinity is analogous to the unity and diversity of the human self (the psychological model) # The Trinity is analogous to the unity of three people (the social model) The psychological model, but only because I find it intriguing. ==== Providence ==== # God is sovereign over all things (the Calvinist view) # God limits his control by granting freedom (the Arminian view) The Calvinist view. ==== Foreknowledge ==== # God foreknows all that shall come to pass (the classical view) # God knows all that shall be and all that may be (the open view) The classical view. ==== Genesis ==== # Created in the recent past (the young earth view) # A very old work of art (the day-age view) # Restoring a destroyed creation (the restoration view) # Literary theme over literal chronology (the literary framework view) The literary framework view, but if I had to pick something chronological, it would be the day-age view. ==== Noah’s flood ==== # Global (the traditional view) # Local This is really more of a biblical studies question, but since it’s in the book I’ll answer it anyway. I don’t know. I’ve always believed the global view, but the local view people have the kinds of arguments that convince me nowadays. Does it really matter? I would like to add one here that was not in Boyd and Eddy’s book, but it’s a fairly significant topic and goes along with my Reformed Baptist views: ==== Redemptive history ==== # Israel and the church are separate entities, and so are the Mosaic and new covenants (Dispensationalism). # Israel and the church are the same entity, but the Mosaic and new covenants are separate (New Covenant Theology). # Israel and the church are the same entity, and so are the Mosaic and new covenants (Covenant Theology). New Covenant Theology. It provides a good framework for the Baptist views on baptism and the Sabbath while not forcing us to be ridiculous about Israel and the church. (heh heh) ==== Christian demonization ==== # Christians cannot be possessed by demons # Christians can be possessed by demons I would say cannot, but really I have no idea. Kind of a random topic. === Anthropology === ==== The divine image ==== # The image of God is the soul (the substantival view) # The image of God is our God-given authority (the functional view) # The image of God is our relationality (the relational view) All of the above. Why in the world would you need to limit it to any of those? ==== The human constitution ==== # The twofold self: body and soul (the dichotomist view) # The threefold self: body, soul, and spirit (the trichotomist view) # The unitary self (the monistic view) Dichotomist. === Christology === ==== The Incarnation ==== # The unavoidable paradox of the God-man (the classical view) # Christ relinquished his divine prerogatives (the kenotic view) The classical view. === Soteriology === ==== The atonement ==== # Christ died in our place (the penal substitution view) # Christ destroyed Satan and his works (the Christus Victor view) # Christ displayed God’s wrath against sin (the moral government view) Penal substitution as a basis for Christus Victor, but moral government is an interesting possibility. ==== Salvation ==== # TULIP (the Calvinist view) # God wants all to be saved (the Arminian view) TULIP. ==== Santification ==== # Santification as a declaration by God (the Lutheran view) # Santification as holiness in christ and in personal conduct (the Reformed [Calvinist] view) # Santification as resting-faith in the sufficiency of christ (the Keswick “deeper life” view) # Entire sanctification as perfect love (the Wesleyan view) The differences among these seem very subtle to me, so it’s hard to choose. I suppose I’ll go with the Reformed view for now, since I’m Reformed in general and I don’t see why sanctification shouldn’t require hard work. ==== Baptism in the Holy Spirit ==== # People are baptized with the Spirit when they believe (the classical Protestant view) # The baptism of the Holy Spirit occurs subsequent to salvation (the subsequent Spirit baptism view) Classical Protestant. ==== Speaking in tongues ==== # Speaking in tongues is evidence that a person is filled with the Holy Spirit (the Pentecostal view [the initial evidence doctrine]) # Some people may be given the gift of speaking in tongues and others not (non-Pentecostal view) Non-Pentecostal. ==== Eternal security ==== # Secure in the power of God (the eternal security view) # The need to persist in faith (the conditional security view) Eternal security. ==== The destiny of the unevangelized ==== # No other name (the restrictivist view) # God does all he can do (the universal opportunity view) # Hope beyond the grave (the postmortem evangelism view) # He has not left himself without a witness (the inclusivist view) Restrictivist, but universal opportunity appeals to me. ==== Infant death ==== # Babies who die automatically go to heaven (the age of accountability view) # Baptized babies go to heaven; all others go to hell (the Augustinian view) # It depends on the faith or unbelief of their parents (a medieval and Reformed view) # Elect babies are predestined to salvation; nonelect babies are not (another Reformed [Westminster Confession] view) # Babies mature in the afterlife and then choose (the postmortem evangelism view) I have no idea, unfortunately. === Ecclesiology === ==== Baptism ==== # Baptism and Christian discipleship (the believer’s baptism view) # Covenanting with the community of God (the infant baptism view) Believer’s baptism. ==== The Lord’s Supper ==== # “This is my body” (the spiritual presence view) # “In remembrance of me” (the memorial view) Memorial. ==== The charismatic gifts ==== # The gifts are for today (the continuationist view) # “Tongues shall cease” (the cessationist view) Continuationist. (You were going to guess cessationist, admit it!) But I personally don’t exercise any charismatic gifts, and I don’t really fit in with the charismatic culture, although I find it interesting. ==== Women in ministry ==== # Created equal, with complementary roles (the complementarian view) # The irrelevance of gender for spiritual authority (the egalitarian view) Another toughie. My personality is very democratic, so I lean heavily toward the egalitarian view, but I’m uncomfortable with female head pastors. ==== Submission in marriage ==== # Wives must submit to their husbands (the complementarian view) # Gender-based authority was only cultural (the egalitarian view) As with the previous one, I want to say egalitarian, but I couldn’t prove it. ==== Christians and politics ==== # The church must transform and ultimately control politics (the transformational [Calvinist] model) # Christians should be wary of involving themselves in politics (the oppositional [anabaptist] model) # God works through the secular government and the church for different purposes (the two-kingdoms [Lutheran] model) I actually lean toward the Lutheran model, for no particular reason. === Eschatology === ==== Hell ==== # The unending torment of the wicked (the classical view) # The wicked shall be no more (the annihilationist view) The classical view, but annihilationism would be nice. ==== The book of Revelation ==== # The events spoken of in Revelation were all specifically fulfilled in the first century (the preterist view) # Revelation is a heavily symbolic dramatization of the ongoing battle between God and evil (the idealist view) # Almost all of Revelation records events that will take place at the end of time (the futurist view) # Revelation records the gradual unfolding of God’s plan for history up to the present (the historicist [Reformation] view) Preterist. ==== The millennium ==== # Raptured before the reign (the premillennial view) # Working toward and waiting for a coming reign of peace (the postmillennial view) # The symbolic thousand-year conquest of Satan (the amillennial view) Amillennial. ==== The rapture ==== # Christ will remove the church before the tribulation (the pre-tribulation view) # Christ will return once, after the tribulation (the post-tribulation view) Neither, since I’m amillennial, but if I had to pick one, it would be post-trib. be726f3eadabff9ca5850cd9ea4930146058023c 0 41 82 2006-05-13T00:00:00Z Andy Culbertson 1 Imported from WordPress. wikitext text/x-wiki Version 1.0, 5-13-06 [http://www.thinkulum.net/blog/category/obac/ Blog entries related to this essay] === Introduction === “On being a what??” Yes, an agnostic Christian. And yes, it is an oxymoron. But it will make sense once I explain it, though it might not mean what you think. Take the word ''agnostic''. Agnosticism is the view that we don’t know and perhaps can’t know whether or not God exists. But the word ''agnostic'' can also be used broadly to mean that one has no firm opinion on a topic, and that’s the way I’m using it here. By agnostic Christian, I don’t mean someone who isn’t sure about God but does like Christian morality—in that case I might use the term Christian agnostic. No, an agnostic Christian is a Christian who is simply uncertain about many things. And yes, that’s me. I am a Christian. But I am an ailing one. I am a Christian who doubts. It wasn’t always this way. I grew up in a Christian household and was baptized at seven. In early my teenage years I began to take my faith seriously, and as time went on, my spiritual vitality rose and fell in phases. In the earlier phases I had a sense of mission. I think of those as my golden years, when I was young and excited and, well, naïve. But as I learned more about Christianity and the world and myself, my clarity faded, and my enthusiasm followed. This trend has led to a period of uncertainty about my Christian faith, and this is where I find myself now. For a couple of reasons I tend to keep these things to myself. First, while some Christians are content to let doubters fight their own battles and come to resolution on their own, other Christians tend to become uneasy and to provide anxious and unhelpful responses. Then there are Christians (whom I haven’t spoken with much but have seen in action) who think the answers are simple, go into apologist mode, and offer arguments I’ve already dismissed. With these last two groups it’s easier just to avoid the subject. So I do. The second reason I usually keep things quiet is that my doubts are unclear even to me. They are complex, nebulous, and subtle, and until now, I hadn’t sat down to sort them all out. I didn’t arrive at these doubts through a systematic study of Christianity’s claims, or else they’d be nicely organized already. Instead they’ve arisen gradually and haphazardly over the past eight years or so as I lived my everyday life. But drawing random ideas out of my mind all in a tangle is not an effective way to present a complicated and controversial subject if I want to be understood, and I do want to be understood. Bringing up doubt opens up multiple cans of worms, and I’d rather not do that unprepared and bite off more (worms) than I can chew—which is not very many, believe me! So again, I avoid the subject. Sometimes the state of my faith does come up, however, and I’d like to be able to give a substantive answer without babbling incoherently. And if I want to make any progress in resolving my doubts, I’ll need a clear starting point. So for those two reasons, I’ve finally decided to turn on a flashlight, explore my foggy mind, and try to explain myself. This essay is addressed primarily to Christians, especially to Christians who know me, since they are likely to have an interest in my spiritual life and since I still generally approach these issues from a Christian perspective. I’ll start with a summary of my position, then lay out a three-part framework for understanding the discussion, walk through the details, and finally examine my options for the next phase of my journey. === A summary === As a Christian wrestling with doubt, I’m caught in a state of limbo. Doubt involves a certain tension. On the one hand I want to remain a Christian and to become a better one, for several reasons. First, I find much to value in Christianity. Second, I tend to take its basic tenets for granted. Third, I believe it does have some epistemic merit. Fourth, I worry about leaving it in error. Fifth, I don’t want to hurt the people I care about. And sixth, I’m sometimes very aware that I ''need'' God. On the other hand, various forces have been weakening my convictions and even pushing me in other directions. First, it seems extremely difficult or impossible to know what the correct version of Christianity ''is''. Second, I’ve always found it difficult to understand or engage with the experiential dimensions of Christianity and to progress as a Christian. That by itself isn’t a reason to give up, but it is a discouraging and demotivating factor. Third, even though I think Christianity has some epistemic strengths, some of its fundamental tenets seem hard or impossible to support. Fourth, naturalism often seems to me like a very plausible alternative to Christianity. And finally, since the source of my conservative evangelical Christianity is my upbringing, which is essentially arbitrary, I feel that I ought to investigate other theologies and worldviews out of a sense of intellectual duty. But none of these reasons takes away from my first statement, that I do want to remain a Christian. ''Both'' sides of this tension exist in my mind. Each surfaces at different times and in different ways. I aim to resolve this tension, though the tension is involved even in the attempt to resolve it. That is, I hope that the tension will be resolved on the Christian side, and I will give Christianity every chance I can, but I don’t feel it’s right to give it a free pass. Christianity will have to stand on its own merits. If it can, then hopefully I will have the awareness to perceive it. Even then, however, I’m left with the daunting task of sorting out my theology and spirituality. Although these questions are of vital importance to me, the difficulty of finding what I consider solid answers has reduced my passion for pursuing them to a few smoldering coals. I tried to sort everything out for several years, but after I’d had enough bewilderment I quietly shelved my search for answers and put my spiritual well-being on hold for a while. Right now I just sort of exist, and I pursue other interests, with these other issues rumbling just below the surface. But I hope that this essay will be a first step in resuming the search. === A three-part framework === The issues in this essay are rather complicated. So before I descend into the messy details, I’d like to lay out a conceptual framework so you can understand how all the pieces relate to each other and what their implications are. The framework has three parts: five characteristics of beliefs, three areas of Christian thought, and five epistemic problems that motivate and guide my search for truth, along with my methods for evaluating opposing views. In the rest of the essay I will be combining these factors and looking at how they show up in my life. ==== The nature of belief ==== Before I explain my model of belief, I’ll set out some rough definitions to get us going. A ''belief'', in very basic terms, is an idea that a person accepts as true. Various levels of belief are possible, and these could be described by other terms, but I’ll use belief as a catch-all in this essay. The concepts I want to differentiate more carefully, for the sake of my believing readers, are the varying degrees and types of non-belief, which I will call uncertainty, doubt, skepticism, and unbelief. ''Uncertainty'' is an indecision about whether to believe an idea. ''Doubt'' is a suspicion that an idea might not be true. ''Skepticism'' can be used in three senses: as a general strategy used in evaluating ideas, as a stance one takes toward particular ideas, or as a name for a specific view of the world. As a strategy, skepticism assumes that ideas are probably false until they have been proven true, rather than, among other approaches, assuming that ideas are true until they have been proven false. As a stance, skepticism is a stronger one than doubt. It is a confidence that a particular idea is either probably or definitely not true. And when speaking of it as a viewpoint, I use skepticism more or less as a synonym for naturalism. Here I’ll outline five main characteristics of beliefs according to my understanding. First, a belief is not only an idea a person has that something is true—it’s not merely a thought. It’s <span class="item">an idea that is integrated into the rest of a person’s life. The result is that the idea is connected to the person’s other beliefs and has effects in the person’s thoughts, feelings, and behavior. Let’s say a nefarious person has presented me with a large wicker basket that has a hole in the side. The hole reveals only darkness, so I can’t see what the basket contains, but the villain tells me that inside is a poisonous snake. He seems to be the kind of person who would keep such a dangerous creature on hand, so I believe him. Because of this belief, I interpret the hissing sound and occasional movement of the basket to be the work of the snake. I even imagine what the snake looks like as it slithers around and bobs its head menacingly inside the basket. These are thoughts. Suddenly the villain grabs my arm and tries to force my hand into the hole! In response, I am terrified—an emotion—and I resist—an action. I have an ''expectation'' that if my hand enters the basket, it will be bitten by the snake and I’ll die. And I have these interpretations, expectations, emotions, and physical reactions as a direct result of my belief that there is in fact a poisonous snake in the basket. This relationship between thoughts and the rest of one’s life is also how we can tell that someone is insincere. They say they believe one thing, but then they do things that conflict with that purported belief.</span> Second, <span class="item">beliefs can be simple, complex, or anything in between</span>. An example of a relatively simple one would be the belief that if a door is locked, merely turning the doorknob won’t let me open it. A prime example of a complex belief, and the one most relevant to this essay, would be a worldview—an interpretation of reality and human life as a whole—such as Christianity. The word ''Christianity'' is like a container for a lot of other ideas, each of which must be believed in for someone to say that they believe in Christianity. Third, <span class="item">beliefs are held for many different reasons</span>, some of which are better than others. A person can believe something based on varying degrees of evidence or for non-rational reasons, such as a sense of loyalty to other people who believe the idea. Sometimes an idea can be adopted for pragmatic reasons, such as when one is forced by dire circumstances to trust a stranger, and I suppose this could be called a type of belief. And often beliefs are based on assumptions. Here I’m defining ''assumption'' to mean an idea that is taken for granted without strong evidence to back it up. Sometimes an idea is assumed consciously and on purpose as a strategy for carrying on an investigation to see where the idea leads. But usually people’s assumptions are unconscious. People have many, many beliefs that either can’t be proven or that they simply haven’t taken the time or don’t have the time to prove. Fourth, <span class="item">beliefs can be arrived at in different ways</span>. For example, they can be taught as part of one’s upbringing. They can be formed as the result of an experience. Or they can be adopted after intentional study. Several paths can lead from a purposeful investigation to a conclusion and, if the conclusion is convincing to the investigator, a belief; and these paths correspond to the types of logical arguments. The kind that is most familiar to people is deductive reasoning (all men are mortal; Socrates is a man; therefore Socrates is mortal). But there are other kinds, and one that is especially relevant to this essay is known as abductive reasoning. Abduction is the process of finding the best explanation for a set of facts. In general my approach to searching for truth is abductive. Fifth, <span class="item">beliefs are held with different strengths</span>. At a certain degree of weakness, a belief might be considered an opinion. If a belief is held strongly, it’s usually not easy to change. For example, most people probably believe that the universe is very large. If you randomly stopped a person on the street and told them that the universe is actually quite small and asked them to just believe it, they would probably have a hard time fulfilling your request. They might imagine what the universe would be ''like'' if it were small, or they might ''say'' that they believed it, but deep down they would still believe that the universe is large. People can’t just hop from one belief to another and hold those beliefs strongly. What all this means for this essay is that I need to explain not only what I believe and what I doubt but also what ''kind'' of belief and doubt I have regarding those things. ==== Areas of Christian thought ==== Apologetics, theology, and spirituality are three major areas of Christian thought, and uncertainties can exist in all three. The fundamental issues of Christian belief are in the realm of <span class="item">apologetics</span>. Apologetic questions have to do with the foundational tenets of Christianity and whether Christianity as a whole is true. Does God exist? Is the Bible God’s Word? Is the Incarnation a coherent concept? <span class="item">Theological</span> questions have to do with the details of Christian belief, what the true nature or shape of Christianity is. What is the nature of the atonement? Does God know the future? What is the relationship between the Old and New Covenants? Should women be leaders in the church? <span class="item">Spiritual</span> questions have to do with the spiritual realities that relate to our own time and place—current events in the spiritual realm, you could say—as well as how theological truths should be lived out in general. What is God doing in the world? What is genuine prayer? How is my relationship with God? Do I even have one? I experience uncertainty in all three areas. I’m really using the term ''doubt'' as shorthand for a much broader set of difficulties. <span class="item">My problem isn’t just that I don’t know whether to remain a Christian. It’s that I don’t even know what kind of Christian to be if I stay one, let alone how to be a </span><span class="item_em">good</span> one. I’m in a general state of confusion. These three areas of Christian thought are interrelated and can’t be totally separated from each other. Thus as I explain my situation in each area, I’ll bring in aspects of the others that relate to it. In this essay my main concern is conceptual—what is the state of my faith right now? For some historical background on my relationship to these topics, see the introductions to the [[Christianity Introduction|Christianity]] section and the [[Theology Introduction|theology]], [[Hermeneutics Introduction|hermeneutics]], [[Apologetics Introduction|apologetics]], [[Spirituality Introduction|spirituality]], and [[Evangelism Introduction|evangelism]] subsections of my site (don’t worry, they’re shorter). ==== My epistemic situation ==== What is an epistemic situation? It sounds medical. Actually it’s philosophical. Epistemology is the study of knowledge, and something that is epistemic is something that has to do with knowledge or the process of knowing. In each of these areas—apologetics, theology, and spirituality—I’m asking three basic questions: Are my existing beliefs true? If not, what is? If so, what then? I have five epistemic problems that are motivating these questions and also making it difficult to answer them. The first problem is that <span class="item">my existing beliefs aren’t epistemically secure</span>. That is, they aren’t based on solid methods of establishing knowledge. Instead of secure epistemic foundations, such as a comprehensive network of sound arguments, my existing beliefs are based on my upbringing, my personal preferences, my simple intellectual dabblings, and my unwillingness to give them up just yet. Those might be okay to start with, but for me ultimately they aren’t good enough. My second problem is that <span class="item">I don’t know enough yet to make my beliefs more secure</span>. And there’s a lot to know. People have different ideas about how to establish knowledge, but for now, as I’ve said, I take a best-explanation approach; and to do a really good job of arriving at a best explanation, you have to survey all the possible explanations and determine at least three things about each one: how well it fits the facts it’s supposed to explain, how effectively it explains them (for example, does it extrapolate from the evidence to make predictions that can be tested?), and how internally consistent it is. A major part of determining those things is examining the arguments for each possibility, the rebuttals to those arguments, the arguments against each possibility, and the rebuttals to those. And you have to try to be fair and impartial when evaluating all these arguments. It’s a demanding task. I consider it also to be a part of what it means to be intellectually responsible, whereas making forceful assertions without examining all the available evidence would be intellectually irresponsible. My third problem is that <span class="item">when I encounter arguments from opposing sides, they tend to balance each other out</span>, and I’m no closer to the truth than I was before I heard them. This is where the agnostic part of being an agnostic Christian comes in. The world is complex enough that just about any view will be supported by some of the facts and contradicted by other facts. This is why, in a trial, both the prosecution and the defense are able to make a case. For any two opposing views, the evidence that appears to support the one will be facts that the other has to somehow explain away or incorporate into its system of ideas. When deciding between the two views, you have to look at how clearly the evidence supports the first view, how well the second view takes that evidence into account, how clearly the second view is supported by its evidence, and how well the first view takes that evidence into account. In some cases the truth is fairly obvious and there’s little debate. In areas of knowledge that are more remote or intangible, however, such as history or metaphysics, the evidence for both sides can be equally convincing (or unconvincing). This is the trouble I repeatedly have in the area of religion. The arguments within evangelical Christian theology, apologetics, and spirituality are ''sort of'' convincing, but other theologies and worldviews have good arguments too. So I’m still on a search (though a stalled one) for the best explanation, because the one I have doesn’t entirely stand out. My fourth problem is that <span class="item">I’m </span><span class="item_em">not</span> completely fair and impartial, which is one of the requirements for a search for the best explanation. I don’t want to leave Christianity. In fact, I want to become a ''better'' Christian. This is why I call myself an agnostic Christian and not a Christian agnostic—I’m fundamentally a Christian who has some agnostic tendencies and not an agnostic who just likes Christian morality. Now, from a Christian point of view, not wanting to leave Christianity is a ''good'' thing. Part of the essence of being a Christian is loyalty to God and to fellow believers, and that’s what I feel. It’s a large part of what keeps me a Christian, aside from a fear of judgment and of social pressure. But loyalty to a particular viewpoint isn’t all that good for intellectual inquiry, if your inquiry is about the truthfulness of that viewpoint. This is a conflict I call the <span class="item">loyalty-truth tension</span>. Sometimes the people and ideas you feel loyal to really are trustworthy and true, but sometimes they’re not, no matter how intensely you feel about them. And when they’re not, sometimes that feeling of loyalty can blind you to the truth. That’s why, when truth is your aim, loyalty can get in the way. When you’re loyal to something that really is true, of course, there’s no particular problem, although there could be if your goal is to be absolutely sure you have the truth, since to do that you’d have to examine other possibilities as if they could be true. In a certain sense this tension is a conflict between ''two'' loyalties, a loyalty to a particular conclusion and a loyalty to reason as a method for coming to conclusions. The conflict is that reason might lead you to some other conclusion than the one you want to be loyal to. It could be true that instead of loyalty to the conclusion, the other loyalty should be abandoned—the loyalty to reason—and some other method chosen for seeking truth. For now I trust reason, but this is a question I’ll need to explore. My fifth problem is that, even though I’m not completely impartial and I do want to remain and progress as a Christian, <span class="item">when I look at Christian theology, apologetics, and spirituality from an epistemological point of view, I’m not very satisfied with what I see</span>. This is one reason I’m asking these questions in the first place (are my existing beliefs true?, etc.). If our beliefs were all completely obvious, there would be no need to investigate them. Knowing the truth would be as easy as breathing. But that’s not the world we live in. The real world is something that has to be explained; the truth is something we have to find; and sometimes we turn out to be wrong and have to rethink our position. Various factors give us clues about whether we’re right or wrong about an idea. Here are three major steps for an idea that’s on the road from speculation to knowledge: First, the idea has to have meaning or definition. Otherwise we don’t know what we’re talking about when we try to express it. Second, the idea has to be coherent. That is, it can’t contradict itself. And third, the idea has to be attested by evidence. Now, I don’t necessarily mean the physical kind of evidence they pick up on ''CSI'', just that the idea needs to be supported by sound arguments, of which there are different kinds. I’ll have more on that in the essay’s conclusion. The problem is that when I look at Christianity, significant concepts within it seem to ''lack'' meaning, coherence, or evidence. The rest of this essay is devoted to explaining these observations, so I won’t go into them here. But they are the reason that my loyalty to Christianity and my loyalty to reason are in tension. If Christianity made complete sense to me, then there wouldn’t be a problem and I could get on with my life without worrying about such things. This lack of meaning, coherence, and evidence has a consequence beyond knowing if Christianity is true, which is that even if it is true, I don’t know what to do with it. How do I live as a Christian if I barely know what Christianity means or how it relates to the everyday world? I’ll explain this difficulty in the section on spirituality. To a certain degree I don’t know if these epistemic weaknesses are a problem with Christianity itself or a problem with my understanding of it. I’m like an airplane pilot who’s lost at sea and has encountered a foggy island, but all I can see are the tops of the mountains. Are those mountains connected by dry valleys? Or are they a series of unconnected peaks jutting out of the ocean? If I descend, will I be able to land? Similarly, are the terms of Christianity connected meaningfully to each other and to human life? Are the concepts that seem to be in conflict connected by bits of logic that I can’t see yet? Are the seemingly speculative teachings of Christianity connected to the real world by evidence? The situation is ambiguous until the facts make it clear, and as I’ve said, I don’t have enough of the evidence yet to know the answers to these questions. Anything can seem nonsensical if you know little enough about it. It’s fine to ask questions, but to find out if they can be answered you need data, sometimes lots and lots of it. Maybe I haven’t read the right books or had the right experiences. At the least, I can say there’s a disconnect between Christianity and my sense of reason. Maybe the fault is on Christianity’s end; maybe it’s on mine. To summarize my situation (because even I have trouble keeping this stuff straight), I am struggling to understand Christianity deeply while wrestling with issues of intellectual responsibility in the religious realm. I am an evangelical Christian, and I like being one and want to grow in my faith. But I see that the reasons I have right now for being a Christian aren’t entirely solid, and when I ask myself how reasonable (or livable) Christianity seems to me, the answers are discouraging. So I feel the need to step back and examine, as fairly as I can, the epistemic strengths and weaknesses of both evangelical Christianity and the alternative theologies and worldviews, so that I can come as close as possible to the best explanation for the world and human experience. My feelings of loyalty to evangelical Christianity and my tendency to see all viewpoints as equally plausible could get in the way of this search, although if Christianity is true, my loyalty to reason could get in the way of my loyalty to Christianity. Balancing those possibilities is a challenge. My questions can be boiled down to two: Is there a viewpoint that fits the facts of the world better than evangelical Christianity or than Christianity in general? And how do I go about investigating that question fairly while giving proper weight to the possibility that my current beliefs may be true after all? To summarize my methods, the goal of my search is to answer the following questions: (1) Are my existing beliefs true? (2) If not, what is? (3) If so, what then? The process of answering these questions involves surveying the ideas that are competing with those beliefs and answering at least three other questions about each one: (1) Does the idea have meaning? (2) Is it coherent? And (3) is it supported by the evidence? Examining the evidence relevant to an idea involves further questions: (1) How clearly does the evidence support this idea? (2) How effectively does the idea explain the evidence? (3) How well is the idea able to account for evidence that seems to contradict it? And throughout this process of investigation, four kinds of arguments need to be examined, whenever they’re available, about whatever point you’re investigating at the time: (1) arguments for the position in question, (2) rebuttals to those arguments, (3) arguments against the position, and (4) rebuttals to those arguments. Note that these are methods used in an intentional study and not necessarily in the haphazard reflection I’ve done so far. The rest of this essay is occupied with explaining how I’ve seen these questions show up in my thinking on theology, apologetics, and spirituality. One caveat before I go on. Some of my friends, knowing my preference for intellectual rigor, tend to assume that every opinion I express stems from some exhaustively researched, carefully reasoned study of the topic; and they might be tempted to think that’s what this essay represents. This is completely false. Intellectual rigor is unfortunately much more an ideal than a reality in my life. The purpose of this essay is to collect my hazy ''impressions'' of these issues and to draw out the principles that seem to govern them. The result will hopefully be a starting point for more rigorous study. I’ve worked hard to present these things in a logical and organized format so they will be easier for everyone, including me, to understand. But if you scratch the surface of all this clarity, you’ll find that it’s a thin layer on top of a sea of disordered vagueness. In other words, if you ask me questions about what I’ve written here, I might have to think for a while and get back to you (especially if it’s a request for examples—specific cases seem to flee my mind as soon as I’ve drawn conclusions from them). That’s how the whole process of writing this essay has been. I knew I had issues involving doubt, but to put together anything like a complete picture of the state of my faith, I had to spend a long time stirring the murky waters of my mind, collecting the thoughts that bobbed to the surface, and putting them together in a way that made sense. A lot of the details are still down in the depths. === Theology === ==== The problem—the too-fertile field of possibility ==== Since I’m already a Christian, I’ll start with issues internal to Christianity. These internal issues make up Christian theology—the Christian view of God, humanity, and the universe. There is a large set of important questions about the world that Christians have opinions on. Unfortunately, the set of specific beliefs that all Christians agree on is very small. They disagree on everything from the nature of the atonement and the authority of the church to speaking in tongues and styles of worship music. So which Christian answers are the right ones? What beliefs constitute the “one true theology”? The brief answer is I don’t know. Overall, I’m willing to affirm the core beliefs of Christianity—that God created the world; humanity is sinful; Jesus is the Son of God, died, rose from the dead, and will come again; and that we must have faith in him for salvation. But beyond those few central points of doctrine, I don’t know what to think. There are too many viewpoints within Christianity, and any choice seems arbitrary without more study than I’ve done so far. It’s not that I don’t have opinions. I do have theological [[My Current Theology|default positions]], derived from my upbringing and my own dabblings, and some of them I feel rather strongly about. But I’m very aware that with more study, I might change my mind about them. In the spirit of intellectual fairness, I am even willing to entertain the notion that orthodox Christian theology might misinterpret the Bible on some points and that the heretics might have been right after all, though I don’t think it’s likely. Sometimes I think that if I studied the Bible more extensively, I would arrive at satisfying conclusions, that the answers are ''there'' if you just think carefully enough. But sometimes (more often these days, I’m afraid) I think the answers just can’t be known. As I hear the arguments offered for various positions, the Bible seems ambiguous enough that it is very difficult or impossible to settle on one theological position while being fair to all the biblical evidence. But why would God give us such a long, drawn-out revelation of himself while leaving its meaning so unclear? ==== Theology and apologetics—the nature of the Bible ==== This question leads me to the intersection of theology and apologetics—that is, the relationship between determining what Christianity teaches and determining whether Christianity is true at all. The Bible is supposed to be a primary source of theological truth, but its ambiguity makes me wonder if the Bible is really a coherent document. Interpreters of the Bible disagree widely, but is it really just a problem of interpretation? Did the ''writers'' of the Bible agree? As a conservative Christian, my default answer is yes. Maybe the Bible’s meaning was clear when it was first written but it has been clouded by the distance of time and culture. Maybe God values the effort we put into understanding spiritual truth, and the struggle is more important than the outcome. And maybe the reason is simply a mystery kept hidden within God’s mind. But the persistence of these problems leads me to ponder the no answer too. And when I explore that answer, I see three basic possible explanations. Either the Bible was inspired by God but not in the carefully controlled way that conservative Christians think it was; God exists, but the Bible isn’t his Word; … or there isn’t a God to inspire it in the first place. In either of the last two cases, the Bible is merely a record of human speculation. I won’t leap to any of those conclusions, but I also can’t simply dismiss them. ==== Effects—avoidance and restraint ==== My thoughts on these questions are undecided enough that I tend not to think or talk about theology much. I almost think discussing theology is a waste of time, at least for me at this point in my life. It’s a field of study that is highly dependent on the conclusions from other fields; and until I’ve dealt with its prerequisites, I just can’t take theological discussions very seriously. First we have to establish that the ground of theology (Scripture) is reliable, and then we have to work out a reliable way (hermeneutics) to build a theology from that foundation. And I am very far from having accomplished either of these. I don’t even know if I ought to be a theological foundationalist. So I tend to avoid getting into theological discussions in the first place. When I do interact with people on these issues, my uncertainty causes me to restrain my emotions. I don’t want to press a point if I know I could easily be wrong about it. When people ask me questions about theology, I usually give noncommittal answers, as if I had little knowledge on the topic. In reality, I know enough to answer the question. I just don’t know enough to tell them which answer is the ''right'' one and defend it. And when I affirm my default positions with people who agree with them, I often feel like I’m only humoring them, since at the same time I’m thinking, ''I don’t really know if this is true, but I don’t want to sound like a heretic just yet''. But I’ve been trying to be more open about my uncertainties lately. The same hesitancy goes for living by these beliefs, which is where theology intersects with spirituality. I’m reluctant to pursue actions very enthusiastically when they are based on a belief with so much uncertainty behind it. Another idea might be true instead that requires a different response. In fact, I feel disingenuous when I try to enthusiastically embrace ideas I’m not sure I believe. So I generally don’t, and my spiritual life is correspondingly weak. I’ll have more on that in the spirituality section. If you’re a Christian, especially if you know me personally, you may feel disturbed by all this. That’s understandable. But don’t panic—I haven’t gone off the deep end yet. I’m only asking questions and raising possibilities, not stating conclusions. My concerns are real, but I’m in no hurry to abandon my roots. === Apologetics === Now, just to review, I am an evangelical Christian, and I like being one and want to grow in my faith. But various uncertainties have crept into my mind over the past several years, and in spite of my general contentment with being a Christian, I can’t just ignore them. My desire to remain and progress as a Christian and my wish to be true to my reason form a tension, a conflict in my mind, and I’d like to journey toward resolving it. So I’m trying to explain this tension and its various facets in this essay in order to give myself a starting point and to help me interact with people when the topic of my spiritual life comes up. As I’ve said, the state of my faith has not been very clear to me in recent years, but in the months I’ve spent writing this essay, I’ve been able to gather the following insights into my inner thoughts. ==== Overarching themes—abduction, naturalism, and the varieties of doubt ==== Good theology is important to me, but it isn’t enough. My concerns are more fundamental than merely wanting to define the details of Christianity. For the past few years I have been interested in developing my critical thinking skills and applying them to as much of life as I reasonably could. I’ve wanted to have rational reasons for holding my beliefs and to have ways of critically evaluating ideas to decide whether I should accept them. While it’s impossible to investigate ''everything'' rationally, I don’t want to intentionally exclude areas of life from that program. And that means that religion has to undergo scrutiny too. The upshot has been that, even without undertaking a concentrated study of these issues yet, my confidence in my Christian beliefs has gradually been eroding. In some ways this is nothing unusual. The more I learn, the more complicated the world seems, and the less sure I am of anything. Thus, I’ve been in a general trend of agnosticizing over the past several years. I don’t know the answers to society’s questions, and I’m not sure all of them ''can'' be known. I’m hoping this isn’t a permanent state, but it is the reality I’m facing right now. Since my doubts and questions come up randomly in the course of everyday life, I usually only think about them in disconnected bits and pieces, but there are several broad issues lying behind them—a best-explanation approach to reasoning, naturalism as a competitor to Christianity, and the variety of forms doubt can take. In general, I take an abductive approach to apologetic questions, as I do with most questions. Abduction is the process of finding the best explanation for a set of facts. In the case of a worldview, abductive reasoning would try to find the best explanation for all the facts in the universe, or at least the most important ones, whichever those are. Differing worldviews could thus be thought of as competing explanations for the facts of the universe and human experience. I believe this would correspond most closely to a cumulative case approach in apologetics. Given my analytical personality and science-oriented upbringing, when I consider the available options, I am much more tempted toward skepticism than toward another religion. So although in principle I think I should find out, I rarely wonder if, say, Hinduism is more warranted than Christianity. For me, the main competitor to the Christian explanation of the world is the naturalistic one. I tend to look at life from both of these perspectives in an inner dialog. For a while I wondered if this skeptical inner dialog meant I was maybe a budding atheist, but the thought of how that would hurt the people I cared about was painful to me. If someone falls away from the faith, they aren’t saved, and that can be terrible to contemplate. I couldn’t easily do that to my family and friends. But then I realized that part of the reason for my anguish was that I believed they could be right. ''I'' believed that apostasizing would mean judgment, and it seemed like a tragic choice to make. So why make it, if that’s still what I believed? And it wasn’t only judgment that bothered me. I felt like I would be hurting God if I concluded he didn’t exist. A contradiction, I know, but it brings out the fact that I hadn’t (and still haven’t) drawn that conclusion yet. In any case, I doubted I would be the kind of hardened atheist who sneers at all things Christian. I would more likely be a weak agnostic who was always hoping to find the missing piece of evidence for the Christian religion. From an intellectual standpoint, there isn’t a lot of difference between that and a weak ''Christian'' who’s looking for the missing piece of evidence. Blaise Pascal, the French mathematician and philosopher, argued that if you’re uncertain whether Christianity or atheism is true, it’s a safe bet to settle on Christianity, since if atheism is true, the Christians lose nothing, whereas if Christianity is true, the atheists lose everything. Pascal’s wager has some significant weaknesses, but for a case like mine it’s perfect. If it comes down to a choice between being a weak agnostic and being a weak Christian, I’ll side with Pascal and keep my Christianity for as long as it retains a glimmer of credibility. This is an example of how the loyalty-truth tension gets played out in my mind. Now, my doubts come in various forms. Often I’m essentially playing “what if” with myself. I think, ''What if the skeptics are right about such-and-such? How would they argue for it?'' And the skeptical arguments I come up with make sense to me. Then I wander out of that frame of mind and go back to taking Christian things for granted. Some of my doubts have more to do (for now) with the strength of the arguments we have for certain beliefs than with the beliefs themselves. After I had concluded that I didn’t ''really'' want to become an atheist, I took a brief inventory of what Christian beliefs I tend to take for granted and what things I actively doubt. What I still believe are the basic formal doctrines of Christianity. I take it for granted that the God of the Bible exists; that Jesus is the incarnate Second Person of the Trinity; that he was born of a virgin, died for our sins in some sense, and was raised from the dead; that he is sitting at God’s right hand and will return at some point in the future; that we must trust in him for salvation. That is, not only do I take these doctrines to reflect the true form of Christianity (see the theology section), but I also assume them to be true. I’m more uncertain about everything else. In practical terms the fact that I take these ideas for granted means that they form part of my mental picture of the world. When I think about the way things are, those features are there, however dimly I understand them and their implications. And they form the basis of my limited spirituality, which I’ll talk about in the spirituality section. You could say I’m a ''de facto'' fideist on these central points. I take them almost purely as assumptions, although I don’t believe that I should. Truthfully, that leaves me wide open to doubt in those areas (my theological default positions are even wider open). Once I do examine them critically, there’s every chance that my belief in them will fall apart. For the moment I tend to assume that somehow it all works out in Christianity’s favor, and from a Christian perspective I suppose this kind of weak fideism is okay for now. However, some of my doubts have become more entrenched. Compared to the things I take for granted, these more settled doubts seem limited in scope, but they come in at a fairly fundamental spot. Where my faith primarily falters is at the inspiration of the Bible. Since that’s my main area of doubt, I’ll take some time to explain it in depth. ==== Revelation—the central conflict ==== For me, the two competing explanations for the world are Christianity and naturalism. The Christian explanation of the world comes from God’s self-revelation and the human theology that is based on it. Hence, at least for me, the major battleground between Christianity and naturalism (or indeed any other worldview) is this revelation. Traditionally God’s revelation has been seen as coming in two forms, general revelation, which is God’s use of the natural world to display his existence and attributes, and special revelation, which is God’s communication in the form of written Scripture. Despite my belief in God, general revelation has for a long time seemed faint to me. It seems to me that few features of the universe are uniquely explained by Christian theism. When I’m thinking about the classical theistic arguments, then, I find most of them weak; and I wonder if, going only on the information in the realm of general revelation, deism or naturalism wouldn’t explain the world just as well. At the moment the only theistic argument that really appeals to me is the fine-tuning argument, which argues that conditions in the universe are just right for life to exist, and therefore the universe must have been designed. Special revelation is a much more complex issue than general revelation because the theological ideas it asserts are much more specific, there are many more of them, and they are wrapped up with all the complexities of human history and the process of recording that history in writing. One of the central Christian tenets is that the Bible is God’s Word. In keeping with my current attention to the justification of beliefs, my basic question here is why Christianity should be allowed such strong claims for its Scriptures. The Enlightenment began a concerted effort on the part of scholars to study the Bible as a merely human book like all other books. And the Bible certainly is a human book. If it were merely divine, it might have materialized out of nothing one day. But it was written by human beings. If the Bible is divinely inspired in some sense, then it would obviously be wrong to treat it as merely human. But here’s my question: ''How would we know?'' How can we tell the difference between a divinely inspired book and a merely human book? And how can we tell that the Bible is of the divinely inspired kind? It’s potentially a complicated question because the Bible wasn’t written in one day by one person. It was written by many people over thousands of years. How do we know that ''each book'' of the Bible is inspired? And ''each part'' of each book? At this point, I don’t know, and to take the whole Bible to be inspired ''just because'' a pastor or theologian says so seems like a rather tall order. Once skeptics have excluded God from the writing of the Bible and from history itself, they often feel the need to explain the supernatural elements in the Bible. Sometimes they seem to be grasping at straws, but other times their alternative explanations give me pause. I find myself wondering, for example, if skeptics are right when they claim that the story of the Exodus and of Israel’s special relationship with God was invented to justify the conquest of Canaan. Of course, there are less extreme positions one could take than the view that the Bible is only human or only divine. Christians believe it’s both, but they vary in the way they define the Bible as God’s Word. The strongest form of the claim is probably dictation theory, in which God simply “whispered in the ear” of the biblical writers and they wrote down whatever he told them. The Bible shows obvious signs of the normal human processes of writing a book, as even conservative evangelicals agree. The question is what the relationship is between the human writing and the divine message. If God didn’t hand every word to the writers, then how did they get their information about the invisible spiritual realities they wrote about? I believe some liberal Christians hold that the Bible writers were simply theologians trying their best to interpret the awesome events they had witnessed. The question of the writers’ sources for spiritual knowledge repeatedly enters my mind, and it leads me to wonder if maybe the liberals are right. Maybe the Bible was only indirectly inspired through the events that prompted its writing rather than directly in the process of the writing itself. And along with this more lenient view, I wonder if it isn’t more sensible just to admit errors here and there. I’m not saying definitely. Just maybe. Doesn’t throwing out inspiration have serious consequences for the rest of Christian belief? It does look that way. But does that mean we should hold on to it? I have trouble moving in that direction epistemically. It seems wrong to say, “We need Christianity to be true; therefore the Bible must be true.” We could say other things like, “There’s evidence that the Bible is true; therefore the Bible is probably true,” or even, “We have reason to believe that Christianity is true; therefore the Bible is probably true.” But simply rejecting one position because it’s dangerous to another position won’t work. This is another manifestation of the loyalty-truth tension. In this case we would be taking a logically questionable step in order to preserve the belief that has our devotion. Even though this doubt about inspiration is more persistent than many of my others, I’m not usually thinking all this when I actually read the Bible. I tend to read it as if it’s God’s Word. I assume that the writers at least knew what they were talking about, even if I don’t. So at times I think of the Bible as innocent until proven guilty (of being merely human) and at others guilty until proven innocent. It’s a strange case, I know. ==== Intellectual base covering ==== There are other things to doubt, of course. Skeptics sometimes argue that various Christian doctrines are logically incoherent or that if he exists, God cannot be truly good because of the suffering in the world or because some of his actions in the Bible appear morally objectionable. These issues are important, and since I think Christianity needs to be examined, I intend to deal with them, but they aren’t my primary concern right now. Similarly, it may be that neither Christianity nor naturalism is true but some other religion or secular worldview is. The intellectually responsible course would be to try to investigate all the options. But I can’t do everything, and to be honest it would be more out of a sense of duty than genuine interest. Being fair to the various possibilities while balancing my time is something I’ll have to figure out as I go along. ==== The persisting converse—tenacity and apologetic potential ==== But for now and the foreseeable future, I remain a Christian. These questions don’t mean I’m about to plunge into atheism. Abandoning Christianity still seems very wrong to me; I’m not about to do it glibly. In fact, it would take a long time and a lot of work for me to conclude that Christianity simply cannot be believed, and despite my history with apologetics, I feel like I’ve barely started. This tenacity is part of my approach to managing the loyalty-truth tension. I don’t think of sticking with Christianity as just a safe bet on eternity. To a certain degree loyalty can be a benefit in the search for truth. The thing you’re loyal to might turn out to be true after all, in which case if you drop it at the first sign of trouble, you might miss seeing the key pieces of evidence that would convince you. So since I still take Christianity seriously, dismissing it prematurely is one error I want to avoid. And in any case, I don’t see Christian apologetics as completely devoid of promise. There’s the fine-tuning argument for God’s existence that I mentioned earlier. Jesus’ resurrection is supported by some interesting arguments. Conservative scholars’ arguments for the Bible’s historical reliability usually impress me, and so do the insights of contemporary Christian philosophers of religion. And believers have some striking stories about their experiences of God that I’d like to explore and examine. === Spirituality === In case you’re memory’s getting foggy, I am an evangelical Christian, and I like being one and want to grow in my faith. But various uncertainties have crept into my mind over the past several years, and in spite of my general contentment with being a Christian, I can’t just ignore them. My desire to remain and progress as a Christian and my wish to be true to my reason form a tension, a conflict in my mind, and I’d like to journey toward resolving it. So I’m trying to explain this tension and its various facets in this essay in order to give myself a starting point and to help me interact with people when the topic of my spiritual life comes up. As I’ve said, the state of my faith has not been very clear to me in recent years, but in the months I’ve spent writing this essay, I’ve been able to gather the following insights into my inner thoughts. ==== Evangelical spirituality in a nutshell ==== Now I’ll bring the discussion into the most personal domain of the three, the spiritual. First, a technical description: In the evangelical spirituality I’ve spent the most time with, the goals of spirituality are spiritual growth and the enjoyment of a relationship with God. Spiritual growth has various causes and occurs in the context of this relationship. In general, it happens when the individual comes to a realization about some issue, often through an experience of interaction with God, that leads to a change in attitude or behavior. These realizations and interactions with God can be spontaneous, or they can be brought about when the Christian engages in certain practices that foster spiritual growth, such as prayer, Bible reading, worship, fellowship, and the sacraments. In some way, both God and the believer play a causal role in spiritual growth, though the ultimate cause is God. The results of spiritual growth are that the person increasingly embodies and displays certain positive character traits, such as patience, compassion, boldness, holiness, and closeness to God. Collectively these traits are known as godliness. I believe this pattern describes evangelical spirituality in general, and it might reflect Christian spirituality outside evangelicalism too. In the realm of spirituality, my uncertainties seem to exist in layers. ==== Spirituality itself—the mystery of meaning and the perplexities of practice ==== My problems begin with the fact that, for various reasons, this system of spirituality has never worked very well for me. For one thing, <span class="item">I’ve rarely been able to engage in spiritual practices like prayer and Bible reading in a way that was meaningful to me</span>, and as I see it, meaning is a prerequisite for their effectiveness. Here I’m using the term ''meaning'' somewhat differently than I used it in my framework. There it meant “definition.” Here, by ''meaningful'' I mean that an idea has implications for the other facts of the world or of an individual’s life in ways that are emotionally significant to that person. Without going into my theory on emotions (and making this essay even longer), I’ll say that the Bible is an emotional book; Jesus himself had emotions; and if we are to become like him, we have to learn to see in the world the same meaning that he saw in it. And as far as I can tell, getting to that point typically means having emotionally significant experiences with the ideas we’re meant to find meaningful. For various reasons, I haven’t made it very far down that road yet. The paths I’ve tried didn’t seem to lead anywhere, and now I’m back to the place I started. Part of the problem I have finding meaning is that the world of the Bible seems remote. The Bible was written to people whose circumstances and concerns were very different from mine. It’s difficult for me to feel inspired by their stories. I even have trouble responding emotionally to the Bible’s depictions of God, such as Isaiah’s vision in Isaiah 6. They’re dramatic, but I have trouble wrapping my mind around them. Maybe if I could expect to encounter God in those ways in my own life, I could relate to them better, but to my knowledge such experiences are very rare in the modern world (and, granted, were rare even back then). Meaning also eludes me because the practices I’ve always been told to pursue and the spiritual messages I’ve been told to draw strength from have never quite made sense to me. Sometimes this is because the language people use is barely comprehensible. Christians often speak poetically about God and the Christian life, and I usually find it hard to correlate their imagery with real life actions and experiences. It lacks meaning in the sense of definition. Other times it’s because I have trouble getting the concepts themselves to make sense. That is, they seem to lack coherence. I especially have this problem with prayer (e.g., if God already knows, why pray?) and the idea that we can trust God to take care of us (what about Christians starving in Africa?). A second reason evangelical spirituality hasn’t worked well for me is that <span class="item">some of its directives seem unworkable</span>. That is, they seem generally coherent, but they don’t seem practicable, although since they’re supposed to be put into practice, this could be considered another type of incoherence. If not truly unworkable, they’re at least outside my realm of experience. Here I’m thinking mainly of the idea of a conversational relationship with God, which is actually a fairly fundamental concept in the evangelical scheme of things. Then there’s <span class="item">the sheer difficulty of the highest Christian principles</span>. Christianity entails a very different way of life from the one that comes naturally. It’s really ''hard'' to trust God completely. It takes a lot of courage to be willing to sacrifice everything for someone else’s good. Sometimes I wonder if it’s even possible to be both a devoted Christian and a human being, but some people seem to manage it. A common theme in most of my difficulties is the fact that <span class="item">God is a very unusual person, so unusual that he’s hard to relate to</span>. All the other people I relate to have bodies, which means I can have direct, two-way communication with them. But God is a spirit. He is invisible, inaudible, and intangible, and for the most part we must relate to him indirectly through the Bible and perhaps other people and the natural world. So I find some of the personal relationship language we use misleading. I acknowledge that there may be aspects of spirituality I haven’t experienced, but relating to God is extremely different from interacting with humans. I would venture to say that this by itself makes having a close relationship with God something we have to work hard to learn, assuming that a personal relationship really is the goal. ==== Spirituality and theology—an unfinished puzzle ==== So that’s the first layer, my general spiritual deficiency. A second layer that makes resolving the first one more difficult is my state of theological uncertainty. Even though most theological debates tend to be abstract, they do have practical implications, if only for the ways we worship and pray. And some of these debates relate directly to spirituality, such as the question of miraculous gifts and the nature of sanctification. Then there are more subtle questions that don’t make it into the theological top 100 but still make a difference in the shape of one’s spirituality. A fairly basic question that seems to fit into this category is, what is God like? I don’t seem to understand God very well. Is he interested in the small details of our lives or only in his grand, missional purposes? Is he strict with his children or lenient? In the Bible, he reacts in different ways to different people and circumstances, and I haven’t sorted it all out yet. I don’t understand him well enough to know what he might be thinking, feeling, and doing in response to me and ''my'' circumstances. And it seems to me that if I’m going to respond to ''him'' appropriately, those are pretty important things to know. There’s more to living the Christian life than knowing God’s thoughts and actions, however. Not every reaction we have to God will be appropriate. Sometimes our instinctive reactions are influenced by sinful attitudes and motivations. And even when sinful attitudes and motivations aren’t obviously getting in the way, it can be easy to get confused. There are a lot of pieces in the Christian life to keep track of. You can’t apply the same spiritual principle naïvely across all situations. For example, if you sin against someone, you can confess it to God, receive forgiveness, and experience the relief and joy that brings, but after that you can’t simply walk up to the other person and act as if the past is happily behind you. You have to respect the fact that you’ve wronged them, humbly reconcile yourself to the other person, and restore the relationship. As I see it, the Christian life is like a complex skill that is foreign to us at first and has to be learned through practice. In many ways I’m still at a beginning, uncoordinated stage, and I don’t even have a clear picture of how all the pieces fit together. I’m assuming optimistically that they do fit together and that everyone basically agrees on how, or at least that the truth is discernable. Since I currently avoid trying to answer theological questions, my spirituality doesn’t have much of a theological shape. In the areas of spirituality that I do try to put into practice, I’m working from a few default positions. They work okay for the low level I’m at, but I suspect I’ll feel more internal pressure to answer the theological questions once I pursue my spiritual life more seriously, and then I’ll need to work through issues of theological method, as I mentioned earlier. “Theological method?” you say? “I thought you were being practical in this section.” Well yes, dealing with theory does seem like a step back when I’m trying to put my faith into action. But when the people I go to for guidance disagree with each other, I need some way to decide between their conflicting words of advice. I could flip a coin or rely on my feelings or just pick one, and in fact I might end up doing that on some occasions. But generally I’d like to make a more informed decision, and in theology I’m not sure how to do that yet, if it can be done at all. ==== Spirituality and apologetics—the inspiration of the Bible and the interpretation of experience ==== Then while all that is going on, in float my apologetic doubts—the question of whether Christianity is even true. Since I pretty much take basic Christianity for granted, this isn’t as big a problem as it could be, at the moment, but it is an obstacle. The difficulty comes from two angles. The first is <span class="item">the inspiration of the Bible</span>, which I covered in the apologetics section above. The question often comes to my mind, where did the writers get their information? It’s hard for me to worship God on the basis of what goes on in the spiritual realm or God’s agenda in history when I find myself wondering how the Bible writers could know those things. The second angle is <span class="item">the nature of the spiritual</span>. Since it’s invisible, inaudible, and intangible, I sometimes wonder if it’s even there. Or at least if it’s the way Christians describe it. Christians often describe the inner and outer events of their lives in terms of divine action. I call these events psychological and circumstantial miracles, respectively. The miracles that people usually think of are what I call physical miracles. Physical miracles are the most confirmable, at least in principle, but they are the least common. Most of the time when believers describe God at work, they’re telling the story of a psychological or circumstantial miracle. They tell of a change in their character when they converted, for example, and they attribute it to the work of the Holy Spirit. Or they relate the story of a bad situation in which a remarkable coincidence got them off the hook or gave them an insight into their lives, and they say God was working behind the scenes to make it happen. They even describe the situation in metaphorical terms, as if God were visibly, audibly, tangibly interacting with them. Now, it may be perfectly true that these ''are'' supernatural events and that psychological and circumstantial miracles ''do'' occur all the time. But when I have my skeptic hat on, when I’m in the mode of wanting to make sure what I believe is true, I often wonder if we aren’t just letting our imaginations run away with us. Human beings are interpreters. They compulsively look for patterns and reasons and meanings, and they sometimes find them where they don’t exist. Couldn’t it be that coincidences sometimes just happen, and people then find meaning in them that isn’t there? And how do we know that the psychological changes Christians describe can’t be explained as merely psychological rather than supernatural? This last question is important from two perspectives. From an apologetic perspective, if we can’t distinguish supernatural psychological events from natural ones, then we can’t use them as evidence for the supernatural. And from a spiritual perspective, if we can’t tell the miraculous psychological events from the ordinary ones, then it’s impossible to know if we’ve really had a special experience of God or if we only think we have. I especially wonder if it’s is all in our heads when I think about the fact that believers come up with positive explanations for both good and bad events. God is either blessing them or teaching them a lesson, but he never lets them down. How would we know if he had? It’s as if God’s faithfulness is nonfalsifiable. Predictably, it’s hard to have a spiritual life when you suspect that any spiritual meaning you find in your experiences might be illusory. ==== Effects—inertia, isolation, and laissez-faire evangelism ==== The result of all this is that I haven’t seen much spiritual growth in my life. I’m a decently good person, but you don’t have to be a Christian to be decently good. It seems to me that true spiritual growth should make one shockingly good, and I’m not that. It should at least bring you to a point that you wouldn’t have reached through the normal process of maturing. But when I look at my life, I don’t see much that’s specifically Christian about the ways that I’ve grown. And beyond general moral character, I also don’t see much progress in the ways I relate to God—worshiping, trusting, loving him, and so on. I admit, some of my behavior is motivated by a desire to obey Jesus. And it may be that some of the growth in my life has been supernatural and that God has worked in ways I’m not seeing right now. But in general, my progress in the spiritual life is lacking. These uncertainties and deficiencies also make fellowship with the Christian community difficult. I feel somewhat like an outsider in that way, but not a total outsider, more like someone on the periphery—a tangential Christian, you could say, or a minimalist Christian. People make statements about how God works in our lives or some other spiritual topic, and sometimes I can simply accept what they’re saying, but often I think, ''Well, maybe''. In those cases I can’t really share in their feelings of inspiration or add to them with insights or experiences of my own. In fact, sometimes I have to hold my tongue because I don’t want to ruin the moment with a discussion of my doubts. But it’s not only skepticism that hinders my fellowship. It seems that the standard levels of spiritual understanding or experience that evangelicals tend to expect from each other, I just don’t have, at least not in a way I can affirm with conviction. If I’m expected to give input in a spiritually oriented setting, I usually come up with something marginally acceptable and avoid talking about my real issues. These uncertainties and deficiencies, along with my uncertainties in theology and apologetics, also make it difficult to recommend Christianity to others, simply because I’m not quite sure what I’m offering, why they should believe it, what it’s supposed to do for them, or what they should do once they have it! I’m exaggerating somewhat, but since I don’t have a clear idea of what’s true right now, that’s my gut reaction when I think about evangelism. It’s one thing to believe Jesus is the Son of God for my own, idiosyncratic reasons. But to assert that belief as a fact to someone else is to imply that I can give reasons for believing it that should be adequate for anyone. I’m not to that point yet, so when I try to advocate Christianity to other people I feel at best clueless and tentative and at worst a little guilty. After all, implying that something is plainly true when I know I can barely defend it is tantamount to lying. ==== The persisting converse—vestigial spirituality and Christianity’s merit ==== Despite my confusion and doubt, I do still have my own, limited sense of spirituality. That’s why I described myself as a minimalist Christian. I am sometimes able, in the moment, to forget about my doubts and engage Christianity with the thin film of understanding that I have of its significance for my life. I still talk to God as if he is listening. My prayers are hardly profound; there is little emotion invested in them, and I don’t take extended time out specifically to pray. But I do speak (or rather think) to God briefly at random times because I think of him as being present and available to hear me. I still think of God as arranging my circumstances to foster my growth. I try to stay grateful for what I have and the good things that happen. I still take communion, and I take that time to reflect on Jesus’ death and my life and what might make the Lord’s supper as a ceremony mean something to me (''that'' been a lifelong struggle). I still participate in worship music. I do it rather mindlessly most of the time, and usually I see the lyrics more as nice ideas about God than as specific facts about him that I can wholeheartedly affirm, but sometimes the words mean something to me. Overall I do want to follow Jesus. And when I’m feeling especially in need of protection or comfort or forgiveness, it becomes very important to me for God to exist and to be with me and on my side. In those times, I experience my relationship with God as a need rather than as an obligation or an abstract ideal. Even with all my reservations, I still think that as a philosophy of life, Christianity in some forms has a lot to recommend itself. For instance, it has a very high view of human dignity and actually has a metaphysical reason for it (that humans were created by God in his image), whereas any naturalistic view of human dignity would have to be somwhat artificial and tenuous I think. Along with that, Christian teachings explicitly promote the formation of caring communities. Meanwhile, its Scriptures present a grand, intricate story with a richness of insight and symbolism that has allowed it to form a large part of the Western way of thinking (I can appreciate the depth and breadth of this story even if it doesn’t affect me as much as I’d like). And rather than calling suffering an illusion or telling people to rid themselves of desire, Christianity acknowledges and embraces the full range of human experience. The desires and behaviors it deems sinful, it views as corruptions of more basic aspects of human nature that it then tells us to put to higher uses (even if that’s really hard to do!). Not only does Christianity acknowledge and embrace human experience, but it amplifies and transforms it by relating that experience to a transcendent personal being. So a desire for safety becomes a trust in God’s providence. A need for personal purity and for harmony with others becomes a need for divine grace and reconciliation with God and his family. A desire for significance and purpose in life becomes a devotion to God and involvement in his activities in the world. Any positive event becomes an occasion for praise and thanksgiving to God. A time of suffering becomes an opportunity to identify with the sufferings of Jesus and to receive divine comfort that we can then pass on to others. A fear of death becomes a hope in eternal life—and not a disembodied spiritual existence, but a full-fledged life lived out in immortal bodies and in direct, unhindered fellowship with God. And this hope isn’t based on mere speculation but on an event in history—the resurrection of Jesus himself. It sounds great. Now I just have to figure out what it means, if it’s true, and how it all works out in practice! You could say I’m a seeker, though one who is beginning on the inside of Christianity rather than outside it. Maybe the best witness I can give right now is to the value of Christianity if true, and my best invitation is either to plunge right in or to embark on a journey of discovery. Join mine, if you like. === The way forward === What am I saying by all this, and what am I not saying? Well, if you haven’t caught on by now, I’m ''not'' saying that Christianity isn’t true and these are the reasons why. I’m only describing my current state of mind. I’m not saying these difficulties are insurmountable and I’m ready to deconvert. For all I know, the answers could be right in front of my nose. This essay is just an acknowledgment of work that needs to be done. It’s a midpoint, not an end point. Since I still consider these questions vitally important and there’s still so much I don’t know, there’s really nothing else to do but to pick up the search again. But where will I go from here, and how will I get there? In terms of that question, this essay is also something of a crossroads. I find several forces at work in my mind, pushing me in different directions. My desire to remain a Christian competes with my doubts and my sense of duty to investigate all the options and evaluate them impartially. And my desire to progress in some direction is impeded by a sense of futility and the distraction of other interests. ==== The problem of motivation ==== You would think that with all these vitally important issues unresolved, I would be desperately scouring the library for answers, having nervous breakdowns, and so on. But I’m not, and there are several reasons for this. First, I’m used to these questions. I’ve been looking into issues of apologetics, theology, and spirituality on and off for a long time, so this is all kind of old hat to me. Now, back when I was in college and first discovering that Christians disagree with each other about everything—even basic, important things like how to live as a Christian—I ''was'' in crisis. But eventually I decided that it wasn’t helpful to take everything so seriously and be confused and panicked all the time; that no matter how desperate I felt, I wasn’t going to find the answers I needed overnight; and that I could live some form of the Christian life even before I had all the answers. So I calmed down and settled into the search. And then a while after that, I got tired of repeatedly believing people’s opinions and then realizing I didn’t have proof for them; and with school in the way I didn’t have time to investigate everything seriously, so I put it all on hold until I could give more attention to it and then went on with my life. Second, I’m lacking one of the factors that causes people to go into a panic when they have doubts in the first place. That is the feeling that their Christian faith is their most cherished possession and they couldn’t bear to live without it. I used to have the same feeling, but as I’ve said, my grasp on the meaning of Christianity for my life has weakened considerably. I do think Christianity is deeply meaningful, but mostly in an abstract sense. My task is to discover or rediscover that meaning. I’m ''pursuing'' a sense of Christianity’s value rather than trying to preserve a sense I already have. But if it turned out that Christianity wasn’t true and naturalism was, well, it probably wouldn’t be that much different from my experience of life right now, aside from any social pressure I would then feel to continue espousing Christianity. As I keep saying, however, hopefully that won’t be the case and I will be awakened to more of the reality of God in my life. Finally, since I tend to be equally convinced by the arguments on all sides of an issue—or rather, since I tend to feel that the evidence for any position on a debatable issue is too weak to be conclusive—I have this feeling that the answers can’t be found, which makes me much less eager to try. I think that’s what drove me in my earlier forays into apologetics, theology, and spirituality—the idea that the answers were there to be found. I had been promised buried treasure, so I dug as fast as I could. And I did find a few gold coins and some nickels and dimes, but not the rich trove I was expecting. Some of the gold coins weren’t even real; they were just those chocolate coins with the gold-colored wrappers. Tasty, but not as valuable as they looked at first. So now if I keep digging, it will be because I’m forcing myself, because I know it’s important to see if anything is there, not because I have a good idea of the spectacular things I’ll find. Meanwhile, other things in my life that seem more achievable are attempting to attract my attention. So my mind isn’t roiling with all these doubts and questions. What I do feel is a subtle pressure in the back of my mind to get these issues resolved. I feel like my life can’t truly progress in any fundamental sense until I do, though I expect to be addressing them ''as'' the rest of my life progresses. ==== Paths to knowledge ==== Let’s assume that I can push through my lack of motivation and get somewhere with my questions. How should I proceed? Well, guess what. Not only do people have different ideas about ultimate truth, they even have different ideas about how to find it. It’s one of the basic epistemological questions: What are the sources of knowledge? For the answer to this, the primary options in the history of philosophy have been the senses and reason, as preferred by empiricism and rationalism, respectively. But there are other possible sources of knowledge. One is mystical experience—direct encounters with God or the infinite, whatever the mystic understands that to be. And another source is the pronouncements of an authority, such as the Bible or the church councils. The investigative approach that’s considered the proper one depends somewhat on the worldview you’re aiming for. Naturalism would call for something like empiricism, while certain Eastern philosophies would consider mysticism a more appropriate vehicle for truth. But I suspect that opinions differ within those worldviews. I know they differ within Christianity. Yes, Christians disagree on their basic epistemology along with everything else. Some emphasize the use of evidence because of the fact that Christianity is a historical religion. Others attempt to rely solely on an authoritative source for their spiritual information—the Bible and perhaps the church. And some believe that the spiritual nature of our relationship with God means that our faith should rely on mysticism. Which view is right? Who knows. I’ll figure it out later. For now I can only be what I am, and what I am is an American who grew up in a scientifically minded household and has had two decades of thoroughly Western education. For most kinds of knowledge I trust introspection, analytic philosophy, and the scientific method. I also like to explore new ideas and try to keep an open mind, though I like to come to conclusions eventually. That’s my basic methodological starting point. As I go along I’ll investigate others. But, obviously, one thing I won’t do is to simply take anyone’s word as the absolute truth without discussion. I’ve tried that already. I would like to mention one other path to knowledge that I’m borrowing from Dallas Willard, among others. He says, “[Jesus’] way is self-validating to anyone who will openly and persistently put it into practice.” The idea is that as we practice Jesus’ way of life, “we gain insight into how and why his path works and receive a power far beyond ourselves” (“Foreword,” ''The Spirit of the Disciplines''). C. S. Lewis expands this to a general principle in “Meditation in a Toolshed” (''God in the Dock''). Looking ''along'' a beam of light toward its source gives you a very different experience and body of knowledge than merely looking ''at'' it. Being open to experiences gained through action can lead to new understanding. Now, I can’t say that I’m open to every experience under the sun. But as long as I’m trying to gain a better grasp on Christianity and to find as much truth in it as I can, I might as well include Christian practice among my research methods, especially since Christian practice is one of the puzzles I’m trying to sort out. And even though I won’t just take people’s word for it when they give me their views, I might try out their ideas experimentally. What will I study? For now I plan to concentrate on the topics that are the most uniquely Christian and the most fundamental to investigating worldviews and Christianity in particular. That means I’ll be looking at the issues surrounding the authority of the Bible and probably the church, the life and teachings of Jesus, the resurrection, miracles, some of the theistic and atheistic arguments, religious pluralism, and the nature of religious knowledge. And I’ll explore Christian spiritual formation. Yes, this could all take several lifetimes. I’ll try to reach some conclusions before then! I’ll probably put off theological debates until later, such as the mode of baptism or even Calvinism and Arminianism. There are also some apologetic debates I’ll put off, such as creationism. I see theistic evolution as a legitimate option, though if I ever thought I’d become an atheist, I’d need to study this issue to make sure creationism could be safely buried. ==== Loyalty and truth revisited ==== And how will I reconcile my loyalty to Christianity with my desire to find the truth, whatever it might be? It may be that they are simply incompatible and that I’ll have to alternate between wanting to believe in Christianity and being coldly indifferent to it as I consider the merits of other options. But a search for truth isn’t the kind of task that requires swinging back and forth between absolute acceptance of a possibility and absolute rejection of it. There’s a wait-and-see element. In this respect a sporting event offers a helpful parallel. The fans are cheering for their own team, and throughout the game they are clearly biased toward their victory; but if by the end of the game their team has clearly lost, they’re not going to pretend that they’ve won. In my case I’m not the most energetic fan, but I still want Christianity to win. Even though my faith has been eroded and dispirited, I still think Christianity holds some promise, and I consider it the richest and most noble thing around, so I want to give it the best chance I can. I might not stay an inerrantist. I might not even stay an evangelical, though that would be nice. But I hope my investigations will allow me to remain within Christianity for as long as possible, which of course, in the Christian scheme of things, is forever. 52f5a9824b2ad31b13c511915723c9f8003a8abe 0 42 84 2006-06-06T00:00:00Z Andy Culbertson 1 Imported from WordPress. wikitext text/x-wiki Version 1.0, 6-6-06 === [[On Being an Agnostic Christian#Introduction|Introduction]] === The [[On Being an Agnostic Christian|original version]] of this essay is very long, which I know is a barrier to reading it. So here’s a shorter version. The structure of this essay mostly follows the structure of the longer one, so if you want more explanation on a point I raise here, see the same section in the original. The section headings link to the same sections in the longer version. Also note that there are a few extra sections in the original that I had to cut out. I describe myself as an agnostic Christian because I’m uncertain about many aspects of my faith, yet I still consider myself a Christian. My doubts throw the future of my beliefs into question, but my hope is to stay a Christian and to grow in my faith. I wrote this essay to give myself a clear starting point for future study and for interacting with other people on my spiritual state. === [[On Being an Agnostic Christian#My_epistemic_situation|My epistemic situation]] === Basically, I am struggling to understand Christianity deeply while wrestling with issues of intellectual responsibility in the religious realm. I am an evangelical Christian, and I like being one and want to grow in my faith. But I see that the reasons I have right now for being a Christian aren’t entirely solid, and when I ask myself how reasonable (or livable) Christianity seems to me, the answers are discouraging. So I feel the need to step back and examine, as fairly as I can, the epistemic strengths and weaknesses of both evangelical Christianity and the alternative theologies and worldviews, so that I can come as close as possible to the best explanation for the world and human experience. My feelings of loyalty to evangelical Christianity and my tendency to see all viewpoints as equally plausible could get in the way of this search, although if Christianity is true, my loyalty to reason could get in the way of my loyalty to Christianity. This is a conflict I call the loyalty-truth tension. Balancing those possibilities is a challenge. Theology, apologetics, and spirituality are three major areas of Christian thought, and uncertainties can exist in all three. === [[On Being an Agnostic Christian#Theology|Theology]] === ==== [[On Being an Agnostic Christian#The_problem.E2.80.94the_too-fertile_field_of_possibility|The problem—the too-fertile field of possibility]] ==== Theological questions have to do with the details of Christian belief. Christians disagree with each other about almost every theological question. So which views are the right ones? Overall, I’m willing to affirm the core beliefs of Christianity, but beyond those any choice seems arbitrary without more study than I’ve done so far. I do have theological [[My Current Theology|default positions]], derived from my upbringing and my own dabblings, and some of them I feel rather strongly about. But I’m very aware that with more study, I might change my mind about them. I might even side with the heretics on some issues, though I doubt it. Sometimes I think that if I studied the Bible more extensively, I would arrive at satisfying conclusions, that the answers are ''there'' if you just think carefully enough. But sometimes (more often these days, I’m afraid) I think the answers just can’t be known. ==== [[On Being an Agnostic Christian#Effects.E2.80.94avoidance_and_restraint|Effects—avoidance and restraint]] ==== My thoughts on these questions are undecided enough that I tend not to think or talk about theology much. I almost think discussing theology is a waste of time, at least for me at this point in my life. To make any real headway I’d need to work out my hermeneutic and other issues of theological method. The same hesitancy goes for living by these beliefs, which is where theology intersects with spirituality. I’m reluctant to pursue actions very enthusiastically when they are based on a belief with so much uncertainty behind it. So I generally don’t, and my spiritual life is correspondingly weak. === [[On Being an Agnostic Christian#Apologetics|Apologetics]] === ==== [[On Being an Agnostic Christian#Overarching_themes.E2.80.94abduction.2C_naturalism.2C_and_the_varieties_of_doubt|Overarching themes—abduction, naturalism, and the varieties of doubt]] ==== Apologetic questions have to do with the foundational tenets of Christianity and whether Christianity as a whole is true. For me, the main competitor to the Christian explanation of the world is the naturalistic one. I tend to look at life from both of these perspectives in an inner dialog, though for now I ultimately side with Christianity, if only because it’s a safer bet. Some of my doubts have more to do (for now) with the strength of the arguments we have for certain beliefs than with the beliefs themselves. The beliefs I have in mind are the basic formal doctrines of Christianity. You could say I’m a ''de facto'' fideist on these central points. But I do want to investigate them rationally, so I can only hope that a good case can be made for them. However, some of my doubts have become more entrenched. Where my faith primarily falters is at the inspiration of the Bible, which I’ll explain in more detail below. ==== [[On Being an Agnostic Christian#Revelation.E2.80.94the_central_conflict|Revelation—the central conflict]] ==== One of the central Christian tenets is that the Bible is God’s Word. If the Bible is divinely inspired in some sense, then it would obviously be wrong to treat it as merely human. But how can we tell the difference between a divinely inspired book and a merely human book? And how can we tell that the Bible is of the divinely inspired kind? If we acknowledge that the Bible was inspired, what does that mean? One more liberal option is that the Bible writers were only indirectly inspired. They were simply theologians trying their best to interpret the awesome events they had witnessed, and God’s revelation was in the events rather than in the writing. It’s a possibility I’m considering. Even though this doubt about inspiration is more persistent than many of my others, I’m not usually thinking all this when I actually read the Bible. I tend to read it as if it’s God’s Word. I assume that the writers at least knew what they were talking about, even if I don’t. ==== [[On Being an Agnostic Christian#The_persisting_converse.E2.80.94tenacity_and_apologetic_potential|The persisting converse—tenacity and apologetic potential]] ==== These questions don’t mean I’m about to plunge into atheism. At this early stage in my search, that would be premature. This tenacity is part of my approach to managing the loyalty-truth tension. If the thing you’re loyal to is true after all, then you can miss that fact if you abandon it at the first sign of trouble. And in any case, I don’t see Christian apologetics as completely devoid of promise. The fine-tuning argument for God’s existence still appeals to me. Jesus’ resurrection is supported by some interesting arguments. Conservative scholars’ arguments for the Bible’s historical reliability usually impress me, and so do the insights of contemporary Christian philosophers of religion. And believers have some striking stories about their experiences of God that I’d like to explore and examine. === [[On Being an Agnostic Christian#Spirituality|Spirituality]] === Spiritual questions have to do with the spiritual realities that relate to our own time and place—current events in the spiritual realm, you could say—as well as how theological truths should be lived out in general. In the realm of spirituality, my uncertainties seem to exist in layers. ==== [[On Being an Agnostic Christian#Spirituality_itself.E2.80.94the_mystery_of_meaning_and_the_perplexities_of_practice|Spirituality itself—the mystery of meaning and the perplexities of practice]] ==== My problems begin with the fact that, for various reasons, the evangelical system of spirituality has never worked very well for me. For one thing, I’ve rarely been able to engage in spiritual practices like prayer and Bible reading in a way that was meaningful to me, and as I see it, meaning is a prerequisite for their effectiveness. The world of the Bible seems remote, so I have trouble connecting with it; and many Christian practices and messages have never quite made sense to me. A second reason evangelical spirituality hasn’t worked well for me is that some of its directives seem unworkable. They’re at least outside my realm of experience. Here I’m thinking mainly of the idea of a conversational relationship with God. Then there’s the sheer difficulty of the highest Christian principles. Christianity entails a very different way of life from the one that comes naturally. It’s really ''hard'' to trust God completely. It takes a lot of courage to be willing to sacrifice everything for someone else’s good. A common theme in most of my difficulties is the fact that God is a very unusual person, so unusual that he’s hard to relate to. Unlike the human beings we normally interact with, he is invisible, inaudible, and intangible, and for the most part we must relate to him indirectly through the Bible and perhaps other people and the natural world. ==== [[On Being an Agnostic Christian#Spirituality_and_theology.E2.80.94an_unfinished_puzzle|Spirituality and theology—an unfinished puzzle]] ==== A second layer that makes resolving the first one more difficult is my state of theological uncertainty. I don’t seem to understand God well enough to know what he might be thinking, feeling, and doing in response to me and my circumstances, which is important for knowing how to respond to him. But even when I know that and I’m not encumbered by obviously sinful attitudes and motivations, it can be easy to get confused. There are a lot of pieces in the Christian life to keep track of. As I see it, the Christian life is like a complex skill that is foreign to us at first and has to be learned through practice. In many ways I’m still at a beginning, uncoordinated stage, and I don’t even have a clear picture of how all the pieces fit together. ==== [[On Being an Agnostic Christian#Spirituality_and_apologetics.E2.80.94the_inspiration_of_the_Bible_and_the_interpretation_of_experience|Spirituality and apologetics—the inspiration of the Bible and the interpretation of experience]] ==== Then while all that is going on, in float my apologetic doubts. The difficulty comes from two angles. The first is the inspiration of the Bible, which I covered in the apologetics section above. It’s hard for me to worship God on the basis of what goes on in the spiritual realm or God’s agenda in history when I find myself wondering how the Bible writers could know those things. The second angle is the nature of the spiritual. Since it’s invisible, inaudible, and intangible, I sometimes wonder if it’s even there. Christians often describe the inner and outer events of their lives in terms of divine action. But sometimes I wonder, couldn’t it be that coincidences sometimes just happen, and people then find meaning in them that isn’t there? And how do we know that the psychological changes Christians report can’t be explained as merely psychological rather than supernatural? ==== [[On Being an Agnostic Christian#Effects.E2.80.94inertia.2C_isolation.2C_and_laissez-faire_evangelism|Effects—inertia, isolation, and laissez-faire evangelism]] ==== The result of all this is that I haven’t seen much spiritual growth in my life. I’m a decently good person, but I don’t see much that’s specifically Christian about the ways that I’ve grown over the years. These uncertainties and deficiencies also make fellowship with the Christian community difficult. People make statements about how God works in our lives or some other spiritual topic, and sometimes I can simply accept what they’re saying, but often I think, ''Well, maybe''. In those cases I can’t really share in their feelings of inspiration or add to them with insights or experiences of my own. My uncertainties in spirituality, along with those in theology and apologetics, also make it difficult to recommend Christianity to others, simply because I’m not quite sure what I’m offering, why they should believe it, what it’s supposed to do for them, or what they should do once they have it! ==== [[On Being an Agnostic Christian#The_persisting_converse.E2.80.94vestigial_spirituality_and_Christianity.E2.80.99s_merit|The persisting converse—vestigial spirituality and Christianity’s merit]] ==== Despite my confusion and doubt, I do still have my own, limited sense of spirituality. I am sometimes able, in the moment, to forget about my doubts and engage Christianity with the thin film of understanding that I have of its significance for my life. I still talk to God as if he is listening. I try to stay grateful for what I have and the good things that happen. I still participate in worship. Overall I do want to follow Jesus. And I still think that as a philosophy of life, Christianity in some forms has a lot to recommend itself. Among other things, it amplifies and transforms human experience by relating that experience to a transcendent personal being. So a desire for safety becomes a trust in God’s providence. A need for personal purity and for harmony with others becomes a need for divine grace and reconciliation with God and his family. A fear of death becomes a hope in eternal life—and not a disembodied spiritual existence, but a full-fledged life lived out in immortal bodies and in direct, unhindered fellowship with God. And this hope isn’t based on mere speculation but on an event in history—the resurrection of Jesus himself. It sounds great. Now I just have to figure out what it means, if it’s true, and how it all works out in practice! === [[On Being an Agnostic Christian#The_way_forward|The way forward]] === Since I still consider these questions vitally important and there’s still so much I don’t know, there’s really nothing else to do but to pick up the search again. For now I plan to concentrate on the topics that are the most uniquely Christian and the most fundamental to investigating worldviews and Christianity in particular. That means I’ll be looking at the issues surrounding the authority of the Bible and probably the church, the life and teachings of Jesus, the resurrection, miracles, some of the theistic and atheistic arguments, religious pluralism, and the nature of religious knowledge. And I’ll explore Christian spiritual formation. Even though my faith has been eroded and dispirited, I still think Christianity holds some promise, and I consider it the richest and most noble thing around, so I want to give it the best chance I can. I might not stay an inerrantist. I might not even stay an evangelical, though that would be nice. But I hope my investigations will allow me to remain within Christianity for as long as possible, which of course, in the Christian scheme of things, is forever. [http://www.thinkulum.net/blog/category/obac/ Blog entries related to this essay] def5fb22374fb3b8c6ce2b158153b239ba657873 0 29 58 2006-07-29T00:00:00Z Andy Culbertson 1 Imported from WordPress. wikitext text/x-wiki Version 1.4, 7-29-06 Hello. Welcome to my website. It’s here as a repository for the things that I like, things I think, things I’ve written, collected, created, or experienced. === Content === What you will find here: essays of various sorts, random musings, reviews and commentaries, a weblog, collections of links and other things, reference materials, creative projects. I am interested in a lot of stuff. This means that I am almost never bored. Distraction is the more typical problem. It also means that there’s a lot to keep track of, so I’ve tried to keep things organized here. The difficulty is that most of my interests are interrelated and could fit into more than one category. So if the organization seems odd, that’s why. I also tend to use my terms broadly for the sake of cramming as much into the category as possible. My interests come and go in phases, so at various times some parts of the site will be updated a lot more than others. To give you a context for understanding what I post here, I’ve written introductions to most of the sections of the site. These explain basically how I got into the subject, my general take on it, and what my specific interests are. === Updates === My site will be updated very sporadically. To save yourself the trouble of checking my updates page all the time and being constantly disappointed, you can either reading my RSS feed or subscribing to my e-mail updates. If you’re into RSS (and why in the world wouldn’t you be?), you can get my blog’s RSS feed [http://www.thinkulum.net/blog/wp-rss2.php here]. I recommend [http://www.rssbandit.org/ RSS Bandit]. Alternatively, you can have my blog updates e-mailed to you by signing up here: E-mail: You’ll get a confirmation e-mail with a link to click, and then you’ll be subscribed. Don’t worry. I hate spam. Your e-mail address won’t be shared with anyone. If you want to contact me, you’ll have to wait till the bottom of the page to find out how. ;) === Title === What is a “thinkulum” anyway? Um, well, it’s a silly pun. According to Merriam-Webster, a vinculum is a “a straight horizontal mark placed over two or more members of a compound mathematical expression and equivalent to parentheses or brackets about them” or more generally, “a unifying bond.” In Star Trek, it’s the part of a Borg ship that connects the minds of all the drones on the ship and organizes their collective thoughts. The Thinkulum is a web space in which semi-organized and interconnected thoughts are collected in concrete forms. === Me === A little about myself, in bullet point fashion. ==== Circumstantial ==== # My name is Andy Culbertson. # I was born on March 7, 1978. # I have two parents, a brother, and a sister, who are both younger. # I am from Texas, but that is incidental. There is nothing Southern about me. # I am a Christian and a conservative one. However, I am not ignorant, intolerant, pushy, etc. # I have a BA in Christian Education and an MA in Biblical Studies, both from Wheaton College (IL). I don’t know what I want to do when I grow up, possibly teach philosophy. # For now I’m an editorial assistant and programmer at a Christian book packager. # Some thoughts on [http://www.thinkulum.net/blog/2005/06/26/the-current-shape-of-my-life/ the current shape of my life]. (added 7-17-05) ==== Essential ==== # I am a ponderer. I mostly live inside my head. I am very curious. I write a lot. # I am interested in people. I like to listen to them and understand them. I value close relationships, but I am fairly independent. # I am a pragmatic idealist. # I am a male. # I have a low-key, impish sense of humor. I love irony and absurdity. # I have a weird imagination. # I am a very [http://www.typelogic.com/intp.html INTP]-ish [http://www.typelogic.com/infj.html INFJ]. On the Enneagram I am a [http://www.eclecticenergies.com/enneagram/type5.php 5w4]-ish [http://www.eclecticenergies.com/enneagram/type9.php 9w1]. # [[A Picture of Me|A picture of me]]. ==== Favorites ==== # <span class="fav">Musical instruments</span>: Piano and French horn. I have played the piano most of my life. I played the French horn for seven years and soon will again because I now have money to buy one, thanks to my amazingly generous parents. # <span class="fav">Colors</span>: Green and blue. # <span class="fav">Fruits</span>: Grapes, oranges, and peaches. Drink Welch’s white grape peach juice. “It’s like a magic potion,” says my friend Jason. # <span class="fav">Animals</span>: Cats, dolphins, hamsters, hermit crabs, sloths. I’m sure I like others, too. My family has a big, fat cat named [http://www.xanga.com/home.aspx?user=KittieKrunchies Ariel] who really loves meowing. I call her Ariel the Blimp. # <span class="fav">Style of architecture</span>: Gothic is kind of neat. Minimalist, too. # <span class="fav">Types of clothing</span>: T-shirts and jeans, sweatsuits. # <span class="fav">Genre of literature</span>: Fantasy. # <span class="fav">Genres of visual art</span>: Landscapes, surrealism. # <span class="fav">Type of pen</span>: Gel or liquid ink. I really like Pilot G2s. # <span class="fav">Types of store</span>: Bookstores, office supply stores, computer stores. # <span class="fav">Types of weather</span>: Sunny and 75-80, dark and windy if it’s not cold, thunderstorms with lots of lightning if I’m inside. # <span class="fav">Time of day</span>: The middle of the night. # <span class="fav">Website</span>: [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Page Wikipedia]. I have three overarching goals in life: to understand the world, to help people, and to keep myself entertained. The result is what you find on this site. === Site History === This is the reincarnation of my old website. The site was born in 1996 at Geocities when I was a freshman in college, and it was called ''Andy’s Alcove''. It didn’t have very much on it. Then it went through five other versions, gaining and losing content, most of which was was school papers because it was easier than coming up with original material. In the meantime my ideas, interests, goals, and self-understanding became more and more defined, and this led to my wanting to take my site a lot more seriously. So I pulled things together (over about three years of distraction and procrastination), got paid web hosting, and changed the name to ''The Thinkulum'', and on March 20, 2005, a new site was born. The title of this layout is “Pages from My Notebook.” Anybody who knows me in person will probably understand it as a reference to my writing habits. I’m always walking around with a blue notebook that contains whatever notes I’m working on at the time. I call these my “thoughts pages.” I write my all my notes on letter-size, white scratch paper (reduce, reuse, and recycle!), which I fold into fourths because I like small writing surfaces, and I use the notebook as my desk. My writing is small and fairly orderly, which is the first thing everybody comments on, and I always use a blue gel ink pen because I like dark, smooth lines. Particular, ain’t I? Well, journaling is my hobby. These thoughts pages are the source of much of this site’s material, at least in spirit if not in content. === Tools === # The whole site is powered by [http://wordpress.org/ WordPress]. # For the parts that aren’t automatically generated, I attempt to code these pages in XHTML and CSS using the text editor [http://www.liquidninja.com/metapad/ Metapad]. # I check my links with [http://home.snafu.de/tilman/xenulink.html Xenu’s Link Sleuth]. # My webhost is [http://www.p4host.com/ P4HOST]. # The color scheme was determined using [http://www.colorschemer.com/online/ Color Schemer]. # I created the background by scanning part of my notebook and then cropping and sharpening it with [http://www.irfanview.com IrfanView]. The section headings are my handwriting. === Contact === I think of personal websites as conversation pieces, so talk to me if you have the inclination. # E-mail: [mailto:%74%61%72%61%6E%40%74%68%69%6E%6B%75%6C%75%6D%2E%6E%65%74 taran@thinkulum.net] # AIM: [aim:goim?screenname=Andyroonee Andyroonee] # Yahoo: [http://edit.yahoo.com/config/send_webmesg?.target=andyrooni&amp;.amp;src=pg andyrooni] # MSN: [msnim:chat?contact=%74%68%69%6E%6B%75%6C%75%6D%40%68%6F%74%6D%61%69%6C%2E%63%6F%6D thinkulum@hotmail.com] ([msnim:add?contact=%74%68%69%6E%6B%75%6C%75%6D%40%68%6F%74%6D%61%69%6C%2E%63%6F%6D add to contacts]) # [http://www.thinkulum.net/blog/2005/03/21/guestbook/#comments Guestbook] And that’s all for the intro. Enjoy! 81b6e11e22fab9cf7f54abff98f85db3ea8e3767 0 33 66 2006-07-29T00:00:00Z Andy Culbertson 1 Imported from WordPress. wikitext text/x-wiki Version 1.2, 7-29-06 Philosophy can be thought of either as a way of thinking or as a specific set of topics to be thought about. The academic discipline of philosophy is made up of the latter and hopefully uses the former. I am made up of the former and sometimes drift into the latter. (That’s right! I am in fact an abstract thought process and not an embodied human being. The truth is out!) I’ve been a philosopher as long as I’ve been alive, but it wasn’t until recently that I recognized it as a distinct part of myself and gave myself the label. I just approach life philosophically. That is, I analyze things and think about their broader implications. As far as the actual discipline of philosophy goes, my formal education has been meager. Most of the philosophy I’ve learned has come from my own sporadic reading, and I still consider myself pretty new to it. But my primary loyalties are definitely with analytic philosophy. I think of myself as being interested in continental subjects while taking an analytic approach. I am grateful to Michael Martin, even though we are diametrically opposed on some major issues, for his ''Atheism: A Philosophical Justification'', which was my first real exposure to analytic philosophy and helped to kindle my love for it. A common way to organize philosophy as a discipline is to divide it into three categories: epistemology (the theory of knowledge), metaphysics (the theory of reality), and axiology (the theory of value). Not everything in philosophy fits neatly into those categories, but they are an easy way to get a handle on the subject. === Epistemology === Epistemology has by far the most draw for me and I’m sure will accumulate the most material. I ask epistemic questions always and about everything. How do I know which politician is telling me the truth? How do I know which car is the best one to buy? What criteria should I use when evaluating a movie? How did the characters in this novel know the correct solution to their problem? How do I know who is right in an interpersonal conflict? These are the kinds of questions that invariably pop into my mind whenever I face a new situation. In fact, epistemology is my philosophical starting point. Even though I know that any epistemological view will carry assumptions about metaphysics and axiology, I feel a need to answer questions about knowledge first and then use those answers to help me gain knowledge about existence and value. I have a hard time doing it the other way around. I want to deal with the more abstract questions of epistemology (can we trust our senses, and all that), but my main concerns are practical. I would like to come up with a generalized set of guidelines and procedures for investigating an issue from start to finish. They would cover things like the kinds of questions to ask about a topic, effective research methods, criteria for evaluating evidence and arguments, cognitive pitfalls to avoid, and the epistemic idiosyncracies of various subjects. For lack of a better term I’m calling this my “investigative process project.” I want to go beyond the basics, which are readily available anyway. I’m always discovering nuances as I observe people’s ways of dealing with issues, and this project is partly an effort to gather these observations in one place and to make them useful. It’s sort of a meta-project, since the process of investigation is involved any time anyone studies anything. I love reference works. Give me an encyclopedia and I’m happy. The problem is I have no good place to put such things on my website, and I’m not going to create a whole category just for reference. I already have enough categories already. So since general reference works have to do with knowledge, I’m just stuffing them in the epistemology section! You’ll notice I do that kind of thing a lot. === Metaphysics === About metaphysics I have mixed feelings. I like practicality and certainty, and metaphysical issues seem to teeter on the edge of complete irrelevance and unanswerability (I could probably say the same about some epistemological questions–but I won’t!). However, to be fair, some of the questions of metaphysics are ''somewhat'' relevant to everyday life (are people basically good or evil?). Some of them are only really relevant to other philosophical or theological questions, but some of those other questions can be important (for example, the nature of time is relevant to certain arguments about the existence and nature of God). And some seem relevant to philosophical reasoning in general (such as the distinction between necessary and contingent truths). Certain issues, like the question of determinism, I’m not sure can even be resolved, apart from divine revelation, if even then. Still, they are all questions I will try to address seriously at some point. I acknowledge my massive ignorance on the subject. === Axiology === Axiology can be divided into ethics, aesthetics, and politics. Here my feelings are even more divided. I care intensely about the value dimension of life (as I do about epistemology), but I have a certain despair about its arguability (as with metaphysics). With aesthetics it doesn’t matter so much. Getting your aesthetics wrong doesn’t usually carry serious consequences unless you’re a professional artist. With ethics, on the other hand, the issues are vitally important, both to me personally and to society in general. They pop up everywhere every day. Two problems haunt me when I consider interacting with other people about ethical issues. One is that I feel that people are very bad at discerning the real issues in most moral debates. The other is that even if they do understand them, agreement is impossible if the participants don’t share certain fundamental moral assumptions. So I tend to avoid moral debates because they’re just so complicated and frustrating and generally painful to me. Maybe I’ll be more willing to engage in them after I’ve fully investigated the issues on my own. Why do I have a whole page on my site called “Aesthetics” and then a subsection of my philosophy page for aesthetics? Well, it’s just another example of the contents of my mind trying to burst through the boxes I shove them into. The philosophy section is really the most natural home for a section on aesthetics. I just needed a term for my entertainment section that reflected the philosophical way I approach entertainment. My discussions of aesthetics in the philosophy section will be more general and theoretical, while the material in the main aesthetics section will be more practical. For convenience, I’m going to consider the philosophy of life to be a branch of ethics. One of my overarching aims in life is to understand the world so that I can fit myself into it. This amounts to forming a philosophy of life. It involves questions like, what is the meaning of life? What are its appropriate goals? What activities are worth spending one’s time on? These questions rival epistemology for the amount of thought I pour into them, so the material will probably pile up in this section as well. This topic overlaps significantly with spirituality. Politics can be thought of as ethics applied on a societal level. It can also be thought of as a social science, and I will dip into that aspect of the subject, but I’d rather have a single place to put it all, and I’m more a philosopher than a social scientist. It may be a while before I write much in this section. I’m a complete novice when it comes to thinking about politics because it’s only been in the past couple of years that I’ve begun paying much attention to it, so for now I’m much more of an observer than a debater, and my interests within the subject are rather vague. Topics on the national and international levels appeal to me, whereas local politics tends to leave me yawning. I think it’s because national and international politics are more dramatic and seem to more directly reflect the fundamental issues in political philosophy. As for my basic position, I was raised a conservative, and I’m happy to remain one unless my studies convince me otherwise. However, my feelings about politics are a lot like my feelings about ethics, only less intense. The issues are important, but the answers are hard to nail down. Despite the tension and frustration it sometimes puts me through, I like philosophy. It is the best way I have for dealing with life. I used to think I might make it my career, but now I’m thinking about psychology. Whatever I end up doing, I will do it using philosophy’s tools. c4833870e7eedd975d6511f1436ad65b413ceb44 0 43 86 2007-04-29T06:20:06Z Andy Culbertson 1 Imported from WordPress. wikitext text/x-wiki Version 1.0, 4-29-07 Sher, Barbara. [http://www.amazon.com/Refuse-Choose-Revolutionary-Program-Everything/dp/1594863032/ Refuse to Choose! A Revolutionary Program for Doing Everything That You Love]. Emmaus, PA: Rodale, 2006. (also available in [http://www.amazon.com/Refuse-Choose-Interests-Passions-Hobbies/dp/1594866260/ paperback] with a different subtitle) === Summary === Scanners. You probably know some. Scanners are people who have many interests and a strong desire to pursue them all, and in many cases they try, flitting from one job or project to the next. In a society in which people are defined by their careers, this characteristic puts them in tension with the people around them, who want to know why they can’t just pick an occupation, stick with it, and make something of themselves! Barbara Sher, a Scanner herself, identified this group of people in her work as a life coach. She recognized that they shared gifts that were more valued in earlier periods of history than they are now, and so their tremendous potential is left untapped because modern culture provides them no guide for making the most of their talents. Thus, her task in this book was to define what a Scanner is, explain why it’s okay to be one, and give Scanners a manual for achieving the goal that sets these people apart—to do everything in life that they love. Along the way she identifies roadblocks and offers creative tools for sidestepping them. The book is divided into two parts. The first part deals with the question of what a Scanner is and the basic problems that any Scanner might face: Scanners tend to feel that they’re deficient because they seem so scattered. They’re often afraid that they’ll waste their lives. Many fear that committing to a job will keep them from following their interests. Some are just too busy for extra pursuits. Some feel so overwhelmed by their interests that they can’t begin to follow any of them. Some are too intimidated by their projects to start anything. And some begin lots of things and never finish them. The second part divides Scanners into nine types organized into two broad categories—Cyclical Scanners and Sequential Scanners. Cyclical Scanners have a limited number of interests that they return to repeatedly, while Sequential Scanners move from one interest to another and leave the old ones behind. Within each category Sher sorts the types by how often they switch interests. Each type gets a chapter, which discusses the distinguishing traits of that type; its unique motivations; and the life design models, careers, and tools that will allow Scanners of this type to do everything that they love. Life design models are comprehensive ways of organizing your time, tasks, and environment that naturally fit your goals and styles of working. In a word, this book is terrific. Barbara Sher’s writing is engaging, her descriptions true to life, her advice comprehensive and practical, and her outlook inspiring. The book could serve as a model for other self-help works. I have no real criticisms, only a few clarifications and issues for further discussion. Sher has a website with a forum for just such discussions at [http://www.barbarasher.com/ www.barbarasher.com]. This isn’t really a review, since I was too impatient to tidy it up much. The following is more a collection of notes I took on my reactions and reflections while reading the book. === Good things === Sher’s writing style is personal and engaging. Like many self-help authors, she addresses the reader directly and reveals her principles through stories. In her case they are largely accounts of her experiences as a life coach or other conversations she’s had with Scanners. But what makes Sher’s book so compelling is her blend of profound optimism and intense practicality. She believes unwaveringly in the goodness and potential in being a Scanner, in spite of all appearances and obstacles, and this is because she’s seen what Scanners can do and has a comprehensive plan for making it work. One Scanner, Ella, told Barbara about a story she heard when she was young called ''Rusty in Orchestraville'', “about a little boy who couldn’t make up his mind which instrument he wanted to learn, and so he ended up not playing anything and couldn’t be part of the orchestra.” Barbara replied, “In my experience, Rusty becomes a famous conductor. He needed to study all the instruments, because his instrument is the whole orchestra” (35). I’m not sure Ella’s recounting accurately captures the message of the story (see the description [http://www.317x.com/albums/l/alanlivingston/card.html here]), but Barbara’s version is an apt image for the role of Scanners in the world. Another is, “You have the eyes to see what many people miss” (43). She responds to the conventional wisdom about “buckling down” and devoting your life to one thing by demonstrating that it just isn’t true, noting trends in modern society as well as examples of successful Scanners throughout history (xiii–xiv, 115–116, and chapter 4). She has ''tons'' of ideas for getting things done, and they seem like they could really work, because they’re based on her years of experience talking and working with dozens of Scanner clients, friends, and acquaintances. An example of a good idea that struck me: “Sometimes you simply take an armful of books home from the library and read the introductions, the final chapters, and the index at the back. I get insights into very complex books I’d never be able to read all the way through” (236). I did this kind of thing once sort of by accident, and it was an effective way to get an idea of the subject. It would be worth being more intentional about the technique. This book will open your mind to possibilities (and jobs) you never knew existed (see pp. 254ff). For example, you could get a job as an expediter. They do all the tedious, bureaucratic things that their bosses don’t have time for, and sometimes they have to wait in line for hours to do it, which gives them plenty of time for Scannery things like reading (265). She asks a lot of good, probing questions. For example, to help Wanderers tie their random interests together, she has them ask during any activity that attracts them, “What element, if it were missing, would have made my exploration uninteresting?” (213). She is very thorough in her advice. She anticipates a large variety of problems that Scanners will encounter when trying to become more productive and offers many practical techniques for overcoming them, and she even recognizes when a particular tool won’t do the whole job. For example, in chapter 7 she introduces the Backward Planning Flowchart tool for identifying the steps toward reaching a goal, but then she notes that identifying these achievable steps won’t necessarily make the goal seem easier to reach. It might actually make the goal more intimidating! There can be a huge psychological leap between planning and acting. So you need to identify what mental obstacles are still holding you back and look for other tools that will help you through them, many of which she provides in other parts of the book. “Almost no one stays at one career ‘forever’ anymore” (50). One person I talked to about this point said that some fields suffer because people leave their jobs so quickly, and she was thinking specifically of public education. With a high turnover rate, there’s no consistency, and it’s hard to get things done within the field. I think this problem can be avoided in many cases with things like the LTTL system—Learn, Try, Teach, Leave (58–59). I love this idea, by the way, such a tidy way to be temporary. As long as the important policies and plans of an organization stay constant, the people can change, as long as each new person is competent. At certain points Sher brings up practical caveats to her “do what you want” philosophy, such as the fact that you sometimes do have to finish things even when you’ve gotten bored with them. Then she gives tools for dealing with that too (113–115), though “when it comes to your own projects, who cares?” (36). And even though she’s spent the whole book saying things like, “Start everything. And don’t bother to finish ''any'' of it” (110), she closes with an epilogue on the idea that “As enthusiastic as you may be about every passion, an active mind doesn’t get refreshment from producing nothing. Scanners actually grow tired when they’re underused. So you’ll have to give hard work another look, because inside you there are highly original works waiting to be brought into the world. Nothing will do that but starting and finishing at least one of them—or all of them, one at a time” (249). The point of this book isn’t that Scanners are just fine exactly as they are. They do need to be reshaped a bit, but the general thrust and contour of their life is all right. They have a valuable and truly different core. It just needs to be disciplined a little—''but'' in ways that are most natural for a Scanner while still being effective. (243) Throughout the whole book the key productive finishing skill for Scanners is the ability to pass on what their minds have collected in some way, through either writing, speaking, or creating. It’s not ''really'' okay ''just'' to learn or experience. (243) === Issues to discuss === ==== The Definition of a Scanner ==== She quotes a Scanner: “If I have to slow down or use only one part of me at a time, I become bored, worse than bored—I feel like a part of me is dying on the vine” (28). I think this is what makes the difference between Scanners and other people. When describing the essence of a Scanner and contrasting them with Divers, it’s not enough to say that Scanners can’t have fewer interests or restrict themselves to one. For all we know, they may just be intractably undisciplined. But this part of my experience as a Scanner suggests that there’s something more going on. It’s the profound sense of withering when I’m deprived of my projects that makes me think all these interests are ''vital'' to me and that they’re not just whims I can’t resist. ==== The Goodness of Scannerhood ==== Barbara talks about the relief that Scanners felt once she began identifying them as such. “The realization that their behavior was different—because they were actually genetically different—explained so much that it was accepted right away” (xv). This genetic difference hasn’t been proven, but it certainly seems genetic anyway. That by itself doesn’t mean the genetic difference is a ''good'' one. Being a Scanner could be a congenital disability or character flaw, like having anger management problems. We have to evaluate Scannerhood based on its ''effects''. This, of course, she does throughout the book. Scanners are multitalented people who have a lot to offer the world ''because they are Scanners''. They do have some disadvantages, but these can be overcome by the use of all these great tools. Scanners do need some discipline; they need to be shaped, but not fundamentally changed. Their contribution to the world is not hindered by the fact that they pursue many interests. “To be honest, the elated reaction of people who realized they were Scanners came to me as a surprise at first. I had no idea that simply knowing there was a name for them would cause such a complete turnaround in their outlook and feeling of self-worth” (24). Again, not enough to prove it’s good. Part of their relief was probably from the name itself. It sounds like a personality type. If instead she said, “You have Scanneritis,” they might not be so happy, because that sounds like a disease to be cured. Of course, she does say in the next sentence, “Now I’ve seen over and over what amazing things a Scanner can do with nothing more than simple permission to be herself.” ==== Rewards and Durations ==== “When you lose interest in something, you must always consider the possibility that you’ve gotten what you came for; you have completed your mission. … That’s why you lose interest: not because you’re flawed or lazy or unable to focus, but because you’re finished” (31). “The reason you stop when you do: You got what you came for” (103). I think there’s a difference between what my emotions came for and what my mind came for. Sometimes I get bored with what I’m doing because I’m tired of working, and sometimes I’m just tired of looking at the same project after so long, though I think those are a more temporary and superficial type of boredom. But these projects are important to me on a larger level, so I want to finish them. Usually this is either because later projects are intended to be built on them or because they fulfill some deep purpose I have for my life. It’s if I ''gave up'' on them that I’d feel a loss of meaning. So what if what you came for isn’t enough? What if your feelings of excitement enjoy discovery but your sense of civic duty likes giving back what you’ve learned, but you lose steam simply because it’s hard work and takes a long time? What’s the tool for ''that''? But while feelings can’t indiscriminately be a good clue to Rewards, I think there’s merit to Barbara’s approach. There’s a certain kind of deeper boredom that can be a good clue. The clue comes when continuing the project isn’t just tiresome but actually ''feels pointless'', as Barbara mentions a few paragraphs before: “It was the riveting experience of confronting something he’d never imagined before. That was the only part he really cared about. What followed felt pointless.” Another caveat is that often I leave a project simply because I get distracted by other projects. I might still be perfectly interested in picking it back up if I thought about it, but often I don’t think about it. I wonder if this fits into Durations and Rewards or if it’s a separate issue, probably the latter. “When you’re getting your Reward from any activity, you always feel happy, absorbed, energetic. And when you are satisfied, or the Reward diminishes, you get bored. It’s as natural as sitting down to eat when you’re hungry and leaving when you’re full” (32). Hmm, when I’m done eating I feel satisfied, not bored. If I kept eating after that I might feel unpleasant, though perhaps not bored, unless I was just tired of tasting the same food. Hard work doesn’t always make me feel happy, absorbed, and energetic, but surely it’s important for many projects. I guess if you’re just trying to discover what makes you tick, those happy feelings are good ones. Satisfaction could also be a good clue, but that implies having reached a goal or at least a saturation point. Sometimes it happens on its own, and then using it as a clue would only require paying attention. Sometimes it requires having a goal to reach. But if you don’t have a good sense of your Rewards, maybe you’re not yet in a position to set the right goals. Maybe part of this exercise should be to evaluate the project goals you do set and your motivations for them. Are you, for example, just trying to fulfill someone else’s expectations? Just trying to be complete? Once you reach your goal, what then? would be another good question. In one example, Barbara relates a conversation with Meg, who wished she had stuck with Spanish, even though it bored her after a year, because then she’d be somewhere by now, such as being a teacher. But when Barbara pressed her, Meg admitted that would bore her too (214). Paying attention to your happy feelings is also good for identifying the kinds of projects that would let you just play, which is something Sher thinks Scanners should be allowed to do. Many of the common Rewards (33–34) are true for me in degrees. Maybe a five-point Likert scale would be good here. ==== Scanners and School ==== What does a Scanner major in? Barbara talks about what she did (“I gave up and took an easy major, anthropology … and with some disappointment, I went for the grades-and-graduation thing like everyone else.” [xii]), but what would she have done had she known all about being a Scanner back then? ==== Cathy Goodwin’s Review ==== I am not a career counselor, but Cathy Goodwin is, and she has [http://www.amazon.com/gp/discussionboard/discussion.html/ref=cm_rdp_st_rd/002-7195016-9929633?ie=UTF8&amp;ASIN=1594866260&amp;store=yourstore&amp;cdThread=TxJ98AUVMQFE8H&amp;reviewID=R3KTCC78R4ZL5Y&amp;displayType=ReviewDetail reviewed] Sher’s book on Amazon. Her review is not as glowing as mine, but it is probably more realistic. 6eff6c8130be36f47ad557f7eea99206dab79a79 0 44 88 2007-05-12T06:30:14Z Andy Culbertson 1 Imported from WordPress. wikitext text/x-wiki Version 1.0, 5-12-07 In addition to the inspiring stories, perspective-altering advice, Life Design Models, and career possibilities Barbara Sher serves her readers, ''Refuse to Choose'' also contains about forty tools that Scanners can put to work when they need a little organization or motivation. These tools are listed in an index in the back. Unfortunately, in spite of the creative names she has given them, I had a hard time remembering when I should use each tool. Hence, I have added descriptions of the circumstances in which each tool would be helpful, based on Barbara’s discussions. {| class="wikitable sortable toptextcells" |- ! If ! Then You Need The ! See Page(s) |- | You don’t finish what you start because you don’t have a clear sense of direction | 15-Month Goal Calendar (use it with the Rotating Priorities Board) | 152 |- | You have many interests that you’d like to explore deeply, but you don’t have time | 20 or 30 Three-Ring Binders | 84, 157–158, 174, 253 |- | You have ideas you want to put into action, but you’re anxious about it and/or you have trouble keeping in mind what you need to do | Appointment Planner (use it with the Success Team) | 95 |- | # You’re disorganized and spend too much time getting the materials together for your projects, or # You find that you’ve neglected your projects for a while and you miss them | Avocation Station (use it with the Setup) | 153–156 |- | You think about your ideas but don’t get around to doing anything about them | Backward Planning Flowchart (use it with the Real Deadline) | 91–95, 97, 98 |- | You are interested in practically everything and you want to study each of those things deeply, but that’s impossible, so you don’t do any of it | Big List | 77–79 |- | You feel you can’t pursue your interests because it would be irresponsible | “Busting Open Either/Or Thinking” Game | 127–128 |- | # You’re trying to decide on a (temporary) career, or # You want to explore a variety of new fields or jobs | Career Tryout | 56–57, 207 |- | Ideas enter and leave your mind too quickly without being written down, so you forget them, can’t show them to anybody, can’t do anything with them, and start to forget who you are | Catalog of Ideas with Potential | 244–245 |- | You have an idea for a project | Da Vinci Write-Up (use it with the Scanner Daybook or the 20 or 30 Three-Ring Binders) | 11–17, 110, 243–244 |- | You live two lives, and you want to keep your gear for your other life in one place while you’re waiting to get to it | Destination Steamer Trunks | 139–140 |- | You’re doing a project you intend to finish, and you need a little pressure to keep you going | Down-to-the-Wire Tear-Off Calendar | 251 |- | You want to find out what your interests have in common so you can find a job that matches that theme | “Everything I Don’t Want” List | 216–217 |- | You can’t fit all your interests into one job (and maybe you don’t want to be pressured to do those things anyway), yet you still need to pay the bills | Good Enough Job | 60, 136–137, 143, 159, 233–235, 264 |- | You can’t keep track of your ideas or follow up on your interests | Interest Index Binder | 83–84 |- | # You need to test your Setups, or # You have neglected your projects and you miss them | Kitchen Timer (use it with the Avocation Station) | 155 |- | You want to find a career that can use all your experiences, or you’d like to find a theme to your interests, but you tend to get lazy about writing | Letters from the Field (use it with the Web E-mail Account) | 189–190, 225 |- | You need to adjust your environment, schedule, and/or career to give you the ability to pursue all your interests | Life Design Model | 128–129 |- | You finish a project, either completely or via a Scanner’s Finish, and especially if you aren’t used to appreciating your own wonderful mind or you think you never accomplish anything | Life’s Work Bookshelf | 112–113, 210, 236–237, 252 |- | You’ve started a lot of projects you haven’t finished and your home is cluttered with them, and you’re embarrassed by it | Living Quarters Map | 17–19 |- | You’re afraid of committing to a job long term because you know you’ll get bored with it | LTTL (Learn, Try, Teach, Leave) System | 58–59, 169–171 |- | You have a lot of stress and anxiety because you’re so busy all the time | Micro Nervous Breakdown | 66–67 |- | You keep accumulating a variety of skills and experiences, but it would look bad to put them all on your résumé | Never-Ending Résumé | 188 |- | # You’re very busy and you want to capture your ideas while you’re out and about, and especially if # You need to take a break now and then to think about something else | Portable Dream Deck (use it with the Alternating Current Life Design Model or just by itself) | 69, 167 |- | You finish a project, either completely or via a Scanner’s Finish, and you want a creative way to display it | Private Museum | 237 |- | You have interests that are too 3-D to put in a binder | Project Box | 157 |- | You need some accountability to keep you moving toward your goal | Real Deadline | 91, 94, 95, 97, 99, 250–252 |- | You can’t decide if your idea is a good or bad one just by thinking about it | Reality Research | 97–99 |- | # You feel guilty about jumping from one thing to another, especially if you don’t finish your projects, # You want to design a life that will fit your particular interests, or # You want to know how far to pursue an interest, especially if you’re afraid you have too many | Rewards and Durations | 29–36, 38, 79–81, 103, 117 |- | You’re juggling several projects, and your interest level for each one is unpredictable, so you don’t know how to prioritize them from day to day | Rotating Priorities Board (use it with the 15-Month Goal Calendar) | 152–153 |- | # You feel ashamed of the way you dabble in many different subjects, and you avoid getting involved in new subjects because you have too many interests and projects already, especially if you haven’t finished the ones you’re working on, # You tend to get ideas and then lose them, # You’re doing a Scanner exercise from ''Refuse to Choose!'' or taking notes on something Scanner related, # You’ve been neglecting or undervaluing certain sides of you, # You want to understand what interests you, what causes you to lose interest, and the way your mind works, # You want to capture the excitement you feel when coming up with a project, # You want to preserve your ideas for posterity, # You’ve been too busy to come up with any projects or to let your mind wander, # You just want to have fun in Scanner fashion, # You want to find a theme to your interests, or # You’re returning to Scanner mode after doing your Best Work | Scanner Daybook (use it with the Da Vinci Write-Up) | 11–20, 24–25, 33, 36, 57, 68, 77–79, 105, 109, 110, 140, 155, 156, 165, 167, 198, 209, 213, 225, 244–245, 252 |- | You have several projects you want to work on, but you can’t organize your time well enough to juggle them | Scanner Planner (use it with the School Day Life Design Model) | 146–148 |- | You have a project that you feel bad about not finishing, but you’re not interested enough to keep working on it | Scanner’s Finish (use it with the Life’s Work Bookshelf) | 111–112, 210 |- | You’re really busy and have only two minutes here and there to work on your projects | Setup | 69–70, 153 |- | # You finish a project (typically something you’ve made) and you want to show off the results, or # You need some accountability to keep you moving toward your goal | Show-and-Tell Party | 237–238, 250–251 |- | You want to learn and do a lot of different things, and you think informal learning would work better than college classes | Soiree | 230–231 |- | You learn something that calms your Scanner Panic | Sticky Notes | 47 |- | You need accountability and moral support to keep you moving toward your goal | Success Team | 92, 94–95, 99 |- | You keep accumulating a variety of skills and experiences, but it would look bad to put them all on your résumé | Three Scanner Résumés | 266–267 |- | You’re afraid you’ll never get to do everything you want to do | Wall Calendar Poster | 45–47, 138–139, 140 |- | You need a convenient place from which to write your Letters from the Field | Web E-mail Account (use it with the Letters from the Field) | 189–190, 225 |- | You think you haven’t accomplished much in your life | “What Have I Done So Far?” List | 24–25 |} c9b2ca6838e9db34778ab99a949cd15071af4c88 0 45 90 2007-10-02T03:22:30Z Andy Culbertson 1 Imported from WordPress. wikitext text/x-wiki === Links === # [http://maps.google.com/maps/ms?msa=0&amp;msid=111762791336614627847.0004387a4fbb10bd55916 The Map] # [[Recommended Preachers Online: The List|The List]] === Motivations === As I reflected on my lack of spiritual vitality earlier this year (2007), I concluded that it would help to have more Christian input into my mind. Once a week at church and an occasional devotion wouldn’t cut it. To keep my mind on spiritual things, I needed to hear the Christian message more often. One easy way for me to do that is to listen to online Christian audio, so I set out to collect some. === Procedure === As things usually go with me, the project quickly expanded beyond all reasonable proportion, and instead of gathering two or three sources I could rely on for insight and inspiration, I decided to find as many as I could, searching in a comprehensive and semi-systematic fashion. And by comprehensive, I mean searching every city (above a certain size) in every state in the US. And then expanding to other English-speaking countries after that. That’s what I’m shooting for anyway. In reality I’ll search until I get tired of it. At some point I may expand the project to include speakers that aren’t attached to a church. My overall procedure is to take the states in the order of their importance to me and search for churches by city, starting with the largest. I didn’t start out this way—I tried alphabetically first, so the map began with some random churches in Alabama—but officially the first state in the list is Illinois, and the first city is Chicago. And then along the way I’ve thought of churches in other states I knew I wanted to include, and I’ve listened to sermons at my friends’ churches from around the country, so I’ve interrupted my orderly progression to add some of those. Normally I would keep a list like this in my bookmarks, but since the data was geographical, I thought it would be fun to make a Google map out of it, which I have linked to above. My bookmarks are holding the raw results of my search, and to make my decisions, I’m taking more detailed notes in a Zoho Creator database. === Benefits === In addition to collecting more listening material than I could ever possibly take in and stimulating my thoughts and feelings on spiritual matters, this project has come with some unexpected side benefits. One is that I feel more connected with different parts of the country. If Birmingham, Alabama, comes up in a conversation, I can think, Ah, I know something about Birmingham. I’ve listened to some good preachers there. If a natural disaster sweeps through, I can wonder how my churches there are doing. If on a Sunday I’m traveling in an area that has churches on my list, I can visit one of them and gain a more personal connection. If I have a friend who needs a church, I can refer them to my list, if I’ve covered their area; or I can take the project on a detour through their city to see what I can find. For my friends who go to churches on my list, it gives me a little more of a connection with them and more topics for conversation. And finally, this project lets me exercise one of my joys in life, which is to find hidden treasure and share it with people who might not have found it otherwise. Some of the preachers in the list are well known, but there are pastors out there who are unknown but still good, and they deserve a wider audience. So by posting my discoveries online, I can hopefully give them a bit more exposure and put a few more people in touch with their unique perspectives and good preaching, and the happiness and well-being in the world can be increased. :) === Criteria === This list is extremely subjective. While there are a few things I look for, I don’t apply a rigorous and objective rubric to each church. The question that determines whether a church makes the list is, Would I listen to this preacher regularly? If the answer is probably or yes, they go on the map. (If it’s maybe, I come back to it later and listen to a sermon or two more to decide.) So this is not a list of all the good churches in the world or even all the good preachers, just the ones I have personally found to be especially worth listening to so far. Obviously someone else would have a different list. Also, since most of these decisions are based on a single sermon, I will take a church off the list if I change my mind about it on later listenings. I do keep my ears open for a few basic characteristics. I prefer speakers who have a more natural speaking style, as opposed to a highly affected one. I gravitate toward thoughtful pastors who are speaking to audiences who already have the basics of Christianity under their belt and who are looking to live it more effectively. I like hearing preachers who express the Christian message in new ways, rather than delivering the same old content with the same old language. And I appreciate a balance between exegesis and application. If it’s unbalanced, I’d rather it be on the application side. I am also a conservative Protestant, so you will see a clear bias toward this category in my list, which also I think comes from the fact that they seem to care more about preaching and getting their message out into the public. Since there are potentially thousands of preachers who fit these criteria, I also keep a few limiting questions in mind: Is this speaker unique enough to stick in my mind? Is he or she easily ignorable (by being overly academic, rambling, or boring in some other way)? Does the speaker express a lot of opinions I disagree with without adding anything to my understanding? Is this speaker annoyingly liberal or conservative? I am more tolerant of conservatism, but I will turn them off if they’re too simple minded for me. And although I am fairly ecumenical, I skip over churches that don’t fit into what I would consider orthodox Christianity, so no Mormon, Christian Science, or Unitarian churches. Seventh-Day Adventists are a little too iffy; they’re out too. Most of these criteria can be overridden by others in particular cases. Sometimes I can overlook an affected speaking style if the preacher is especially reflective. Or I can forgive a simple message if I feel inspired by the speaker’s sincerity. And I also look for certain specific preaching styles that I wouldn’t normally listen to because occasionally I do feel like listening to them. Sometimes I’m in an “old time religion” mood, for example, which is normally when I turn on Family Radio, even though Harold Camping is kind of a heretic. And of course my friends’ churches get special consideration. ;) Though they are not automatically included. -.- Even if they’re the preacher. === The List === The list linked to below corresponds to the placemarks on the map. It should be updated often while I’m on this project, except when I take breaks to concentrate on other things, and the changes will be reflected on the Recent Changes page and in the corresponding “all updates” feed. The churches on this page are arranged by state, then by city, then by church name. The Google map list is arranged in the order in which I added them. [[Recommended Preachers Online: The List|The List]] 72cb322c5ec0ae5908669aea39b34cde334cb966 0 46 92 2007-10-02T03:25:35Z Andy Culbertson 1 Imported from WordPress. wikitext text/x-wiki === Links === # [http://maps.google.com/maps/ms?msa=0&amp;msid=111762791336614627847.0004387a4fbb10bd55916 The Map] # [[Recommended Preachers Online|Explanation]] === The List === {| class="wikitable sortable toptextcells" |- ! Church ! Pastor(s) ! City ! State ! Notes |- | [http://www.ebcathens.com/ Emmanuel Baptist Church] | David Carpenter | Athens | AL | |- | [http://www.shadesmountain.org/ Shades Mountain Bible Church] | Ron Gannett | Birmingham | AL | |- | [http://www.stpetersbhm.org/ St. Peter’s Anglican Church] | John D. Richardson | Birmingham | AL | I really placemarked this because Lyle Dorsett sometimes preaches. |- | [http://www.twickenham.org/ Twickenham Church of Christ] | Brad Cox | Huntsville | AL | |- | [http://www.freepres.org/church.asp?trinity Trinity Free Presbyterian Church] | Myron Mooney | Trinity | AL | |- | [http://www.trinitychurchonline.org/ Trinity Church] | Ian Cron | Greenwich | CT | |- | [http://www.saint-peters.net/ St. Peter’s Anglican Church] | Eric Dudley | Tallahassee | FL | |- | [http://www.ctkfoxvalley.org/ Christ the King Church] | Ken Carr | Batavia | IL | |- | [http://www.allsaintsorthodox.org/ All Saints Antiochian Orthodox Church] ([http://ancientfaithradio.com/specials/allsaints/ Audio]) | Patrick Henry Reardon | Chicago | IL | |- | [http://www.chicagochurch.org/ Chicago Church of Christ – Chicago Ministry Center] | Jeff Balsom, Todd Fink, Randy Harris, Jim Lefler | Chicago | IL | |- | [http://covenantchicago.org/ Covenant Presbyterian Church of Chicago] | Aaron Baker | Chicago | IL | |- | [http://www.edgebapt.com/ Edgewater Baptist Church] | Jim Shedd | Chicago | IL | |- | [http://www.firstbaptist-chicago.org/ First Baptist Church of Chicago] ([http://www.fbcpreacher.com/ Audio]) | Jesse M. Brown | Chicago | IL | |- | [http://www.moodychurch.org/ The Moody Church] | Erwin Lutzer | Chicago | IL | |- | [http://www.churchrez.org/ Church of the Resurrection] | Stewart E. Ruch, III | Glen Ellyn | IL | |- | [http://www.gcvalley.org/ Grace Church of the Valley] | Clark Richardson, Mike Hill, Jerry Kennell | North Aurora | IL | |- | [http://www.kishwaukeebiblechurch.org/ Kishwaukee Bible Church] | Frank Yonke, Steve Leston, Ron Spiotta | Sycamore | IL | |- | [http://www.friendsofthesavior.org/ Church of the Savior] | Bill Richardson | West Chicago | IL | |- | [http://www.blanchardalliance.org/ Blanchard Alliance Church – Wheaton] | John Casey | Wheaton | IL | |- | [http://www.hopeingod.org/ Bethlehem Baptist Church] | John Piper | Minneapolis | MN | |- | [http://www.whchurch.org/ Woodland Hills Church] | Greg Boyd | St. Paul | MN | Okay, yes, he’s an [http://www.theopedia.com/Open_theism Open View] theologian. But other than that he’s really good! |- | [http://www.parksidechurch.com/ Parkside Church] | Alistair Begg | Chagrin Falls | OH | |- | [http://www.salemalliance.com/ Salem Alliance Church] | John Stumbo | Salem | OR | |- | [http://www.pcpc.org/ Park Cities Presbyterian Church] | Joseph “Skip” Ryan (formerly) | Dallas | TX | |- | [http://www.stonebriar.org/ Stonebriar Community Church] ([http://www.insight.org/ Audio]) | Chuck Swindoll | Frisco | TX | |- | [http://www.christchurchplano.org/ Christ Church Plano] | David H. Roseberry | Plano | TX | |- | [http://advancedministry.com/sites/index.cfm?i=1148 Bethany Community Church] | Richard Dahlstrom | Seattle | WA | |- | [http://www.jesusfellowshipofbelievers.com/ Jesus Fellowship of Believers] | Tim Dodson | Menomonie | WI | |- | [http://www.immanuelwestbend.org/ Immanuel Church] | Rich Vincent | West Bend | WI | |} 3aa672ebaccee3a7a66e07c15bc53449a11577b0 0 47 94 2010-01-01T07:49:48Z Andy Culbertson 1 Imported from WordPress. wikitext text/x-wiki Version 1.0, 1/1/2010 It’s the start of a new year, and you may be thinking about reading through the Bible. If you’d like a more vigorous reading plan than usual, try this one. It’ll take you through the whole Bible in 90 days. If you want to do a “quick” overview study of the Bible, this is one way to make your way through it. If you are creating a long Bible-related work, such as a commentary, this list may also be suitable for dividing your work into more manageable volumes. Each day’s reading is not of equal length. I tried to avoid ending a day’s reading in the middle of a narrative or discourse or starting it in the middle of one book and ending in the middle of another, which meant stretching some readings and shrinking others. I also used whole chapters throughout the plan so it could easily be used with audio Bibles, which are often divided by chapter. The days cover about 5,000 to 10,000 words each, with most in the 7,000- to 8,000-word range. For most people 5,000 to 10,000 words translates into about 30 minutes to an hour of reading. {| class="wikitable sortable toptextcells" |- ! '''Day''' ! '''Text''' |- | 1 | Genesis 1-16 |- | 2 | Genesis 17-28 |- | 3 | Genesis 29-39 |- | 4 | Genesis 40-50 |- | 5 | Exodus 1-13 |- | 6 | Exodus 14-27 |- | 7 | Exodus 28-40 |- | 8 | Leviticus 1-15 |- | 9 | Leviticus 16-27 |- | 10 | Numbers 1-10 |- | 11 | Numbers 11-24 |- | 12 | Numbers 25-36 |- | 13 | Deuteronomy 1-11 |- | 14 | Deuteronomy 12-26 |- | 15 | Deuteronomy 27-34 |- | 16 | Joshua 1-12 |- | 17 | Joshua 13-24 |- | 18 | Judges 1-12 |- | 19 | Judges 13-Ruth 4 |- | 20 | 1 Samuel 1-15 |- | 21 | 1 Samuel 16-31 |- | 22 | 2 Samuel 1-12 |- | 23 | 2 Samuel 13-24 |- | 24 | 1 Kings 1-7 |- | 25 | 1 Kings 8-14 |- | 26 | 1 Kings 15-22 |- | 27 | 2 Kings 1-13 |- | 28 | 2 Kings 14-25 |- | 29 | 1 Chronicles 1-9 |- | 30 | 1 Chronicles 10-20 |- | 31 | 1 Chronicles 21-29 |- | 32 | 2 Chronicles 1-16 |- | 33 | 2 Chronicles 17-32 |- | 34 | 2 Chronicles 33-Ezra 10 |- | 35 | Nehemiah |- | 36 | Esther |- | 37 | Job 1-21 |- | 38 | Job 22-42 |- | 39 | Psalms 1-22 |- | 40 | Psalms 23-41 |- | 41 | Psalms 42-72 |- | 42 | Psalms 73-89 |- | 43 | Psalms 90-106 |- | 44 | Psalms 107-125 |- | 45 | Psalms 126-150 |- | 46 | Proverbs 1-16 |- | 47 | Proverbs 17-31 |- | 48 | Ecclesiastes-Song of Songs |- | 49 | Isaiah 1-12 |- | 50 | Isaiah 13-27 |- | 51 | Isaiah 28-39 |- | 52 | Isaiah 40-53 |- | 53 | Isaiah 54-66 |- | 54 | Jeremiah 1-10 |- | 55 | Jeremiah 11-23 |- | 56 | Jeremiah 24-31 |- | 57 | Jeremiah 32-39 |- | 58 | Jeremiah 40-49 |- | 59 | Jeremiah 50-Lamentations 5 |- | 60 | Ezekiel 1-15 |- | 61 | Ezekiel 16-24 |- | 62 | Ezekiel 25-36 |- | 63 | Ezekiel 37-48 |- | 64 | Daniel 1-6 |- | 65 | Daniel 7-12 |- | 66 | Hosea |- | 67 | Joel-Obadiah |- | 68 | Jonah-Zephaniah |- | 69 | Haggai-Malachi |- | 70 | Matthew 1-16 |- | 71 | Matthew 17-28 |- | 72 | Mark 1-7 |- | 73 | Mark 8-16 |- | 74 | Luke 1-8 |- | 75 | Luke 9-18 |- | 76 | Luke 19-24 |- | 77 | John 1-10 |- | 78 | John 11-21 |- | 79 | Acts 1-14 |- | 80 | Acts 15-28 |- | 81 | Romans |- | 82 | 1 Corinthians |- | 83 | 2 Corinthians |- | 84 | Galatians-Ephesians |- | 85 | Philippians-2 Thessalonians |- | 86 | 1 Timothy-Philemon |- | 87 | Hebrews-James |- | 88 | 1 Peter-Jude |- | 89 | Revelation 1-11 |- | 90 | Revelation 12-22 |} 4c92a362a679a4ed388a856e30910ee905bc7536 0 48 96 2012-03-30T02:05:37Z Andy Culbertson 1 Imported from WordPress. wikitext text/x-wiki Version 0.1.0, 2012-03-29 === Motivation === My mind is like a murky lake. Along the shore are ropes leading into the water, and at the submerged end of each rope is a net. The ends I can see are questions life asks me that I need to answer from the contents of my mind, and the nets contain the answers I can provide. The ropes are of different lengths, and the nets are of different sizes. The big nets contain detailed and extensive answers, and the small ones contain little but ignorance. The short ropes lead to answers I know that I know and can pull to shore readily. The long ropes are the scary ones. Until the nets have emerged, I never truly know how long the ropes are or what will be at the end. Maybe the nets will have the answers I need; maybe they’ll be disappointingly, frighteningly lacking. Maybe the nets will reach the shore by the time I need the answers; maybe the ropes will be too long for the time I have to pull them. I don’t know how much information is in my mind to meet the needs of the moment or how long it will take to retrieve it. All this would be fine, except that most of the things I like to do—synthesizing and discussing ideas, programming, being a resource of information for people—require a memory that is clear and reliable, if I want to do them well. And I do. Plus, I like the sense of clarity, awareness, and familiarity I get from knowing things about the world around me. I’ve had this gripe against my mind for over a decade, and I’ve finally decided to do something about it. I’m studying memory improvement techniques. It’s turning out to be a much more complex topic than I expected, but at this point I’ve gotten far enough to shape my basic ideas on the subject and to form some goals. So to give myself a milestone and something to show for my work so far, I’m writing for you this summary. Since this is an interim report, I’ll continue to develop these ideas as the project progresses. The concepts, terms, organization, and agenda are all subject to change. === Sources === Where am I getting my information? Two kinds of sources interest me: reports of scientific research on memory and popular memory improvement literature. I look at the research because I want my techniques to be grounded in reality rather than marketing hype. And I look at the popular literature because it offers creative examples for applying the techniques, which I can then analyze and generalize to create a more expansive and flexible system. For this project I started on the research end of the spectrum with Kenneth Higbee’s ''Your Memory: How It Works and How to Improve It'' and some of Alan Baddeley’s much more recent ''Your Memory: A User’s Guide''. At some point I would also like to read ''Mnemonology'' by James Worthen and R. Reed Hunt, which I found while writing this essay, to see how my ideas about the principles behind mnemonics stack up against actual research. But in this summary I’ll mainly be citing Higbee and my own experience, because the material I’ve read in Baddeley has been more specialized and not as applicable to the topics I’m covering here. On the popular end, so far I’ve only dabbled in a few books and articles. === Overview === My project has a relatively narrow focus. Memory is a pervasive part of everything we do in everyday life, and there are several types of memory. But while it’s all important, I want to focus on ways to memorize information for long-term recall. I’m partly aiming for a computer programming approach to human memory. Programming is an excellent grid through which to examine many areas of life, especially areas that involve problem solving or designing systems that will perform tasks intelligently. It’s helpful for these purposes because it involves breaking down a domain into parts, relating them logically, and performing operations on them to achieve specific goals. It’s concrete and practical. Programming is especially good for dealing with human memory because computers have their own form of memory, and the tasks we need to perform with both types are largely the same. We need to store information, modify it, and retrieve it in various arrangements, though human memory certainly works differently from computer memory in some major ways. I’ll draw out these ideas as I go along. My overall approach is to view memory as an interconnected set of components that can nevertheless be treated modularly so they can be assembled to solve a large variety of problems. I divide my analysis of memory into three parts: the basic components that are involved storing and retrieving information in memory, the basic skills of memorization that use these components, and the ways we can apply these skills to various memory tasks. === Components of Memory === By the components of memory, I mean the basic structures we create with information in the mind and the basic operations we perform to store and retrieve it. Memory is a set of subsystems rather than a single structure in the brain {Higbee 2}, and each system handles a different type of information, such as visual or verbal {37-38}. It would be great if I could use the brain’s organization to lay out the principles of memory here. But I don’t know nearly enough about how memory is organized in the brain, and I’m not sure neuroscientists do either {Baddeley 11}. So I’ve attempted to come up with more of a functional framework for arranging the common memory principles and techniques. Most of psychology is about identifying the mind’s API, the things we do from the surface of the mind to achieve the effects we want, regardless of how the brain is doing things on the back end. Still, knowing the implementation can be useful, so I like to hear about the progress neuroscience is making on memory. To memorize information for recall, you’ll need to transfer it from '''short-term''' to '''long-term''' memory. Short-term memory lasts only a few seconds and can contain only around seven items at a time. If the information in short-term memory goes through an encoding process, it’s stored in long-term memory and can potentially be accessed for a lifetime {Higbee 19, 20, 23}. To make this transfer, you’ll need to put to work several factors. So far I’ve grouped them into three categories: description, significance, and maintenance. You’ll need to notice important characteristics and associations of the information, you’ll need to signal to yourself that the information is worth remembering, and you’ll need to keep your memory equipment in working order. The first two, which I’ll call the memorization components, relate to working with specific items of information, and the last relates to the overall operation of your brain’s memory systems. For this summary I’ll only discuss the memorization components, because I’ve done almost no research on the maintenance component, factors such as diet and rest. ==== Description ==== My view is that the mind '''stores''' information by indexing it according to its '''properties''' {50}, which amount to a description of the item. It '''retrieves''' information when it receives a reminder, which gives it one or more properties to search by. Memory researchers call the reminders '''cues''' {26}. A word, for example, is often recalled based on its first letter, its sound, or its meaning {30}. This is why you can often recall a word by reciting the alphabet, looking for the word’s first letter {100}. You can also see this property indexing at work when you remember the wrong word and find that it resembles the word you’re looking for in one or more of these ways. ===== Items ===== For the purposes of this project, an '''information item''' is any set of information you’re treating as a unit. It’s actually a stretchy concept. Our minds can almost always subdivide information into smaller pieces or group it into larger ones. Whatever you’re treating as a unit at the time is an item in that context. This expandability of information is a very important feature that makes it possible to create all kinds of useful associations for memory, as we’ll see later. Some information is easier to think of as a single, simple unit, such as the translation of a single English word into another language, and some is easier to think of as a group of smaller items, such as a grocery list or a whole chapter of a book. I’ll call the simple items '''unitary''' items and the groups '''collective''' items. Since pretty much any information can be subdivided, it’s technically all collective. But these categories are meant to help you in memorizing. Hence, the way you categorize any particular item is somewhat subjective and relative to your purpose for it at the time. I’ll explore the ways these categories can help you later in the essay. What kinds of information items are there? An item can be something more like an object or something more like a sentence, and really you could look at any item as one or the other. So you might memorize the flag of each country and treat each flag as an object, but in the back of your mind, you’re also memorizing a statement that goes something like, “The flag of Algeria looks like this.” ===== Properties ===== A property of an item of information is anything you can say about it. Really it’s just another piece of information that’s somehow related to the item you’re dealing with. In fact, I think of an item of information as being completely made of its properties. An information item is a set of information that someone has bundled into a package and maybe given a label, which is just another one of its properties. For the purposes of memory, there are at least a couple of ways to look at properties. You can think of a property as a handle for an information item that the mind can grab when it’s looking for the item. And you can also think of properties as parts of the item that you can then focus on as items in themselves. I also like to think of properties as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Resource_Description_Framework RDF] triples. That is, a property can be stated in terms of three parts: a subject, a predicate, and an object. For example, one property of tree bark is that it’s rough. That is, it has a texture of roughness. “Tree bark” is the subject, “has a texture of” is the predicate, and “roughness” is the object. Splitting up a property in this way can help you think about enhancing and organizing the material you’re studying, which I’ll cover below. I divide properties into a few somewhat fuzzy categories to help me get a handle on them. One division is between internal and external properties. An '''internal''' property is any characteristic that the item has on its own. I’ll call internal properties '''features'''. An '''external''' property is any connection it has with other information. I’ll call the external properties '''connections'''. If I’m looking at a tree, one of its internal properties is that it has green leaves. An external property might be another tree it reminds me of. Another division I make is between natural and incidental properties. '''Natural''' properties are related to the item’s meaning, and '''incidental''' properties are any other kind. For example, a natural internal property of the word ''horse'' would be its definition in a dictionary or an image of a horse. An incidental internal property would be the way the word looks in a particular font. A natural external property would be the fact that a jockey rides a horse. An incidental external property would be the fact that horse and helicopter start with the same letter. The fact that an item’s storable properties can stray so far from its typical meaning becomes very useful when you’re memorizing information that has very little significance to you or that has no logical structure, such as a list of random words. Memory researchers call these incidental external properties '''elaborations''' {Higbee 94}. We will see this feature of memory come into play when we discuss mnemonics. ===== Storage ===== I also divide memory storage activity into two categories, '''active''' and '''passive'''. These categories apply to both description and the other memorization component, significance. Even without consciously trying, your mind engages in memorizing all the time. For example, people tend to remember where they were when a national tragedy took place. It might not always be the memorizing you expect or need, but you can take advantage of this passive activity and use it to supplement your conscious memorizing. ===== Retrieval ===== As I mentioned above, the mind retrieves information when it receives a reminder, called a cue. A cue is anything that either reminds you there’s something you need to remember or simply reminds you of something you do remember. It’s like a question for you to answer or a sentence with a blank to fill in. It provides you with some of the properties of the information and leaves you to find the rest of the item. As with everything else, I divide retrieval of information into several categories. First, like storage, retrieval can happen passively or actively. I’ve observed that cues tend to happen in chains—one thing reminds you of another, which reminds you of another, and so on—and the chains tend to start with cues from your surroundings. The cues that bring up information from your mind without any effort from you are triggering '''passive''' retrieval. When the cues remind you of your need or desire to remember something and then you search your mind for the information, you give yourself a series of cues that could trigger your recall, and this search is a process of '''active''' retrieval. These cues can be either '''parallel''' or '''chained'''. That is, the cues may be independent of each other, or each cue may remind you of the next. It can also happen at different levels of consciousness. '''Explicit learning''' is retrieval with a conscious awareness that you’ve recalled something. '''Implicit learning''' is retrieval that happens unconsciously; you simply act on the information you’ve retrieved without being aware that you’ve retrieved anything {Baddeley 21}. And retrieval can happen more or less completely. '''Recall''' is the fullest level of retrieval, in which the whole item or set of information is brought to mind with only a starting cue. '''Recognition''' is less complete and more or less amounts to identifying the information you’re viewing as information you’ve seen before. Rate of '''relearning''' measures a subtle level of retrieval, in which you’re able to relearn information you’ve learned before in less time than you took to learn it at first. Your mind retains traces of the material from the first learning effort, so it doesn’t have to do as much work to learn it to the level of recall again {Higbee 26-27}. In this project, as I’ve said, I’ll be focusing on conscious storage for recall. Memory researchers have terms for several patterns of recall. When recall happens because it has been intentionally cued, they call it '''aided recall'''. Recall that happens in any order and without a specific external cue is termed '''free-recall''' {26}. Recall seems to be easier when it’s aided {100}, so it’s best to concentrate on memorizing specific properties of an item so they can reliably serve as cues. Most of my project will concern this strategy. When you recall items in a specific order, memory researchers call it '''sequential learning'''. When one item cues your recall of a second, they call it '''paired-associate learning''' {26}. Most of the memory techniques I’ve seen amount to different forms of aided recall using paired-associate learning. Even sequential learning can be reduced to a series of paired-associate tasks, where each item is the cue for the next in the list {133}. ===== Interference ===== A persistent problem for memory is what memory researchers call interference, the problem of confusing parts of something you’ve learned with parts of something else you learned before or after it {34}. This is different from the problem of strong emotions blocking your ability to learn or recall things, which I talk about in the “External emotional significance” section below. That could be seen as another type of interference, but memory researchers don’t call it that. To combat interference, each item you memorize needs to be unique in a memorable way. That is, it needs to have a unique set of properties. You can think of the items of information as being assigned unique addresses in your memory. The address is made of the item’s unique combination of properties. If two items aren’t meant to live at the same address, assign them different enough sets of properties that they’ll stay separate in your mind. Part of this memory improvement project will be to come up with ways to do that. ==== Significance ==== The second major aspect of memorization I identify is significance. For the mind to memorize something, it has to believe that it’s worth remembering. Here are some of the ways that can happen. Again, I’ve grouped them so they’re easier to remember. My categories for significance are familiarity, emotion, expression, timing, and interaction. Some of the categories from the description discussion apply to various aspects of significance as well—passive and active, internal and external. I’ll expand on them in the sections that follow. An item can gain significance as you discover its properties, such as other items that connect to it. For example, a man’s name may mean nothing to you and be quite forgettable until you learn he’s a brother you never knew you had. This ability of one item to elevate the significance of other items will be very important for the memory techniques I discuss later. ===== Familiarity ===== One obvious type of familiarity is '''knowledge'''. Information you’ve learned before is generally more significant to you than new information. This is important for two reasons. First, if you’ve already learned an item but you don’t remember it well, it will still be easier to learn than information you’ve never seen before {27}. Second, as we’ll see in the observation section, you can use more significant information, such as items you’ve already learned, to increase the significance of other information you’re learning {47}. A different type of familiarity that carries significance is '''sense'''. That is, information you can understand is usually more memorable than nonsense. I think of sense as a type of familiarity in that you understand a piece of information when it conforms to your existing, familiar patterns of thought as well as connecting with your prior knowledge. ===== Emotion ===== Emotion can lend great significance to information, making it easy to remember, though in some cases emotion can be a hindrance to memory. The emotion involved doesn’t need to be intense for it to help memory. In fact, it can be very slight. It just needs to be enough to make the material stand out as important in some way. Emotion that’s too intense may distort your understanding of the information anyway. ====== Internal emotional significance ====== In terms of emotion, I define '''internal significance''' as significance that is derived from the item’s properties. Internal emotional significance means that the item has properties that catch your attention. The information could be funny, surprising, fascinating, outrageous, impressive, disgusting, frightening, exciting, sensible, or touching, for example. Any property of the information—internal or external, natural or incidental, passive or active—can have significance that aids in remembering that information. Uniqueness, or novelty, while most important for separating similar information, also adds an element of significance to the information, if the item is unique in some way that feels significant {107}. It carries a sense of specialness: This item is worth paying attention to because it is one of a kind. On a subtler level, simply having a purpose can make an item more significant, even if it gets its purpose simply from being placed in a list or given a name. These features convey the sense that the item is supposed to be there. Internal emotional significance can be active or passive. Passive significance is reflected in the simple experience of emotionally reacting to the information you’re studying. The information is the type that is already important to you. Hence, I call this kind of significance '''reaction'''. Again, it doesn’t have to be a strong reaction, just a distinct one. A reaction doesn’t necessarily cement the details in your mind, so you may need to supplement your reaction with specific memorizing techniques, but it makes a difference. Taking the right '''attitude''' toward the material you’re learning is one example of active internal emotional significance. That is, you purposely see the information as significant. To do this, you take an interest in what you’re learning. You look for ways the information could be interesting or important or cause some other reaction in you, whether through the information’s features or connections, even though those ways aren’t obvious to you at first. ====== External emotional significance ====== I define external emotional significance as significance that the learner imposes on the information, whether actively or passively, because of the way the learner is feeling apart from the information itself. I haven’t explored this topic very far, and the books I’ve read don’t really cover it, so I’ll just mention it briefly. On the passive side, strong emotions, such as during a traumatic experience, can cement even random facts into your mind. In addition, events that happen directly in relation to the material you’re learning will often lend them significance. For example, the embarrassment of getting an answer wrong in front of other people makes the right information feel very important, and afterward it tends to stick in the mind! Similarly, the shift from confusion to understanding can give an item significance. Once an incomprehensible item makes sense, the feelings of relief and inspiration you get from finally understanding it can make it more significant. Necessity is another factor that can catch your attention. If the information is simple enough, knowing you need to know it can make it more memorable. Unless the necessity comes with a lot of stress, that is. Stress works against memory, which I discuss below. On the active side, you may be able to set an emotional tone for your study time via music, narrative, or some other form of art, and as you interpret the information by that mood, you may see new properties of it pop out as significant. But emotion also can hinder learning. In particular, stress works against both memorizing and recalling things {64-66}. I believe this is partly because stress and other strong emotions draw your attention away from what you’re learning and recalling, but I suspect there are other processes at work as well. My experience is that the mind can lock up under stress {Gladwell}. ===== Expression ===== The mind has several ways of taking in and processing information: visual, verbal, musical, narrative, kinesthetic. I’ll call them modes of expression. Some of these types of information are more memorable than others. It differs from person to person, but there are some trends. Visual information, for example, especially spatial, tends to be very easy for most people to remember {Higbee 37-39}. ===== Timing ===== I’ve encountered a few observations related to the timing of memory storage and retrieval relative to other things. I’ll probably try to generalize these later. You remember items in a list more or less easily depending on their position in the list {53}. You remember better things you learn just before sleeping and less well things you learn right after sleeping {44}. Most forgetting happens soon after learning. The rate slows down and levels off after that {35}. ===== Interaction ===== Your interaction with the material over time, even without any notable emotion, can lend the material significance. ====== Attention ====== Paying attention to the material you’re learning is one of the most basic and important ways of creating significance for it. Of course, you have to pay attention in order to notice things about the information and build up its properties in your mind {59}, but attention also clues your mind in that the information is important. This goes for any active part of memorization. ====== Repetition ====== I define '''repetition''' as repeated storage of an item in memory. Memory researchers know that spaced repetition is a key factor of learning {78-80}. I don’t know how it works out neurologically, but my interpretation is that being exposed to the same information repeatedly over a long period of time clues the mind in that it’s important. Many people think this type of repetition is what memorizing is. Reading over the information a few times is their only technique. But by itself, it’s really a very flimsy one, and we have many more resources at our disposal for planting information firmly in our minds {62}, which of course are the subject of this project. ====== Recitation ====== I define '''recitation''' as repeated retrieval of an item from memory. It seems to me that forcing yourself to recall information using spaced repetition is even more effective than simply exposing yourself to the information {83}. This is why flashcards are an effective study tool. === Memory skills === We can make use of these memorization components by exercising various skills. I don’t think I’ll have a real grasp on this section until I’ve experimented much more with different learning techniques. But I’ve grouped the skills I’ve found so far into several interrelated categories that loosely form a sequence: focusing, observing, selecting, enhancing, organizing, associating, rehearsing, and searching. The first of these is a general skill, the next several are storage skills, and the last is a retrieval skill. To memorize for long-term recall, you need to corral your attention, ask yourself questions about the information, pick out the information you need to know and the other information that will help you remember it, get the information into an easily memorizable form, arrange it all so you can easily link the information together, mentally form the connections, cement the connections over time, and then search your mind for the information when it’s time to recall it. In reality when studying various types of material for different purposes, you’ll mix these skills together rather than following them in a set sequence. ==== Focusing ==== Attention is a fundamental requirement both for active memorizing and for retrieval. So the first set of skills you’ll want to employ are those that focus the attention. The goal with these practices is to remove external and internal distractions. For external distractions, you’ll need to find a place and time that will keep you away from them. Find a quiet spot in the house, turn off the TV, go to the library, whatever circumstances you find the least distracting. You may have to observe yourself for a while and experiment with different setups. I like to sit in my car in a parking lot when I’m doing work that requires concentration. For internal distractions, you’ll need to settle or temporarily put aside disruptive thoughts and emotions. As I mentioned above, strong emotion, especially stress, can be a distraction from learning. So it pays to learn to relax and to remove stressors from your life. Relaxation techniques such as deep breathing exercises can go a long way to calm intrusive emotions. For thoughts that pull you away from the task at hand, it helps to write them down or tell them to someone, at least in summary form. That gives the part of your mind that’s concerned about them the assurance that you’ve given those thoughts some of the attention they deserve and that you’ll deal with them later, even if you haven’t completely resolved them now. And if you’re feeling worried about your memory’s performance when it’s time for recall, then the answer is to build your confidence. Your general confidence in your memory will grow as you practice the skills over time, especially when memorizing ''isn’t'' crucial. Then when you need to memorize something and the stakes are higher, studying to the extent that you overlearn the material will build your confidence that you know it, which will reduce your stress when it comes time to recall it {64-66}. Even if potential distractions are nearby, you may also find certain physical conditions for your study session that put you in a frame of mind for concentrating, such as playing certain kinds of music or simply sitting at a desk or in a room that over time you’ve associated with focused work {69}. In addition to removing distractions, you can help yourself focus by your attitude—gaining an interest in the material you’re learning. This has the added benefit of making the material more significant, which will make it easier to remember {70-71}. You can do a number of things to create interest while studying, which I’ll talk about below. But it can help to start the study session by reminding yourself of the reasons focus and interest are important. And if you can find reasons that are actually important to you personally and not simply reasons other people have for learning, that will be more convincing to you. ==== Observing ==== The rest of the skills relate to working with the specific information you’re memorizing. '''Observation''' is the skill of directing the attention to the specifics of what you’re learning, now that you’ve focused that attention. It’s the skill of noticing an item’s properties, both internal and external (its features and connections). These are the handles you’ll use to retrieve the information, and the main purpose of observation is to prepare the material you’re learning for planting in your mind via association and rehearsal. For this skill, keep in mind that I’m using the word ''item'' flexibly. An item can be anything from a single word to a whole book, to use a verbal example. An item can be subdivided into other items so you can concentrate on memorizing them separately, or it can be combined with other items to form a new whole, a process I’ll cover in the association section below. Before an item is subdivided, you can think of its sub-items as some of its properties. One good way to direct your attention is to ask yourself questions. A question is a type of cue. It gives you a set of properties and prompts you to find the item that matches them and to answer with a label that represents the item. The difference between an observation question and a recall cue is that when you’re observing, you’re looking for items in the material you’re studying as well as in your mind. Since observation plays a part in several of the other memorization skills, questions are a tool that will appear in several of the following sections. ==== Selecting ==== The most straightforward task related to observation is what I’ll call '''selection'''. This is the skill of identifying which information is worth noticing. Two other questions will help you discover which information that is. First, what do you need to know from this set of information? Or coming at it from the other side, what cues do you expect to receive for recalling the information? And second, what information will help you remember it? The answer to this one encompasses at least two types of information. One type is information that’s significant to you, since we can use that to raise the significance of less memorable information. The other type is information that may be in your mind at the time you need to remember the item, such as another item you’ve just recalled. This information can act as a cue if you’ve associated it with the item in question. These two types of information worth noticing are another example of an internal-external division. The cues (which tell you what you need to know) indicate what information is important to your circumstances (which are external to you), and significance indicates what information is important to your mind (which is internal to you). Of course, the same information may be important to both. I’ll call the cue-based information '''important''' information and the significance-based information '''memorable''' information. ===== Important information ===== Two main reasons for observing properties that are related to your expected cues are, first, to make sure you cover everything you need to learn and, second, to decrease your mental load by ruling out the things you don’t. A first natural question is what your expected cues ''are''. That is, what do you expect to encounter that will prompt you to recall this information? If the cues aren’t immediately obvious, try approaching the answer by asking yourself what context you’ll be in when you need to recall the information, such as an exam, a meeting, a party, or traveling. In an exam, the cues will be the test questions. In a meeting, they might be questions posed by the other attendees or simply the invitation to begin giving a presentation. At a party, they could be the greetings of the other guests, which would prompt you to recall their names and other information about them. While traveling, the cues might be landmarks, which would prompt you to recall the need to turn, stop, or look for the next landmark. Once you know the recall context and the types of cues you’ll encounter, you can imagine yourself in that context and begin to list the specific cues you expect to find. For example, who specifically will be at the party? What questions will likely be on the exam? What will the people in the meeting want to know? And once you have the specific cues, you can observe the responses to them that are available in the information you’re studying. ===== Memorable information ===== You will naturally react to much of the information you encounter. This information is already memorable to you, and you probably won’t have trouble remembering at least the gist. The skill is to notice these reactions when they happen so you can take advantage of them to add significance to the rest of the information. You can observe your reactions as you view each item for the first time, asking yourself how you’re reacting to this item, or you can review your reactions after you’ve seen all the material, asking yourself which items you recall reacting to. Observing your reactions is useful because if you can draw your attention to information that’s significant to you, you’re more likely to recall it when you’re looking for ways to make the other information more memorable. ==== Enhancing ==== For the material that doesn’t seem very memorable, you’ll need to associate it with other information that is memorable or with information that draws out its significant aspects. The actual association will come later. First you need to pick out the specific memorable information to associate the forgettable item with. Since this skill involves expanding on each item in various ways and since ''elaboration'' is already taken, I’m calling it '''enhancement'''. I call the items that will make the item in question more memorable '''helper''' items. When you’re looking for helper items, first tell yourself that there is something interesting about the information, even if you can’t see it yet. Then with that attitude in mind, do some more observing. Sharpen your observation of the information’s features and expand your awareness of its connections. You can do this by asking more questions: How does this information make sense? Understanding is typically an important first step in committing an item to memory. What interests other people about this information {72}? Assume they have a good reason! Why was this information included? Assume it has a real point! How does it relate to other items in the material? It may help to think in terms of relations like causation, implication, similarity, and contrast. What does the information remind you of that’s already familiar to you {53}? This question will be important again when you’re using the skill of translation, which I’ll describe in a later section. The answers to most of these questions don’t have to make sense. Certainly you should try to understand the material’s actual meaning. But the mind can invent connections that are significant without being logical {94}. Bizarre juxtapositions tend to be memorable, for example {107}. To use our terminology from earlier, an item’s properties can be natural or incidental, so feel free to take advantage of both. ===== Translating ===== One important type of enhancement is '''translation''', creating an item that you intentionally view as equivalent to the original item. You can think of translation in terms of the RDF triples I mentioned earlier. An item can be linked to its properties via different relationships. These are the predicates of the triples. The causation, implication, similarity, and contrast from the enhancement questions above are some possible relationships. Equivalence is another one. In this relationship, the property specifies another item, a '''substitute''' item, that stands for the one you’re studying {109}, which I’ll call the '''target''' item. In identifying this property, you’re translating the item you’re learning into the substitute item. If the substitute item is very memorable and it cues you to remember the original item, then it makes the original item easier to access in your memory. This is the idea behind many mnemonic techniques and systems. What kinds of items would you need a substitute for? Generally, any item that you expect not to be memorable, anything that seems boring or meaningless to you. More specifically, researchers have found that most people have a harder time remembering words than images, and abstract words such as ''timeless'' tend to be harder to remember than concrete words such as ''apple'' {38, 57}. People also find proper names hard to remember {192}, even though names are concrete in a way, since they usually represent people and physical objects. What kinds of substitutes are helpful? A substitute should have at least two characteristics. First, it should have some kind of connection to the target item that makes sense to you. That is, it should share some properties with the target item that are significant to you. For example, you could choose a substitute that sounds similar to the words of the target item, such as substituting ''celery'' for ''salary''. Or you could choose a substitute that symbolizes the target, such as imagining a set of balancing scales for the term ''justice'' {109}. It’s important for the connection to be meaningful. If you choose a completely arbitrary substitute with no meaningful connection, it will be hard to remember the connection, and the substitute won’t be able to act as a handle very well. Or if you memorize that meaningless connection well and then you run across a target item that the substitute would work much better for, you might confuse the new target with the old one when you’re using the substitute for recall. It’s not important for the connection to be meaningful to everyone, only to you, unless you want the substitute to make it easy for everyone to memorize the item. The second characteristic of a substitute is that it should represent the target item uniquely. If you choose a substitute that could be tied to a lot of different items, it might be hard to remember which item you need at the time. For example, if you’re memorizing the word ''frozen yogurt'' and you picture a bowl of it, you might accidentally recall the word ''ice cream'' if you don’t encode more carefully while you’re learning it {119}. The substitute isn’t meant to be a definition of the target item, only a cue. Its relationship to the target item can be purely incidental. It’s only a handle for pulling the information into your conscious mind. Once it’s there, you can put the substitute out of your mind for the moment and think about the target information normally. This approach lets the substitute do its job of adding significance to meaningless information while keeping the substitute from getting in the way of using the target information itself. The substitute item will often be in another mode of expression from the original item. It can be helpful to augment your learning by translating the information into the most memorable modes for you and even into multiple modes. Most mnemonic systems are based on translating verbal information into mental images {103}. And in addition to visualizing the information, you might also want to vocalize it, speaking the items out loud. I often struggle to find a substitute word as quickly as I need in order to memorize things on the fly. I would like to get better at this. It would help to memorize a lot of substitute words beforehand so I don’t have to be creative in the moment when I’m frantically trying to memorize the material in front of me. I want to write a program to create a dictionary of substitute words and phrases for names and common words. I also want to identify commonly used elements, such as days of the week and family relationships, that I can make a special effort to memorize. You can also take a poetic or musical approach, giving the material a rhythm, making it rhyme {111}, setting it to music, or all three. And if you can, perform this poetry or music for yourself out loud so that your mind can more fully encode the experience. Since most mnemonic systems take a visual approach and not everyone is visual {118}, I would like to find or develop a system along these auditory lines. The things I’d have to collect would be common rhyming words to translate harder words into, rhymes for commonly needed words, common poetic meters, and familiar melodies. The musical system could also use different aspects of music to encode things, like intervals, chords, keys, time signatures, and key signatures, if those things would be memorable. It would be good to see research about that. I would also like to explore a kinesthetic approach to memorization, though I’m not sure what it would look like, maybe creating actions that you associate with the information and arranging the actions into sequences to represent the relationships between the items. Sign language might be helpful here. ==== Organizing ==== The purpose of organizing is to bring together items that will help you remember more of the material. As I said in the selecting section, if you’re memorizing a set of information, you’ll often want each piece of information to remind you of other information in the set. You’ll also want more significant items to prop up the less significant ones. Thus, it helps to see them close together so you can easily associate them later. One type of organization is to group the items. If the items are related logically and you’re free to rearrange them, then you can group the information by category {51}. This gives you a chance to associate the category with all the items within it. Restating pairs of items as RDF triples could reveal categories you can group the information into, if the RDF idea helps you. Another type of organization is to arrange the items in a logical sequence, which lets you associate each item with the next in the sequence {133}. As you’re organizing, there are at least two other general questions to keep in mind. One is which item you should remember first when recalling a set of items {135}. And the other is how you’ll know when you’ve recalled everything you need from the set. To answer the second question, you can observe the total number of items in the group, or if they form a list, the last item in the list. Once you’ve recalled that number of items or that last item, you’ll know you’re done {133}. ==== Associating ==== '''Association''' is the skill of mentally assigning properties to an item. Or to say it another way, it’s cementing multiple items together in your mind. You can associate as many items as you want, but for simplicity we’ll assume it’s two. You can associate the information actively or take advantage of the passive associating your mind is already doing. ===== Active association ===== As I understand it, the way to associate two pieces of information is to create a new whole that incorporates both of them. The new whole, of course, is another item with its own set of properties. You’d think this would just give you more to study and take up more time. The goal, though, is to create associations that are memorable enough that you won’t need to spend much time studying them {166, 180}. There are several types of wholes you can form through association. If you’re visualizing the items, the new whole could be a scene in your imagination that features the two items interacting {104-105}. If the information is purely verbal, it could be a sentence or rhyme that incorporates them {111}. Another type of whole is a sequence of events that the mind groups together. I place classical and operant conditioning in this category. Pavlov rang a bell and then fed his canine subjects, so later when he rang the bell again, the dogs expected food. Simply grouping the items can tie them together, at least in short-term memory. If you’re memorizing a series of digits, such as a telephone number, then grouping them into chunks of two or three can keep them in your short-term memory longer. Memory researchers call this practice '''chunking''' {20}. Chunking can also let you create more complicated associations. You can chunk items together that you have associated with other items. For example, an '''acronym''' is a chunk of letters—a word—whose letters represent other words. Once you remember the word, you can break it down into its letters and remember the other words the acronym is associated with {98}. One effective visual way to establish associations in your mind is to group the information spatially. Group the items you’re associating into different regions of a page or some other surface. Along these lines, you could create a map that relates the items to each other in some way, using geography as a metaphor if the information isn’t geographical. Grouping the items physically is effective because the mind remembers at least basic spatial relationships very easily {150-152}. Another mode of expression that serves in association is storytelling. Humans are narrative beings. We naturally think in terms of coherent sequences of events, and we care about them, especially when they have to do with us. So one type of association that can add significance to the material you’re learning is telling a story that incorporates it {135}, especially a story that relates to your life. It doesn’t have to be realistic, just memorable. ===== Passive association ===== Even without consciously trying, your mind associates things all the time. You can take advantage of passive association by controlling the context in which you learn things. In particular, your mind associates things in your environment with things you’re doing. So if you’re studying for a test, it can help to study in the room you’ll take the test in. The features of the room may remind you of the information you studied there. The same goes for when you’re rehearsing for a performance {67-68}. And as usual, your mind isn’t picky about whether the associations make sense. Most of these associations will probably be for incidental rather than natural properties. Since interference is always a problem, it helps to memorize different pieces of information in different settings, whether different locations entirely different parts of the place in which you’ll be recalling the information {76-77}. That way, if you remember where you were when you learned that thing you’re trying to recall, there’s a chance something about that setting will cue your recall of the information. Making use of passive association is easiest to do with your external context—where you are—but it also includes your internal context—what state of mind you’re in. It also helps to try to learn the material in the same mental condition in which you’ll recall it (the same mood, for example). So if you’re going to be sober when you take a test, don’t be drunk while you’re studying for it {69}. ==== Rehearsing ==== Even the most memorable information will fade over time and become hard to recall if left alone. So in addition to enhancing and associating the information, you need to '''rehearse''' it. Rehearsal can take the form of both repetition and recitation, but recitation will cement the information in your mind more quickly. You can rehearse through recitation in a number of ways, such as using flashcards or having another person quiz you. But the basic procedure is to present yourself with a cue and then take a few seconds to try to recall the corresponding items. Then receive feedback on your result. If you were able to recall something, check the answer to see if you were right. If your recall was wrong or you couldn’t recall the item at all, use the feedback as a way to repeat your mental storage of the information, maybe looking for a new way to enhance it. Then cue yourself for the information again later. Feedback both lets you assess your knowledge and sustains your interest in the material {72-73}. Forgetting takes a certain shape over time. You forget most of what you learn right after you’ve seen it for the first time. After that the rate at which you forget the material slows down and levels off {35}. So your first study session should be a review of the material right after you first encounter it {89}. Learning also takes a certain shape over time. Your study sessions for the material should be frequent at first, but you can space them out more and more as your recall of the material becomes easier {89-90}. There are several algorithms for this kind of spaced repetition that can help you schedule your learning, such as the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leitner_system Leitner system]. ==== Searching ==== The mind stores information by indexing it by its properties. These properties are handles you can grab to retrieve the information as you search your mind for it based on those properties. So when you want to recall something and it’s not coming to mind right away, you can try to find it by suggesting properties to yourself that the information might have and seeing if the suggestion brings the information to the surface. Try to think of as many related types of information as you can, and one or more may trigger the memory. For example, if you enter a room and don’t remember why, look around the room in case your purpose was related to any of the objects in it, retrace your steps in case your previous locations gave you a reason to enter the room, and remember what you were talking or thinking about {Higbee 211}. Kenneth Higbee calls this the “think around it” technique {55-56}. === Applications === The components of memory I’ve discussed can be put together and applied to various problems that require memorization. Programmers sometimes write cookbooks that contain example code. The examples solve common problems in a particular language that don’t have immediately obvious solutions. Using the elements of memory in the above analysis as a rudimentary mental programming language, I’d like to do the same for common memory tasks. These applications can be built up in layers, with simpler applications becoming components in more complex ones. I’m organizing this section around tasks rather than the techniques that accomplish them, because each task can encompass a number of techniques. Since this essay is a summary and I haven’t thought very far about most of these applications, I’ll only cover them briefly here. ==== Holistic information ==== This category includes memorizing text, images, concepts, and music. With this type of information, it doesn’t work well to break it into a list of small components and then string them together with a series of associations, as in the mnemonic systems below. You have to recall it rapidly and fluidly, sometimes even nonlinearly, so it needs to be stored efficiently as a whole unit. You can think of it as assigning a single value, such as a string, to a variable. One good tool for rehearsing text is the [http://bencrowder.net/blog/2011/03/erasure/ erasure method], where several words are erased at random from the text before each repetition. This allows the surrounding words to serve as cues for a word that’s been erased. ==== Dates and times ==== One useful element to encode mnemonically is dates and times. This gives you a way to timestamp your memories, plans, and any other time-specific information. It would be an essential component of any mental task management system. The technique I have in mind would be to encode each component you needed (day, month, year, hour, minute, etc.), and then associate them all together. Then associate the whole clump with whatever information you want to timestamp. ==== Names and faces ==== Remembering names and faces is a very popular use for memory techniques {Higbee 194}. People are very important, but names by themselves are fairly meaningless, and faces can often look alike to the untrained eye. The techniques for remembering them are apparently the same from book to book. The idea is to find a visualizable substitute word for the name and associate it with a distinguishing feature of the face {194-198}. But I have my own spin on the details, and maybe some of the books take this approach too. It can be hard to recognize a distinguishing feature unless you know what the nondescript version would look like {Redman 1-2}, and it’s also harder to identify features when you don’t have a vocabulary for them {Higbee 191}. So I’d like to try using the techniques of caricature artists and, if I’m feeling really enthusiastic, the vocabulary of forensic artists {George chapter 1} to locate and name what’s unique about a person’s face. One benefit of having a technical vocabulary is that you can use substitute words for those terms and associate them with the substitute word for the person’s name. If you’re not very visual, this could be a helpful technique. ==== Experiences ==== There are a number of reasons you might want to remember your experiences in detail. For example, you might want to relive your good memories, which can happen more vividly if you remember more about them. It also gives you a better story to tell. If you’re giving eyewitness testimony, you can provide a better account. And if you’re learning a skill, remembering your mistakes and successes with the skill is important. Probably some of the important factors in remembering experiences are knowing in advance what kinds of things to observe in your experiences, having a reliable way to represent sequence relations to yourself (i.e., this event followed that event), and developing the habit of reviewing the experience right after it happens. ==== Complex sets of information ==== This is often a facet of studying for a school or certification exam, but complex information shows up other places too. Many people’s jobs involve knowing complex webs of facts and concepts. What are the best ways to organize and memorize these webs? ===== Mnemonic systems ===== A mnemonic (pronounced without the first m) is any method for aiding the memory, though most researchers define it more narrowly in terms of elaborations, aids that rely on what I’ve called incidental external properties. Kenneth Higbee helpfully distinguishes between single-purpose mnemonics, which he calls '''mnemonic techniques''' and general-purpose ones, which he calls '''mnemonic systems''' {Higbee 94-95}. An example of a single-purpose mnemonic is using the acronym HOMES to remember the Great Lakes: Huron, Ontario, Michigan, Erie, and Superior {98}. Much of this essay has dealt with the principles that seem to lie behind both types of mnemonics. In this section I’ll talk about mnemonic systems. Memory specialists describe a number of mnemonic systems you can use to memorize certain kinds of lists. Higbee includes five mnemonic systems in ''Your Memory'': Link, Story, Loci, Peg, and Phonetic. The Link system involves visualizing each item of a list and associating that item with the next item in the list {133}. The Story system involves creating a story that incorporates each item in sequence {135}. The Loci system involves memorizing a series of familiar locations, such as the rooms of your home, and then visually associating each item of a list with one of those locations {145}. The Peg system involves memorizing substitutes for a set of numbers or letters and then visually associating each list item with the corresponding number or letter substitute in sequence {157-161}. The Phonetic system involves memorizing a set of consonant sounds for each digit (0-9), translating any numbers you’re memorizing into the consonant sounds of their digits, adding vowel sounds to create words, and, if the numbers are meant to give order to a list, visually associating each list item with the word representing its number in the sequence {173-178}. One aspect of memorizing complex information is to mnemonically create data structures in your mind, the kinds of data structures that are fundamental to programming. Higbee’s five systems fall under the categories of linked lists (Link, Story) and arrays (Loci, Peg, Phonetic). But there are other data structures: stacks, queues, multidimensional arrays, hash tables, heaps, graphs, weighted graphs, and various trees (binary, red-black, 2-3-4) {Lafore}. We can find ways to organize and associate information to mentally build these and any others we need. The key to creating these mental data structures and inventing others is to break them down into sets of key-value pairs. To memorize the pairs, you associate the key with the value using the techniques from the association section above. Even a simple scalar variable is a variable name paired with the value assigned to it. The set of variables in a running program can be thought of as a hash table with the variable names as the keys. And you can think of an array as a hash table with the index numbers as the keys. If you’re using the data structure in a larger context and you might confuse its items with data from another structure, you could encode the keys using a different method or category (such as using animals for one variable’s keys and plants for another’s), or you could include the variable name with each key. So if you’re using a visual mnemonic technique, you’d create one image that incorporates your substitute images for the variable name, the key, and the value. This last technique treats the key as an address for the value. The value lives at key X within variable Y. You can extend this technique to account for data structures with several levels, such as trees or multidimensional arrays. This approach also treats the data structure like a database table with a primary key made up of several fields. In addition to creating the data structures themselves, it’s important to know basic algorithms for inserting, deleting, sorting, and searching for items in them, so I’d like to develop mental versions of those tasks too. ===== Rehearsal ===== Another aspect of memorizing complex information is to drill yourself, such as with with flashcards, which are an easy way to take advantage of spaced repetition. People normally use flashcards to study binary facts, such as sets of foreign vocabulary words. But as we’ve seen, key-value pairs can represent most types of information. This includes the points in an outline, the relationships in a concept map, or the cells in a table. So you could conceivably use flashcards to memorize these types of charts as well. I’d like to program a tool that will convert things like outlines and tables into flashcards. ==== Studying for an exam ==== My first motivation for learning about memory was to study more effectively for tests and not worry that I didn’t know the material. Studying effectively turns out to be a complex process of planning your study time and place, taking on the right attitude, organizing the material, and using effective memory techniques. Some type of chart would be helpful in making decisions about these steps. ==== Task management ==== My latest motivation for learning about memory has been to supplement the productivity system David Allen describes in his book ''Getting Things Done'' (often abbreviated GTD). Allen emphasizes recording your tasks in an external system, such as a planner, that is organized by context, because you can’t rely on your mind to remember everything you need to do when you’re in the right time and place for doing it {Allen 16, 21-23}. I think that the way GTD brings together the concepts of context, next actions, and horizons of focus is brilliant and very effective for helping to stay on top of one’s internal and external commitments. I also agree that an external system is easier to rely on than the mind. But is it really true that the mind is useless as a task manager? I think that using memory techniques creatively, it’s possible to do GTD mentally. For example, you could create a substitute item for each context and associate it with your list of next actions for that context, which you could memorize using the Link system. But at the very least, you can use memory techniques to remember tasks long enough to write them down later if you come up with them in the shower. === Next steps === My next step is to begin experimenting with memory techniques by memorizing things that are important to me. I’ll especially concentrate on finding substitute words and developing techniques for selecting, enhancing, and organizing. === References === “Leitner system.” Wikipedia. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leitner_system http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leitner_system]. “Resource Description Framework.” Wikipedia. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Resource_Description_Framework http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Resource_Description_Framework]. Allen, David. ''Getting Things Done''. New York: Penguin, 2001. Preview at [http://books.google.com/books?id=iykLVJAK49kC http://books.google.com/books?id=iykLVJAK49kC]. Baddeley, Alan. ''Your Memory: A User’s Guide''. New illustrated ed. Buffalo, NY: Firefly, 2004. Crowder, Ben. “Erasure.” BenCrowder.net. [http://bencrowder.net/blog/2011/03/erasure/ http://bencrowder.net/blog/2011/03/erasure/]. George, Robert M. ''Facial Geometry: Graphic Facial Analysis for Forensic Artists''. Springfield, IL: Charles C Thomas, 2007. Gladwell, Malcolm. “The Art of Failure.” New Yorker, August 21, 2000. [http://www.gladwell.com/2000/2000_08_21_a_choking.htm http://www.gladwell.com/2000/2000_08_21_a_choking.htm]. Higbee, Kenneth. ''Your Memory: How It Works and How to Improve It''. 2nd ed. New York: Prentice Hall, 1988. Preview at [http://books.google.com/books?id=N6FPQzBpheEC http://books.google.com/books?id=N6FPQzBpheEC]. Lafore, Robert. ''Data Structures and Algorithms in Java''. 2nd ed. Indianapolis, IN: Sams, 2003. Redman, Lenn. ''How to Draw Caricatures''. Chicago: Contemporary, 1984. Worthen, James B. and R. Reed Hunt. ''Mnemonology: Mnemonics for the 21st Century''. Essays in Cognitive Psychology. New York: Taylor &amp; Francis Group, Psychology Press, 2011. 63d3f0962f157a168815c9dcb48b1db9451d88f6 14 9 16 2012-10-26T05:30:51Z Andy Culbertson 1 Assigned to category Topics. wikitext text/x-wiki [[Category:Topics]] 44384ab6ce771533c6f553b206f1eb55f3edb8f0 14 10 18 2012-10-26T05:30:54Z Andy Culbertson 1 Assigned to category Topics. wikitext text/x-wiki [[Category:Topics]] 44384ab6ce771533c6f553b206f1eb55f3edb8f0 14 11 20 2012-10-26T05:30:56Z Andy Culbertson 1 Assigned to category Topics. wikitext text/x-wiki [[Category:Topics]] 44384ab6ce771533c6f553b206f1eb55f3edb8f0 14 12 22 2012-10-26T05:31:00Z Andy Culbertson 1 Assigned to category Topics. wikitext text/x-wiki [[Category:Topics]] 44384ab6ce771533c6f553b206f1eb55f3edb8f0 14 13 24 2012-10-26T05:31:00Z Andy Culbertson 1 Assigned to category Topics. wikitext text/x-wiki [[Category:Topics]] 44384ab6ce771533c6f553b206f1eb55f3edb8f0 14 14 26 2012-10-26T05:31:02Z Andy Culbertson 1 Assigned to category Topics. wikitext text/x-wiki [[Category:Topics]] 44384ab6ce771533c6f553b206f1eb55f3edb8f0 14 15 28 2012-10-26T05:31:03Z Andy Culbertson 1 Assigned to category Topics. wikitext text/x-wiki [[Category:Topics]] 44384ab6ce771533c6f553b206f1eb55f3edb8f0 14 2 2 2012-10-26T05:32:35Z Andy Culbertson 1 Assigned to category Categories. wikitext text/x-wiki [[Category:Categories]] edd7c1a06a4e48ba36265d707e706b29c4b30967 3 2 2014-05-07T03:57:04Z Andy Culbertson 1 1 revision: Import of structural pages wikitext text/x-wiki [[Category:Categories]] edd7c1a06a4e48ba36265d707e706b29c4b30967 14 3 4 2012-10-26T05:32:37Z Andy Culbertson 1 Assigned to category Categories. wikitext text/x-wiki [[Category:Categories]] edd7c1a06a4e48ba36265d707e706b29c4b30967 14 4 6 2012-10-26T05:32:39Z Andy Culbertson 1 Assigned to category Categories. wikitext text/x-wiki [[Category:Categories]] edd7c1a06a4e48ba36265d707e706b29c4b30967 14 5 8 2012-10-26T06:21:36Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added a description and the category Statuses. wikitext text/x-wiki These are articles that aren't finished but that I'm still working on, at least in principle. [[Category:Statuses]] 3e371731b1147b9dbb0ee5e19eb07690d6d155c7 14 6 10 2012-10-26T06:21:39Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added a description and the category Statuses. wikitext text/x-wiki These are articles that I've declared good enough, at least for the moment. [[Category:Statuses]] 6820adbf1753547f25b4b12f84360292066d0afc 14 7 12 2012-10-26T06:21:42Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added a description and the category Statuses. wikitext text/x-wiki These are articles I don't plan to finish. [[Category:Statuses]] 861a3ec861f77f44d2ae78d150b467a66f8a24b4 14 8 14 2012-10-26T06:21:45Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added a description and the category Statuses. wikitext text/x-wiki These are articles that are now irrelevant because of changing circumstances. [[Category:Statuses]] 737e94cf4aa962e28a2e86c7a6015cfd5886b322 0 1 32 1 2012-10-28T02:53:01Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added a STEM expansion and the Site category link. wikitext text/x-wiki == Welcome == This is my public, personal wiki, a home for my essays and other projects. My blog is [http://www.thinkulum.net/blog here]. == Topics == {| class="wikitable" width="100%" |- style="vertical-align: top" | * '''[[:Category:Religion|Religion]]''' * '''[[:Category:Philosophy|Philosophy]]''' * '''[[:Category:Social science|Social science]]''' * '''[[:Category:Arts|The arts]]''' | * '''[[:Category:STEM|STEM]]''' (science, technology, engineering, math) * '''[[:Category:Weirdness|Weirdness]]''' * '''[[:Category:Life maintenance|Life maintenance]]''' * '''[[:Category:Site|Site]]''' |} 998e11c824132bf9a505a37661f5674741a0613f 1 2014-05-07T03:45:06Z MediaWiki default 0 wikitext text/x-wiki '''MediaWiki has been successfully installed.''' Consult the [//meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Help:Contents User's Guide] for information on using the wiki software. == Getting started == * [//www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Manual:Configuration_settings Configuration settings list] * [//www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Manual:FAQ MediaWiki FAQ] * [https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/mediawiki-announce MediaWiki release mailing list] * [//www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Localisation#Translation_resources Localise MediaWiki for your language] 678d21d1a2ff9fd446dcad01da0b30b375eb7a4d 14 16 30 2012-10-28T02:54:22Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added a description and the category Topics. wikitext text/x-wiki These are articles about this website. [[Category:Topics]] 15a8dbeb8389ef868d409f80e43b679ff4a215af 14 3 5 4 2014-05-07T03:57:04Z Andy Culbertson 1 1 revision: Import of structural pages wikitext text/x-wiki [[Category:Categories]] edd7c1a06a4e48ba36265d707e706b29c4b30967 14 4 7 6 2014-05-07T03:57:04Z Andy Culbertson 1 1 revision: Import of structural pages wikitext text/x-wiki [[Category:Categories]] edd7c1a06a4e48ba36265d707e706b29c4b30967 14 5 9 8 2014-05-07T03:57:04Z Andy Culbertson 1 1 revision: Import of structural pages wikitext text/x-wiki These are articles that aren't finished but that I'm still working on, at least in principle. [[Category:Statuses]] 3e371731b1147b9dbb0ee5e19eb07690d6d155c7 14 6 11 10 2014-05-07T03:57:04Z Andy Culbertson 1 1 revision: Import of structural pages wikitext text/x-wiki These are articles that I've declared good enough, at least for the moment. [[Category:Statuses]] 6820adbf1753547f25b4b12f84360292066d0afc 14 7 13 12 2014-05-07T03:57:04Z Andy Culbertson 1 1 revision: Import of structural pages wikitext text/x-wiki These are articles I don't plan to finish. [[Category:Statuses]] 861a3ec861f77f44d2ae78d150b467a66f8a24b4 14 8 15 14 2014-05-07T03:57:04Z Andy Culbertson 1 1 revision: Import of structural pages wikitext text/x-wiki These are articles that are now irrelevant because of changing circumstances. [[Category:Statuses]] 737e94cf4aa962e28a2e86c7a6015cfd5886b322 14 9 17 16 2014-05-07T03:57:04Z Andy Culbertson 1 1 revision: Import of structural pages wikitext text/x-wiki [[Category:Topics]] 44384ab6ce771533c6f553b206f1eb55f3edb8f0 14 10 19 18 2014-05-07T03:57:04Z Andy Culbertson 1 1 revision: Import of structural pages wikitext text/x-wiki [[Category:Topics]] 44384ab6ce771533c6f553b206f1eb55f3edb8f0 14 11 21 20 2014-05-07T03:57:05Z Andy Culbertson 1 1 revision: Import of structural pages wikitext text/x-wiki [[Category:Topics]] 44384ab6ce771533c6f553b206f1eb55f3edb8f0 14 12 23 22 2014-05-07T03:57:05Z Andy Culbertson 1 1 revision: Import of structural pages wikitext text/x-wiki [[Category:Topics]] 44384ab6ce771533c6f553b206f1eb55f3edb8f0 14 13 25 24 2014-05-07T03:57:05Z Andy Culbertson 1 1 revision: Import of structural pages wikitext text/x-wiki [[Category:Topics]] 44384ab6ce771533c6f553b206f1eb55f3edb8f0 14 14 27 26 2014-05-07T03:57:05Z Andy Culbertson 1 1 revision: Import of structural pages wikitext text/x-wiki [[Category:Topics]] 44384ab6ce771533c6f553b206f1eb55f3edb8f0 14 15 29 28 2014-05-07T03:57:05Z Andy Culbertson 1 1 revision: Import of structural pages wikitext text/x-wiki [[Category:Topics]] 44384ab6ce771533c6f553b206f1eb55f3edb8f0 14 16 31 30 2014-05-07T03:57:05Z Andy Culbertson 1 1 revision: Import of structural pages wikitext text/x-wiki These are articles about this website. [[Category:Topics]] 15a8dbeb8389ef868d409f80e43b679ff4a215af 0 1 33 1 2014-05-07T03:57:05Z Andy Culbertson 1 1 revision: Import of structural pages wikitext text/x-wiki '''MediaWiki has been successfully installed.''' Consult the [//meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Help:Contents User's Guide] for information on using the wiki software. == Getting started == * [//www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Manual:Configuration_settings Configuration settings list] * [//www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Manual:FAQ MediaWiki FAQ] * [https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/mediawiki-announce MediaWiki release mailing list] * [//www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Localisation#Translation_resources Localise MediaWiki for your language] 678d21d1a2ff9fd446dcad01da0b30b375eb7a4d 98 33 2014-05-07T04:00:02Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the intro text and topic category links. wikitext text/x-wiki == Welcome == This is my public, personal wiki, a home for my essays and other projects. My blog is [http://www.thinkulum.net/blog here]. == Topics == {| class=&quot;wikitable&quot; width=&quot;100%&quot; |- style=&quot;vertical-align: top&quot; | * '''[[:Category:Religion|Religion]]''' * '''[[:Category:Philosophy|Philosophy]]''' * '''[[:Category:Social science|Social science]]''' * '''[[:Category:Arts|The arts]]''' | * '''[[:Category:STEM|STEM]]''' (science, technology, engineering, math) * '''[[:Category:Weirdness|Weirdness]]''' * '''[[:Category:Life maintenance|Life maintenance]]''' * '''[[:Category:Site|Site]]''' |} f03ffac3c4def489bea7d45fb42c3ba4e827ba6a 0 17 35 34 2014-05-07T03:57:50Z Andy Culbertson 1 1 revision: Import of WordPress content wikitext text/x-wiki 3-20-2005 Here is a picture of me: <center>[[File:me2.png]]</center> Yeah, I wear dress clothes all the time because I’m too lazy to change when I get home. I bought the wall hanging from some Kenyan librarians my boss hosted when I worked at the college library. 1cd867e81015f1631e0388163d5cb5d6e199bd19 0 18 37 36 2014-05-07T03:57:50Z Andy Culbertson 1 1 revision: Import of WordPress content wikitext text/x-wiki This is an index page from an old version of this site. [[Aesthetics Introduction]] [http://del.icio.us/thinkulum/aesthetics Aesthetics links] === Music === === Writing === === Art === === Comics === === Games === === Mass media === === Humor === a83af3b73d3059769dc91c215b24283ed785cdc8 0 19 39 38 2014-05-07T03:57:50Z Andy Culbertson 1 1 revision: Import of WordPress content wikitext text/x-wiki Version 1.1, 5-1-05 “Aesthetics” is a strange title. Why don’t I just call it “Entertainment” or “Art”? Well, I would, but “entertainment” is too superficial for what I have in mind, and “art” sounds too highbrow; some of what’s here ''is'' just entertainment. But I am at heart a philosopher rather than an artist or entertainer or even a consumer, so I’ve called it something philosophical, “Aesthetics.” I do like immersing myself in the experience of fun, beautiful, or profound things, but I am equally (or more) interested in the ideas they represent and in what ''makes'' them fun, beautiful, or profound. You’ll notice I also have an aesthetics section on the philosophy page. I’ll try to put my more theoretical discussions of aesthetics there. I guess you could call the subject of this page “applied aesthetics.” My general aesthetic theory is that people have different emotional or intellectual desires in life, and they use art to help fulfill them. This leads them into different realms of artistic taste. For instance, I like to use music to create an environment for me to live in, so I don’t listen to music that takes a lot of concentration to appreciate. I tend to listen to new age or ambient music, sometimes classical. I like art that I can “get” at a glance but which also has deeper layers of structure and meaning that I can uncover over time. Additionally, my favorite genres of just about everything are science fiction and fantasy. This is due to the fact that the real world is boring. Before I get started on the subsections, a note on my links: I link to websites I like, but I don’t necessarily approve of everything on those sites. This is true whenever anybody links to anything on the web, but I just want to say to my more conservative readers that while I try to associate myself with wholesome things, sometimes the things I like about a work are accompanied by other things I could do without (usually it’s language and violence). I try to overlook those and just enjoy the parts I do like. I hope my aesthetic and other values will become evident to you as you read through my site. === Music === I’ve been a musician since I was three. I took violin lessons from three till first grade, piano first through twelfth, French horn in band sixth grade through high school, and church choir the whole time. By the end of high school, my musical activities had proliferated so much that I was tired of music altogether. Except for band. Band, I can honestly say, was the best thing I did in school, and I loved it the whole way through. I still kind of miss the French horn. I’ll probably pick it up again someday. When I went to college, I dropped music entirely for a couple of years, after which I helped out with the music at church until our little church closed. Performing is fun (when I’m not doing too much of it), but what I really want to do is compose. This is what I unconsciously wished I was doing whenever I’d sit down at the piano to practice. And I did compose some, though it wasn’t much and not that good. But what I really wanted my teachers couldn’t give me, which was formal training in composition. I did take a music theory class in high school, but that was about it. Wheaton offers a major in composition, but I had other priorities. You can’t major in everything. So now I plan to teach myself. I want to start with tonal harmony and counterpoint and then get into digital music. And of course, I listen to music, too. I don’t connect with most styles of popular music. As I mentioned earlier, mostly I listen to new age, ambient, and other electronic music, some classical, and a few movie and game soundtracks. I used to listen to a lot of Christian music, but these days I don’t connect well with Contemporary Christian Music. I do like hymns. But in general I’m an instrumental person. Vocal music just doesn’t do much for me, with a few exceptions. This section is called “Music,” but other auditory things will likely appear here as well, like sound effects and instrument samples. === Writing === Writing. Yes, I read as well as write. But “literature,” again, sounds too highbrow. I occasionally read high art literature but not that much. I would use “narrative,” but I’m interested in other kinds of writing as well. So I’ll just call the whole thing writing because really, when I’m analyzing other people’s writing, my goal is to know how to write better myself. I read almost no fiction while I was a teenager, except for the stuff we were forced to read in school. I read a lot of fiction when I was younger, but once I hit my teenage years my analytical mind took over, and I read mainly apologetics. What brought me back was a video game. I never played them growing up, but my senior year of college I was introduced to ''Chrono Trigger'', and I was hooked. ''Chrono Trigger'' was an RPG for the Super Nintendo that came out in 1995. I played it for hours at a time, and instead of feeling brain-dead like I did after playing other video games, I always came out of it feeling exhilarated. As I looked for other games like it, I realized that what I liked most about it was the plot, and of course, I could get that from literature. So I broke my narrative fast and picked up ''The Hobbit'', a book I had tried to read twice before and had dropped in the middle of Mirkwood each time. This time I finished it and moved on to ''The Lord of the Rings''. And my fiction consumption has just snowballed from there. Usually I read science fiction and fantasy. And I mostly listen to audiobooks because it lets me do other things at the same time. Despite all this fiction I’m reading, I haven’t been writing any stories like I did when I was little. I have these huge mental blocks that keep me from getting very far with … well, anything, but especially creative writing. My writing is all of a more expositional nature. This is something I hope to overcome. Narrative really fascinates me, and I have this impulse to create that so rarely gets channeled into anything productive. Poetry rarely does anything for me, usually because I find it hard to understand, but I strongly prefer metrical, rhyming poetry over freeverse. I especially appreciate meter-and-rhyme when it occurs in music, though I am also impressed when someone can set prose to a melody and not sound like they’re rambling musically. === Art === I’m including in this category anything visual, such as architecture. I know even less about visual art than the other areas of aesthetics, and my tastes here are even more limited. I’m pretty much at the level of pop culture. Art museums bore me about as much as the average person. I don’t typically care about any art produced before the twentieth century, and the avant garde types of modern art are nonsensical to me or at least uninteresting. My favorite kinds of art are nature photography, fantasy art, and surrealism. Then I have other miscellaneous visual interests, mostly having to do with computers and publishing, like fonts and tiling images. Sometime I want to explore the ins and outs of computer graphics. === Comics === Comics, along with video games, were one of those things I wished I could get into when I was young but didn’t because they cost too much. I did grow up on comic-related TV shows and movies, however. I watched ''Superfriends'', ''The Incredible Hulk'', ''Spider-Man'', ''Wonder Woman'', ''Batman''. Superman and Wonder Woman were at the top of my list of superheros, though they’ve now been supplanted by Spider-Man. There’s something about comics that’s just ''cool'' (not a word I use often, but here it fits). To some degree it depends on the comic, but partly it’s the medium itself that intrigues me. The first comic book I actually read was volume one of Neil Gaiman’s ''The Sandman''. Kind of a dark one to start out on, but that’s what I picked up. Anyway, that launched me into comic books. But one comic medium I had already discovered was ''webcomics''! What a great way to pass the time. I occasionally have the urge to try drawing my own, but who knows if that will happen. I can’t do ''everything''. I have to keep reminding myself of that (if you don’t know what I mean, take a look around this site!). I also dabble in anime and manga, which I like because they are weird and because they are character-driven. And for the record, ''Calvin and Hobbes'' is the best comic strip in the universe. The best webcomic in the universe is [http://www.gpf-comics.com/ General Protection Fault]. === Games === In a sense, games are the centerpiece of my aesthetic interests, specifically what I call “narrative games.” These are any games that revolve around stories. My primary focus is on computer games, like text adventures and computer RPGs. Narrative games bring together two topics that are deeply fascinating to me: narrative and interaction. Why they are so intriguing to me is a mystery I haven’t yet explored. Of course, most people wouldn’t explore it at all. Those people are normal. As I mentioned in the writing section, the game that got me started was ''Chrono Trigger'', which I played about six years after it came out. I love that game. To a certain degree it has become the model by which I evaluate many of the other games I play, at least the RPGs. Since then I’ve been playing a fairly steady stream of RPGs and adventure games, both commercial and freeware. One of my goals in life is to write at least one or two of these games. I want to write at least one text adventure and one graphical adventure. There are other kinds of games I want to create, too–games that are mindless but rewarding. I mean, really. I play games to relax, not to challenge myself. Most games take too much thought or skill. === Mass media === I don’t watch much TV or many movies, but I listen to the radio a lot. I used to alternate between talk and music in phases, but now my musical tastes have drifted away from the kinds of things that get played on the radio, so I listen to talk radio almost exclusively. And even though I pay very little attention to mass culture, in this category goes one of the few things I can genuinely say I’m a fan of, and that’s ''Star Trek''. ''The X-Files'' comes in second. ''Star Wars'' is growing on me, along with one or two others. === Humor === Humor is necessary for my survival. I am addicted to it. And to go along with my philosopher tendencies, I also analyze it. Everything else in this section will be a surprise. a0e99f40036f69a63e4a6995479ff66e20234ff9 0 20 41 40 2014-05-07T03:57:50Z Andy Culbertson 1 1 revision: Import of WordPress content wikitext text/x-wiki Version 1.0, 3-20-05 Apologetics came to my attention very early as a part of my attempt to be comprehensive in evangelism. I wanted to know how to evangelize ''everyone''; and if I got right down to basics and found out how to convince atheists, I thought I could cover all my bases. There was a more practical reason for my study of apologetics, and that was that I really was trying to evangelize atheists. I was friends with at least a couple of them and also a Mormon. I spent most of my junior high and high school years trying to persuade them and got basically nowhere, but at least it helped me. Studying apologetics taught me a lot about critical thinking, Christianity, the Bible, philosophy, science, and scholarship in general. It also taught me that the world is very complicated. Not only do people not simply convert just because of a few arguments, but the truth is not always a simple matter to uncover. Things are not always as they appear. At first I read popular apologists because they were readily available and I wasn’t aware of anything else. But the libraries I visited did have a few books on the academic level; and once I discovered them, those were the authors I gravitated towards. Two notable examples were William Lane Craig and Michael Martin. The first Craig book I picked up was ''The Son Rises'', a popular-level treatment of his arguments for the resurrection. The resurrection had been the subject of one of Craig’s doctorates. I was immediately impressed. Michael Martin was not an apologist (not for Christianity anyway), but his book ''Atheism: A Philosophical Justification'' gave me my first major dose of analytic philosophy. As I wandered deeper into the world of academic apologetics, it bothered me that there was not more material like this available to the general Christian public. The average churchgoer was not going to walk into the local university library and make a beeline for the ''British Journal for the Philosophy of Science''. But this information was important, at least to people who wanted to talk meaningfully with the skeptics in their lives. Bridging that gap, I decided, was one of my life goals. Since then I have noticed a trend in that direction in Christian publishing, for which I am glad. In that first round of apologetic study, I concentrated on evolution, Mormonism, the cosmological argument, and the resurrection. Evolution was first, probably because it’s the most visible apologetic issue. I studied Mormonism because my best friend was Mormon, and we spent about two years straight debating religion over lunch. The cosmological argument came along because I wanted to study apologetics systematically, and the creation of the universe seemed like a natural place to start. The resurrection entered the scene with Craig’s book, and it stuck because it was just such a fascinating topic and, of course, so central to Christianity. I came out of that period thinking that a) the creation-evolution debate is hopelessly complex and not very important anyway; b) Mormonism is unfounded but not easy for its adherents to walk away from; c) the cosmological argument probably works but proves very little; and d) among Christian historical evidences, the arguments for the resurrection are uniquely compelling, both in their force and in their implications. Through an apologetics listserv I subscribed to, I was also introduced briefly to presuppositionalism. My study of apologetics was interrupted at the end of high school by my [[Spirituality Introduction|personal revival]], and during my college and grad school years I neglected apologetics almost completely. Too many other pressing issues were weighing on me. I did learn a lot more about presuppositionalism in my study of Reformed theology, and I considered myself a presuppositionalist for a while; but as with most things, my mounting pile of questions overcame my commitment to the position, and I ended up agnostic on the subject. I also took a short graduate course on apologetics which added some important elements to my thinking about the existential, human side of apologetics. But mostly I was occupied by other things. During this non-apologetic period, questions settled like dust on my mind. These came from both my studies and my independent reading and reflection. Despite being an evangelical school, Wheaton was still a good place to collect troubling questions about one’s faith. I found that my professors in the biblical studies program did a good job of exposing us to non-evangelical scholarship and of training us in evangelical methods of interpretation, but they did an uneven job of refuting their opponents’ viewpoints. I suppose you can’t do everything. But I did gain the tools to answer many of these questions myself. These questions nudged me back toward apologetics, and they had help. My professors and other influences inspired me to develop my research and critical thinking skills further. This resolve was strengthened when I became irrationally alarmed by some conspiracy theories just before the Iraq war. After I recovered from my brief paranoia, I concluded that I was too gullible and that the solution was to learn to use critical thought more consistently. Somewhat unexpectedly, I realized that if I was going to be a critically thinking person in general, I couldn’t leave religion out. I had to think critically about that as well. My reasoning was that each person is born into the world in circumstances that they didn’t choose, and these circumstances include one’s religious environment. People are accustomed to taking the religion they grew up in to be true. But if not all religions are basically the same, then letting your circumstances choose your religion amounts to rolling dice to decide on your spiritual condition, perhaps your eternal destiny. It would be wiser to make an informed choice. And I was not exempt. So the nudge back to apologetics became a shove. I knew the need for critical thought about religion from my earlier expeditions into apologetics, but during that period I took it for granted that Christianity had solid foundations. I probably gave lip service to evaluating one’s faith; but Christianity was my starting point, and as far as I was concerned it only needed rational defence, not evaluation. Non-Christians were the ones who really needed to evaluate their viewpoints. But once I acquired this more critical approach to life, I believed that Christianity had to be examined along with everything else. I didn’t want it ''fail'', but a serious test seemed necessary. So that’s where I find myself now. This section is not for the faint of heart. I ask difficult questions, and I don’t settle for easy answers. If you’re a believer and you easily careen into anxiety and doubt, maybe you would do better to go somewhere else. Check out my apologetics links. These guys will take care of you. I can promise you no such thing. 905b2670bfb2f5a26312d436eaa6d001705ba798 0 21 43 42 2014-05-07T03:57:50Z Andy Culbertson 1 1 revision: Import of WordPress content wikitext text/x-wiki Version 1.1, 5-1-05 Welcome to my web journal and site updates page. And now, a history lesson. Many eons ago I ran across an online diary on somebody’s Geocities site. I didn’t think much of it and didn’t even bookmark it (which is strange for me), but I filed it away in my memory and moved on. A couple of years later a random person read my website and recommended Xanga to me. I registered and then completely forgot about it for a long time. I didn’t actually pay attention to things like online diaries and weblogs until a few days after September 11th, when I Googled my way into a message board for online diarists. In one thread they had been discussing the attacks while they were happening. The transparency and emotional energy of their posts gripped me. But still I moved on. A few months later I was looking up ''Choose Your Own Adventure'' books on Google and wandered into an entry from a diary called [http://urbanality.diaryland.com/ urbanality]. This time it stuck. The entry was so inviting that I had to read the whole thing. I read all the archives, and I discovered once again something I often forget, that people can be utterly fascinating–as individuals, not just as abstractions. Online diarying looked so fun that I had to try it myself. So I signed up with [http://www.diaryland.com/ Diaryland], urbanality’s host, and typed away. I called it ''Taran, Assistant Pig-Keeper'' because I had just read the ''Prydain Chronicles'' by Lloyd Alexander. Then my friend at work [http://www.xanga.com/home.aspx?user=thisismyfathersworld April] started a weblog at Xanga. This brought my attention to the large number of Wheaton students who had Xanga blogs. An online community of which I could be a part! So I revived my neglected Xanga account. I like the blog format better than the diary format because the entries in a blog are more accessible, but I don’t like the way most people keep their archives. Blogs are typically arranged in reverse chronological order so that the most recent entry is at the top. This makes sense if you’re a visitor checking for the latest happenings. It does not make sense if you’re a visitor reading through the whole series of them from the beginning. You have to read backwards. Therefore, ''my'' archives will be arranged in chronological order! You may feel perfectly free to start at the top of the page like a normal reader of English. As I stated at the beginning of this intro, this blog is a combination web journal and site updates page. That keeps things simple, and simplicity is something this site can always use more of! I may keep my other blogs going for now, and if so, I’ll keep everything unified by posting links to those entries in the ''Thinkulum'' blog. Also, you should notice in my blog’s navigation links that I have a page for links to other people’s sites. There you will find some terrific people I know online and off who have websites. When you want to read about somebody’s life but get tired of mine, you can visit ''them''. :) Enjoy! 20a85cd79614a7ec42b9551d90602af34e933658 0 22 45 44 2014-05-07T03:57:51Z Andy Culbertson 1 1 revision: Import of WordPress content wikitext text/x-wiki This is an index page from an old version of this site. [[Christianity Introduction]] [http://del.icio.us/thinkulum/Christianity Christianity links] [[On Being an Agnostic Christian]] (added 5-13-06)<br/><br/>A long essay on the current state of my faith, mostly dealing with the conflict between belief and doubt. It provides a context for much of what will happen in this section. [[On Being an Agnostic Christian: The Severely Abridged Version|OBAC: The Severely Abridged Version]] (added 6-6-06)<br/><br/>If you don’t have time to read the original, try this one. === Spirituality === [[Spirituality Introduction]] === Apologetics === [[Apologetics Introduction]] === Evangelism === [[Evangelism Introduction]] === Hermeneutics === [[Hermeneutics Introduction]] === Theology === [[Theology Introduction]] [[My Current Theology]] (added 7-17-05) 56164d62db62c2e641289c877a3ae756a5cc9939 0 23 47 46 2014-05-07T03:57:51Z Andy Culbertson 1 1 revision: Import of WordPress content wikitext text/x-wiki Version 1.0, 3-20-05 Ever since I was about ten, religion has been overall the most important thing in my life. I had grown up with Christianity all around me, and I was baptized at seven, but ten was the year that religion somehow became magnetic north to me. Some people, when they say, “Religion is the most important thing in my life,” mean something like, “I am totally in love with Jesus, and I would do anything for him.” When I say it, I mean just that I can’t avoid taking it seriously. Sometimes that has meant I’m excited about Jesus, and sometimes it’s meant he utterly baffles me, but it always means that I see religious issues as the fundamental issues in life and that they are something I have to deal with in whatever way seems necessary at the time. Thus, the prominent position of this section on this site. Over the years, my interest in Christian things has settled into five main areas: evangelism, apologetics, spirituality, theology, and hermeneutics. Here’s the quick run-through. You can read the subsection intros for more. I think I was a miniature [[Evangelism Introduction|evangelist]] even in elementary school, in my low key way, but in junior high that phase really kicked in. And since I was trying to evangelize my skeptical friends, evangelism led into [[Apologetics Introduction|apologetics]]. Apologetics was very distracting, and in the process of studying God, I forgot about ''talking'' to him, which led me into a vexing spiritual dry spell. Not to fear, however, for I had a spiritual reawakening at the end of high school and became super-enthusiastic about spiritual growth and the idea of a personal, conversational relationship with God. This was also when I began my habit of journaling. Then I went off to Wheaton College and entered The Crisis, which you can read about in the [[Spirituality Introduction|spirituality intro]]. It basically involved hearing opposing accounts from two different Christian groups of how Christianity is supposed to be lived. The effect of this crisis was to teach me that the world is more complicated than I thought and that I really didn’t know how to be the kind of Christian I wanted to be. It also reaffirmed for me that if you want something done right, you have to do it yourself. I was confused, and no one I talked to had answers that satisfied me, so I concluded I had to find my own. During this time my journal developed into my more organized “thoughts pages” as part of this effort. Other things happened at Wheaton. For one thing, I began working through my [[Theology Introduction|theology]]. This came partly as a result of discovering Reformed theology my freshman year. I was also involved in an Internet evangelism ministry, which kept evangelistic issues churning in my mind. And working at the Billy Graham Center library gave me exposure to various evangelism and missions movements. My church was another influence, of course. Teaching Sunday school there made me aware of ministry issues, as did watching the church dissolve. The process of sorting through my questions was aided by grad school. I did my masters at Wheaton in biblical exegesis, and it fed my latent interest in [[Hermeneutics Introduction|hermeneutics]], which is the theory of interpretation. And as is usual in higher education, I learned a lot but came out with even more questions than I had going in. My last year of grad school, all of these puzzles and others convinced me that it was time to work on my critical thinking and research skills. (Most of that project will appear in the [[Philosophy|philosophy]] section.) One side effect of this decision was to bring apologetics back to my attention, this time as much for myself as for anyone else. In my quest to figure out the world, Christianity certainly gives me the most to think about. It even infiltrates my other subjects of interest. I like to integrate ideas anyway, but Christianity is a special case. I see it as a basic perspective from which to look at everything in life. So there are Christian views of art, money, politics, work, play, computers, and pretty much anything else you can think of. Similarly, there are Christian uses for all these things; and conversely, insights from other areas can inform our understanding of Christianity. I didn’t come up with this idea of integrating Christianity with the rest of life, but it’s one that to me just seems right. 92e8214de3b825db89edff7ec4efb5d372d3baac 0 24 49 48 2014-05-07T03:57:51Z Andy Culbertson 1 1 revision: Import of WordPress content wikitext text/x-wiki This is an index page from an old version of this site. [[Computers Introduction]] [http://del.icio.us/thinkulum/computers Computers links] === Internet === === Programming === === Software === === Troubleshooting === === Tech culture === === Math, science, and technology === 14df1f558d08dafec52173983d0a294513144122 0 25 51 50 2014-05-07T03:57:51Z Andy Culbertson 1 1 revision: Import of WordPress content wikitext text/x-wiki Version 1.1, 5-1-05 I grew up on computers. My dad is an electrical engineer, so we’ve had at least one computer in the house since I was little. The first family computer we had was an Osborne 1. Yes, I know, you’ve never heard of it. To me it was the best thing since sliced bread, which I had only discovered a few years earlier. My dad taught me how to program in BASIC, and for a while that was my major pastime. My brother Michael is the one who really picked it up, however. He is one of my chief sources of computer information, so his name will probably make frequent appearances in this section. I dropped programming in junior high for other things, and I regret it in some ways. The tech world is very interesting to me, and I have some friends in that sphere, but the learning curve for being conversant in computer science is pretty steep and I haven’t kept up with it, so I’m sort of at a disadvantage. But oh well, you can’t do everything. I keep up with programming and computer technology in my own small way, and it’s usually enough for me. After not having programmed for about ten years, I started learning Perl at my brother’s recommendation. It is not an easy language to learn because it can be very cryptic. But I rediscovered what I love about programming. It boils down to two things: puzzles and power. Power because when you know how to program, you can get the computer to do what ''you'' want it to do. You’re not limited to what other people’s programs will allow you to do. And puzzles because programming is a process of problem solving, and it can be surprisingly engrossing. I can sit there for hours, totally absorbed in working out the right code to achieve my goal. But I do have limits. I don’t naturally think like a computer, and contorting my mind into those patterns is taxing. So as with everything else but more so in this case, my attention to the subject comes and goes in phases. There are many other things about the world of computers that interest me, from artificial intelligence to the open source movement to the OS wars. I am fascinated, too, by the philosophical and methodological insights that can be drawn from computer science and applied to other areas. As for hardware, I bought a laptop in 1996, my freshman year of college. It was a Toshiba Satellite 205CDS, a P100 that had about 780M of hard drive space, an 11.5″ screen, and 24M of RAM. This was fine for a few years, but it took a noticeable dive in performance as the software I was trying to run began to surpass it. I also had to clear off hard drive space all the time to have room for my puttering. Eventually I’d had enough and started saving for a new laptop, this time one that would hopefully stay ahead of the software for a while longer. It took me two years to save for it, but finally I got a Sager 5690 at 3.2GHz with a 60GB hard drive, a gigabyte of RAM, and a 15″ screen. That’s a bit better than my old computer. In fact, so much better that it’s way more than I need, so I named it after my favorite overpowered starship Petey, the [http://www.schlockmercenary.com/d/20010325.html Tausennigan] [http://www.schlockmercenary.com/d/20010513.html Thunderhead] [http://www.schlockmercenary.com/d/20010518.html Superfortress] from the webcomic [http://www.schlockmercenary.com/ Schlock Mercenary]! I partitioned the hard drive down the middle so I could dual boot with Windows XP and Linux. So that is what I am currently operating off of, just to give you a frame of reference. Now, about this math, science, and technology section. I’m following the pattern I started when I stuffed the rest of the social sciences into a corner of the psychology page. Basically these are side interests of mine that I needed a place to put, and the computer page seemed the most natural place. My dad is an electrical engineer. I would never be an electrical engineer. But his interest in things technical extends into related fields like physics, math, and astronomy, and that is one thing I did pick up from him. In fact, in junior high I thought I might want to be a scientist when I grew up. Then one year I worked in a lab for a science fair project, and I was cured. But my interest remains. What I like about science is that it amazes me, and I like to be amazed. The natural world is a strange and incredible place. Mainly I’m into the astronomical-physical end of the science spectrum, since that’s what up with I grew. And when you apply science to practical problems, you get technology. I like to be impressed by people’s engineering creativity and the power we can wield over the physical world. That’s one of the main reasons I like Star Trek. As Arthur C. Clarke pointed out, technology is like magic. So every once in a while I’ll point you to some new bit of technological wizardry I’ve been gaping at. Math I flirt with occasionally, and I do mean occasionally. It was always my weakest subject in school, but it still intrigues me in some ways. It’s good training for logical thinking, and the philosophy of mathematics asks some interesting questions. So I’ll dip into math here every once in a while too. a262f7d7d9bf2299466e8c1ade921b2c9352d0d4 0 26 53 52 2014-05-07T03:57:51Z Andy Culbertson 1 1 revision: Import of WordPress content wikitext text/x-wiki Version 1.0, 3-20-05 Evangelism is a controversial topic these days. Not everyone thinks we should do it. It tends to offend people who are of a pluralist persuasion or a private nature. When I was young, around junior high, I didn’t know any of that. I was just discovering how significant my Christian faith was to me, and I had a hefty sense of mission for someone my age. I wasn’t preaching on street corners, but I did make “projects” out of several of my non-Christian friends, and I tried to persuade other Christians to make evangelism a habit as well. I was even working on a book (which fell by the wayside once I got into apologetics). It was going to be a ''Complete Guide to Soul-Winning'', and I spent hours and hours compiling notes from other books on the subject. I was a devoted kid. It all seemed so simple in the beginning. Just show unbelievers the Roman Road or the Four Spiritual Laws, maybe make an appeal to their emotional turmoil, lead them in the prayer, and they’d rush right into the fold. And if they were skeptics or followers of other religions, well, it seemed simple enough to prove them wrong and guide them to the truth. Only it didn’t work out that way. I had three fairly quick converts, but I wasn’t very good at follow-up, so I don’t know how they turned out or even if their conversions were genuine. The others just wouldn’t be persuaded. I talked to some of them for years, and at least one of them got fed up with my attempts. Fortunately she didn’t give up on my friendship as well. Evangelism was just getting more and more complicated, and gradually it faded into the background because I had a growing sense that I didn’t know what I was doing. It was still important; it had just moved itself from the list of “ways I direct my activities” to the list of “life problems to solve.” The more I explored the issue, the more complications I found. I didn’t know how to introduce the Gospel into my conversations. I didn’t know how to connect the Gospel effectively to people’s lives. I wasn’t even sure what the Gospel included. Is the Gospel about justification only or also things like physical healing? And how do faith and works fit together anyway? People have answers to these questions, of course, but these people don’t all agree, and a lot of their solutions seem unsatisfactory to me anyway. To put it another way, I think of evangelism as a great World-Saving Machine, kind of like a tank, sitting in a clearing in the middle of a forest. Now, I ''would'' hop in the driver’s seat and barrel across the countryside, using the machine’s magic to scatter people’s delusions and pull their lives together … only the machine seems to be broken. In fact, it’s ''very'' broken. Some of the parts are missing, there’s very little fuel, vines are growing all over it. This thing isn’t going ''anywhere''. Now, to judge from the stories, other people’s World-Saving Machines are humming along just fine … or at least certain other people’s. I suspect I’m not the only one scratching his head. So I’m in a muddle. Now, I do have a few definite opinions. If the Bible is true (as I believe it is), then evangelism is important. The most obvious reason is that the majority of the human race is lost and on its way to hell, to put it bluntly. This is not a flattering view of humanity, and maybe that’s behind a lot of people’s objections to the practice. But if you’re a Christian and you can get yourself to view things so starkly, evangelism becomes a frantic rescue mission. The panic involved is tempered by other considerations, such as the gentleness and patience of God, but the urgency is still there in the background. But while impending doom is a persuasive factor for me, at a more fundamental level I am driven to do evangelism (or at this point, just to figure it out) simply because to me, conversion is a part of one’s personal growth. Human beings were created to be like God, to embody his character, and in our current state that is impossible. Being recreated by Christ is the crucial ingredient, and that involves conversion, and that involves evangelism. I am interested in the whole process of becoming like Christ, from the initial unbelief and first contact with the Gospel, to the point of belief, to the process of sanctification after. I want to know how that journey works and how I can be involved in it, both for myself and for other people. It’s a large part of what drives my life. So evangelism is a big deal to me. As I said before, evangelism is controversial. I’m interested in the controversies, too. How can evangelism be a justifiable activity in today’s enlightened, pluralistic culture? Are there “anonymous Christians,” or must people believe in Jesus ''by name'' to be saved? And if there are such people, is evangelism really that urgent? I think of evangelism as sort of a meta-issue or an organizing principle. It has its own issues to be worked through, but I think some of the major difficulties will be cleared up as I deal with other issues, especially apologetics and spiritual formation. It ties together many aspects of Christianity nicely, which makes evangelism itself a good spiritual discipline. Evangelism isn’t the ''end goal'' of being a Christian, but it is a significant piece. 351395ba1599fefc66d4bfac73dcce536020287e 0 27 55 54 2014-05-07T03:57:51Z Andy Culbertson 1 1 revision: Import of WordPress content wikitext text/x-wiki Version 1.0, 3-20-05 My senior year of college I started an accelerated masters program at Wheaton in New Testament, which I exchanged for their new Biblical Exegesis program a couple of years later because that program also covered the Old Testament. I thought I wanted to end up working in some branch of practical theology, but that’s not where I wanted to start. Being a thorough sort of person, I believed that the large-scale ideas of theology have to be built on the tiny details of the biblical text. This called for interpretation, or the more technical term, exegesis. Hermeneutics, as I use the word, is a more general term for the theory of interpretation, while exegesis is the process of interpretation itself or the end result of that process. I had already been thinking about interpretative methods for a few years. I didn’t do much Bible study growing up, but when I got to college and became interested in theology, I thought Bible study would be a good thing to get into. My wandering attempts to do this received a boost when I planted myself at Trinity Baptist Church. Our pastor was really into expositional preaching, and Bible study was the major activity of the church as a whole, so I was exposed to a lot of it. Gradually I got an idea of how it worked. And as with everything, it got me asking questions. Why did we ask ''this'' question of the text and not this other one? Why did we zero in on these particular features? Why do we assume the writer laid out the book ''this'' way? And so on. While my graduate program did teach me the tools of exegesis, there’s only so much you can learn in a class. In these courses we were hard at work learning the exegetical techniques of our professors. These techniques belonged to an interpretative approach called the historical-grammatical method. Historical-grammatical interpretation analyzes the language of the text and tries to understand the text based on its historical context. This method seemed like a perfectly natural way to interpret things, but I wanted to know more about … ''the others''. In our biblical criticism classes, we learned about other methods of biblical interpretation, both current and past. As it was explained to us, critical interpretation of the Scripture began around the Enlightenment (“critical” in the sense of “involving careful judgment,” usually judgment about things like the historical circumstances of the work and how it was composed). Thinkers of the time were throwing off the shackles of human institutions, all institutions, including the church. Their goal was to submit only to the authority of reason. Thus, they decided that the Bible was ''just another human book'', not a divinely inspired one. Instead of simply believing it, therefore, they began evaluating it to sort out the true from the false. The idea was that once they knew how the Bible had come to be written and which parts were true, they would know how to interpret it and make it useful for modern society. In the process they came up with a succession of critical approaches to biblical interpretation, each one gaining acceptance and then giving way to a new approach as the old one’s flaws became evident. These critical approaches were obviously unacceptable to many conservative Christians, who attacked them vigorously, especially in the early twentieth century. Evangelicals today do use these critical methods but typically in modified forms that are more friendly toward inerrancy. These days the big deal is reader-response criticism, which is actually an outgrowth of postmodernism rather than modernism. While the earlier methods were a problem, at least as they were originally conceived, reader-response seemed to be public enemy number one for my evangelical professors. The main question in this debate is whether we can know what the “authorial intent” of the text was–what the author meant by what he wrote–and whether it’s important in the first place. The historical-grammatical critics say we ''can'' know it and it’s ''very'' important, and the postmodern critics say we can’t and it isn’t. Well, I’m all for the historical-grammatical method, but it seems strange to me that when it came to interpreting any particular passage, not only was there no consensus in my classes, but there was no agreement among the professional commentators either. Don’t take that too far, by the way. I don’t mean each commentator had a totally different opinion on every little point, only that I was surprised at the number of places they disagreed and how widely their interpretations could differ. It made the text seem very unclear. So I’m curious about these “heretical” interpretative methods, both modern and postmodern. What can be said for and against them? Our discussions in the exegesis program were good, but the theoretical courses covered too much ground to deal with everything to my satisfaction, and the practical courses were less concerned with these questions. So I am left to my own devices, which is what I prefer anyway. 6c796bb218e8894fa672fb7024b28e14b762dcee 0 28 57 56 2014-05-07T03:57:51Z Andy Culbertson 1 1 revision: Import of WordPress content wikitext text/x-wiki This is the home page from an old version of this site. [http://www.thinkulum.net/blog/ Blog] Site updates, life updates, random thoughts, people [[Christianity]] Spirituality, apologetics, evangelism, hermeneutics, theology [[Philosophy]] Epistemology, metaphysics, aesthetics, ethics, politics [[Psychology]] Psychotherapy, personality, education, cognitive, interpersonal, social science [[Aesthetics]] Music, writing, art, comics, games, mass media, humor [[Computers]] Internet, programming, software, troubleshooting, tech culture, science [[Weird Stuff]] Paranormal phenomena, alternative science, conspiracy theories, urban legends [[Life Maintenance]] Food, clothes, shelter, etc. 4f155fef6368f5145d8f4dc8e4583a13fea0ded6 100 57 2014-05-07T04:23:33Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the Site and Obsolete categories. wikitext text/x-wiki This is the home page from an old version of this site. [http://www.thinkulum.net/blog/ Blog] Site updates, life updates, random thoughts, people [[Christianity]] Spirituality, apologetics, evangelism, hermeneutics, theology [[Philosophy]] Epistemology, metaphysics, aesthetics, ethics, politics [[Psychology]] Psychotherapy, personality, education, cognitive, interpersonal, social science [[Aesthetics]] Music, writing, art, comics, games, mass media, humor [[Computers]] Internet, programming, software, troubleshooting, tech culture, science [[Weird Stuff]] Paranormal phenomena, alternative science, conspiracy theories, urban legends [[Life Maintenance]] Food, clothes, shelter, etc. [[Category:Site]] [[Category:Obsolete]] a98ed291a2359cd4757b6383d5524c7d9a4f5bf8 0 29 59 58 2014-05-07T03:57:51Z Andy Culbertson 1 1 revision: Import of WordPress content wikitext text/x-wiki Version 1.4, 7-29-06 Hello. Welcome to my website. It’s here as a repository for the things that I like, things I think, things I’ve written, collected, created, or experienced. === Content === What you will find here: essays of various sorts, random musings, reviews and commentaries, a weblog, collections of links and other things, reference materials, creative projects. I am interested in a lot of stuff. This means that I am almost never bored. Distraction is the more typical problem. It also means that there’s a lot to keep track of, so I’ve tried to keep things organized here. The difficulty is that most of my interests are interrelated and could fit into more than one category. So if the organization seems odd, that’s why. I also tend to use my terms broadly for the sake of cramming as much into the category as possible. My interests come and go in phases, so at various times some parts of the site will be updated a lot more than others. To give you a context for understanding what I post here, I’ve written introductions to most of the sections of the site. These explain basically how I got into the subject, my general take on it, and what my specific interests are. === Updates === My site will be updated very sporadically. To save yourself the trouble of checking my updates page all the time and being constantly disappointed, you can either reading my RSS feed or subscribing to my e-mail updates. If you’re into RSS (and why in the world wouldn’t you be?), you can get my blog’s RSS feed [http://www.thinkulum.net/blog/wp-rss2.php here]. I recommend [http://www.rssbandit.org/ RSS Bandit]. Alternatively, you can have my blog updates e-mailed to you by signing up here: E-mail: You’ll get a confirmation e-mail with a link to click, and then you’ll be subscribed. Don’t worry. I hate spam. Your e-mail address won’t be shared with anyone. If you want to contact me, you’ll have to wait till the bottom of the page to find out how. ;) === Title === What is a “thinkulum” anyway? Um, well, it’s a silly pun. According to Merriam-Webster, a vinculum is a “a straight horizontal mark placed over two or more members of a compound mathematical expression and equivalent to parentheses or brackets about them” or more generally, “a unifying bond.” In Star Trek, it’s the part of a Borg ship that connects the minds of all the drones on the ship and organizes their collective thoughts. The Thinkulum is a web space in which semi-organized and interconnected thoughts are collected in concrete forms. === Me === A little about myself, in bullet point fashion. ==== Circumstantial ==== # My name is Andy Culbertson. # I was born on March 7, 1978. # I have two parents, a brother, and a sister, who are both younger. # I am from Texas, but that is incidental. There is nothing Southern about me. # I am a Christian and a conservative one. However, I am not ignorant, intolerant, pushy, etc. # I have a BA in Christian Education and an MA in Biblical Studies, both from Wheaton College (IL). I don’t know what I want to do when I grow up, possibly teach philosophy. # For now I’m an editorial assistant and programmer at a Christian book packager. # Some thoughts on [http://www.thinkulum.net/blog/2005/06/26/the-current-shape-of-my-life/ the current shape of my life]. (added 7-17-05) ==== Essential ==== # I am a ponderer. I mostly live inside my head. I am very curious. I write a lot. # I am interested in people. I like to listen to them and understand them. I value close relationships, but I am fairly independent. # I am a pragmatic idealist. # I am a male. # I have a low-key, impish sense of humor. I love irony and absurdity. # I have a weird imagination. # I am a very [http://www.typelogic.com/intp.html INTP]-ish [http://www.typelogic.com/infj.html INFJ]. On the Enneagram I am a [http://www.eclecticenergies.com/enneagram/type5.php 5w4]-ish [http://www.eclecticenergies.com/enneagram/type9.php 9w1]. # [[A Picture of Me|A picture of me]]. ==== Favorites ==== # <span class="fav">Musical instruments</span>: Piano and French horn. I have played the piano most of my life. I played the French horn for seven years and soon will again because I now have money to buy one, thanks to my amazingly generous parents. # <span class="fav">Colors</span>: Green and blue. # <span class="fav">Fruits</span>: Grapes, oranges, and peaches. Drink Welch’s white grape peach juice. “It’s like a magic potion,” says my friend Jason. # <span class="fav">Animals</span>: Cats, dolphins, hamsters, hermit crabs, sloths. I’m sure I like others, too. My family has a big, fat cat named [http://www.xanga.com/home.aspx?user=KittieKrunchies Ariel] who really loves meowing. I call her Ariel the Blimp. # <span class="fav">Style of architecture</span>: Gothic is kind of neat. Minimalist, too. # <span class="fav">Types of clothing</span>: T-shirts and jeans, sweatsuits. # <span class="fav">Genre of literature</span>: Fantasy. # <span class="fav">Genres of visual art</span>: Landscapes, surrealism. # <span class="fav">Type of pen</span>: Gel or liquid ink. I really like Pilot G2s. # <span class="fav">Types of store</span>: Bookstores, office supply stores, computer stores. # <span class="fav">Types of weather</span>: Sunny and 75-80, dark and windy if it’s not cold, thunderstorms with lots of lightning if I’m inside. # <span class="fav">Time of day</span>: The middle of the night. # <span class="fav">Website</span>: [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Page Wikipedia]. I have three overarching goals in life: to understand the world, to help people, and to keep myself entertained. The result is what you find on this site. === Site History === This is the reincarnation of my old website. The site was born in 1996 at Geocities when I was a freshman in college, and it was called ''Andy’s Alcove''. It didn’t have very much on it. Then it went through five other versions, gaining and losing content, most of which was was school papers because it was easier than coming up with original material. In the meantime my ideas, interests, goals, and self-understanding became more and more defined, and this led to my wanting to take my site a lot more seriously. So I pulled things together (over about three years of distraction and procrastination), got paid web hosting, and changed the name to ''The Thinkulum'', and on March 20, 2005, a new site was born. The title of this layout is “Pages from My Notebook.” Anybody who knows me in person will probably understand it as a reference to my writing habits. I’m always walking around with a blue notebook that contains whatever notes I’m working on at the time. I call these my “thoughts pages.” I write my all my notes on letter-size, white scratch paper (reduce, reuse, and recycle!), which I fold into fourths because I like small writing surfaces, and I use the notebook as my desk. My writing is small and fairly orderly, which is the first thing everybody comments on, and I always use a blue gel ink pen because I like dark, smooth lines. Particular, ain’t I? Well, journaling is my hobby. These thoughts pages are the source of much of this site’s material, at least in spirit if not in content. === Tools === # The whole site is powered by [http://wordpress.org/ WordPress]. # For the parts that aren’t automatically generated, I attempt to code these pages in XHTML and CSS using the text editor [http://www.liquidninja.com/metapad/ Metapad]. # I check my links with [http://home.snafu.de/tilman/xenulink.html Xenu’s Link Sleuth]. # My webhost is [http://www.p4host.com/ P4HOST]. # The color scheme was determined using [http://www.colorschemer.com/online/ Color Schemer]. # I created the background by scanning part of my notebook and then cropping and sharpening it with [http://www.irfanview.com IrfanView]. The section headings are my handwriting. === Contact === I think of personal websites as conversation pieces, so talk to me if you have the inclination. # E-mail: [mailto:%74%61%72%61%6E%40%74%68%69%6E%6B%75%6C%75%6D%2E%6E%65%74 taran@thinkulum.net] # AIM: [aim:goim?screenname=Andyroonee Andyroonee] # Yahoo: [http://edit.yahoo.com/config/send_webmesg?.target=andyrooni&amp;.amp;src=pg andyrooni] # MSN: [msnim:chat?contact=%74%68%69%6E%6B%75%6C%75%6D%40%68%6F%74%6D%61%69%6C%2E%63%6F%6D thinkulum@hotmail.com] ([msnim:add?contact=%74%68%69%6E%6B%75%6C%75%6D%40%68%6F%74%6D%61%69%6C%2E%63%6F%6D add to contacts]) # [http://www.thinkulum.net/blog/2005/03/21/guestbook/#comments Guestbook] And that’s all for the intro. Enjoy! 81b6e11e22fab9cf7f54abff98f85db3ea8e3767 0 30 61 60 2014-05-07T03:57:51Z Andy Culbertson 1 1 revision: Import of WordPress content wikitext text/x-wiki This is an index page from an old version of this site. [[Life Maintenance Introduction]] [http://del.icio.us/thinkulum/life-maintenance Life Maintenance links] 259b2cfe29de6dbdc36ef35ef740409c91af9e2b 0 31 63 62 2014-05-07T03:57:51Z Andy Culbertson 1 1 revision: Import of WordPress content wikitext text/x-wiki Version 1.0, 5-1-05 I could do without the real world. I am essentially a lazy person. And besides, the world of ideas is so much more fun. Unfortunately, in order to keep living and to do it conveniently, you have to expend a certain amount of energy. It probably takes less in the US than in a primitive, tribal society, but still it takes some. So here I will share with you some of the things I’ve found that have made my life a little easier to maintain. Because we all have better things to do. Of course, many people make their living out of the things on this page. They actually enjoy doing things like managing finances or selling clothes or designing exercise plans. I consider such things to be necessary evils, and I take great pleasure in marginalizing these people’s whole careers. I figure if they’re going to enjoy making my life more complicated, I might as well retaliate by denigrating their chosen occupations. This page will be dedicated to the good people who make these necessary evils more invisible. These people clean up the mess created by the overenthusiastic people of the last paragraph so that I don’t have to deal with it. The less I have to think about, say, buying a car, the better. So if someone tells me exactly what I need to know to do that, they have just improved the world by holding back the evil that desires to encroach upon my life. And if no one is doing that, I’ll just have to do it myself and save both myself and other people time in the future. Hence you’ll find a few of my own stress-saving creations here too. When my mom told me to get my head out of the clouds when I was growing up, I don’t think she quite meant this … 27ee0e7e9d64dcfba9768dc17f46af22b0fa7fe3 0 32 65 64 2014-05-07T03:57:51Z Andy Culbertson 1 1 revision: Import of WordPress content wikitext text/x-wiki This is an index page from an old version of this site. [[Philosophy Introduction]] [http://del.icio.us/thinkulum/philosophy Philosophy links] === Epistemology === === Metaphysics === === Aesthetics === === Ethics === === Politics === e179734233d0240185ea8fd200828a4ee7b6e6dd 0 33 67 66 2014-05-07T03:57:51Z Andy Culbertson 1 1 revision: Import of WordPress content wikitext text/x-wiki Version 1.2, 7-29-06 Philosophy can be thought of either as a way of thinking or as a specific set of topics to be thought about. The academic discipline of philosophy is made up of the latter and hopefully uses the former. I am made up of the former and sometimes drift into the latter. (That’s right! I am in fact an abstract thought process and not an embodied human being. The truth is out!) I’ve been a philosopher as long as I’ve been alive, but it wasn’t until recently that I recognized it as a distinct part of myself and gave myself the label. I just approach life philosophically. That is, I analyze things and think about their broader implications. As far as the actual discipline of philosophy goes, my formal education has been meager. Most of the philosophy I’ve learned has come from my own sporadic reading, and I still consider myself pretty new to it. But my primary loyalties are definitely with analytic philosophy. I think of myself as being interested in continental subjects while taking an analytic approach. I am grateful to Michael Martin, even though we are diametrically opposed on some major issues, for his ''Atheism: A Philosophical Justification'', which was my first real exposure to analytic philosophy and helped to kindle my love for it. A common way to organize philosophy as a discipline is to divide it into three categories: epistemology (the theory of knowledge), metaphysics (the theory of reality), and axiology (the theory of value). Not everything in philosophy fits neatly into those categories, but they are an easy way to get a handle on the subject. === Epistemology === Epistemology has by far the most draw for me and I’m sure will accumulate the most material. I ask epistemic questions always and about everything. How do I know which politician is telling me the truth? How do I know which car is the best one to buy? What criteria should I use when evaluating a movie? How did the characters in this novel know the correct solution to their problem? How do I know who is right in an interpersonal conflict? These are the kinds of questions that invariably pop into my mind whenever I face a new situation. In fact, epistemology is my philosophical starting point. Even though I know that any epistemological view will carry assumptions about metaphysics and axiology, I feel a need to answer questions about knowledge first and then use those answers to help me gain knowledge about existence and value. I have a hard time doing it the other way around. I want to deal with the more abstract questions of epistemology (can we trust our senses, and all that), but my main concerns are practical. I would like to come up with a generalized set of guidelines and procedures for investigating an issue from start to finish. They would cover things like the kinds of questions to ask about a topic, effective research methods, criteria for evaluating evidence and arguments, cognitive pitfalls to avoid, and the epistemic idiosyncracies of various subjects. For lack of a better term I’m calling this my “investigative process project.” I want to go beyond the basics, which are readily available anyway. I’m always discovering nuances as I observe people’s ways of dealing with issues, and this project is partly an effort to gather these observations in one place and to make them useful. It’s sort of a meta-project, since the process of investigation is involved any time anyone studies anything. I love reference works. Give me an encyclopedia and I’m happy. The problem is I have no good place to put such things on my website, and I’m not going to create a whole category just for reference. I already have enough categories already. So since general reference works have to do with knowledge, I’m just stuffing them in the epistemology section! You’ll notice I do that kind of thing a lot. === Metaphysics === About metaphysics I have mixed feelings. I like practicality and certainty, and metaphysical issues seem to teeter on the edge of complete irrelevance and unanswerability (I could probably say the same about some epistemological questions–but I won’t!). However, to be fair, some of the questions of metaphysics are ''somewhat'' relevant to everyday life (are people basically good or evil?). Some of them are only really relevant to other philosophical or theological questions, but some of those other questions can be important (for example, the nature of time is relevant to certain arguments about the existence and nature of God). And some seem relevant to philosophical reasoning in general (such as the distinction between necessary and contingent truths). Certain issues, like the question of determinism, I’m not sure can even be resolved, apart from divine revelation, if even then. Still, they are all questions I will try to address seriously at some point. I acknowledge my massive ignorance on the subject. === Axiology === Axiology can be divided into ethics, aesthetics, and politics. Here my feelings are even more divided. I care intensely about the value dimension of life (as I do about epistemology), but I have a certain despair about its arguability (as with metaphysics). With aesthetics it doesn’t matter so much. Getting your aesthetics wrong doesn’t usually carry serious consequences unless you’re a professional artist. With ethics, on the other hand, the issues are vitally important, both to me personally and to society in general. They pop up everywhere every day. Two problems haunt me when I consider interacting with other people about ethical issues. One is that I feel that people are very bad at discerning the real issues in most moral debates. The other is that even if they do understand them, agreement is impossible if the participants don’t share certain fundamental moral assumptions. So I tend to avoid moral debates because they’re just so complicated and frustrating and generally painful to me. Maybe I’ll be more willing to engage in them after I’ve fully investigated the issues on my own. Why do I have a whole page on my site called “Aesthetics” and then a subsection of my philosophy page for aesthetics? Well, it’s just another example of the contents of my mind trying to burst through the boxes I shove them into. The philosophy section is really the most natural home for a section on aesthetics. I just needed a term for my entertainment section that reflected the philosophical way I approach entertainment. My discussions of aesthetics in the philosophy section will be more general and theoretical, while the material in the main aesthetics section will be more practical. For convenience, I’m going to consider the philosophy of life to be a branch of ethics. One of my overarching aims in life is to understand the world so that I can fit myself into it. This amounts to forming a philosophy of life. It involves questions like, what is the meaning of life? What are its appropriate goals? What activities are worth spending one’s time on? These questions rival epistemology for the amount of thought I pour into them, so the material will probably pile up in this section as well. This topic overlaps significantly with spirituality. Politics can be thought of as ethics applied on a societal level. It can also be thought of as a social science, and I will dip into that aspect of the subject, but I’d rather have a single place to put it all, and I’m more a philosopher than a social scientist. It may be a while before I write much in this section. I’m a complete novice when it comes to thinking about politics because it’s only been in the past couple of years that I’ve begun paying much attention to it, so for now I’m much more of an observer than a debater, and my interests within the subject are rather vague. Topics on the national and international levels appeal to me, whereas local politics tends to leave me yawning. I think it’s because national and international politics are more dramatic and seem to more directly reflect the fundamental issues in political philosophy. As for my basic position, I was raised a conservative, and I’m happy to remain one unless my studies convince me otherwise. However, my feelings about politics are a lot like my feelings about ethics, only less intense. The issues are important, but the answers are hard to nail down. Despite the tension and frustration it sometimes puts me through, I like philosophy. It is the best way I have for dealing with life. I used to think I might make it my career, but now I’m thinking about psychology. Whatever I end up doing, I will do it using philosophy’s tools. c4833870e7eedd975d6511f1436ad65b413ceb44 0 34 69 68 2014-05-07T03:57:51Z Andy Culbertson 1 1 revision: Import of WordPress content wikitext text/x-wiki This is an index page from an old version of this site. [[Psychology Introduction]] [http://del.icio.us/thinkulum/psychology Psychology links] === Psychotherapy === === Personality === ==== Scanners ==== [[Reflections on Barbara Sher's Refuse to Choose|Reflections on Barbara Sher’s Refuse to Choose]] (added 4-29-07)<br/><br/>A rambling review of Barbara Sher’s book on Scanners, who are people who have many interests and an inner compulsion to follow them all. They tend to have trouble settling down into one career. Sher says they don’t have to! [[The Annotated Scanner's Toolbox|The Annotated Scanner’s Toolbox]] (added 5-12-07)<br/><br/>A modified version of the tools index in ''Refuse to Choose''. I added descriptions of the reasons you might use each tool. === Education === === Cognitive === === Interpersonal === === Social science === 8c5ecb6689b4dbaee500447cb866ac28068af212 0 35 71 70 2014-05-07T03:57:51Z Andy Culbertson 1 1 revision: Import of WordPress content wikitext text/x-wiki Version 1.0, 3-20-05 The summer after my junior year in high school, our church youth group went to a week-long camp in North Carolina with about five other youth groups. Youth camp happened every summer, but this was the first time the camp had included other churches. Maybe they felt the need to regroup, or maybe it was their practice to begin with, but whatever the reason, early in the week a few of our guys started meeting together at night to talk about what was going on in their lives and how they were doing spiritually. A day or two into it, I was invited. I had never seen anything like it. Certainly I had never been involved in such a thing. I had always been withdrawn, and I’m surprised I even had the kind of friendships that would get me there in the first place. But instead of feeling threatened by all the openness, I was enlivened by it. It wasn’t, as one friend suggested, that I was glad to see that other people’s problems were worse than mine. It was that people were gathering to share something that was somehow of vital importance to me–their inner lives. Eventually the gathering became co-ed and grew to about forty people (we had a large youth group). My fascination only grew as the group did. The more the merrier, to me! Thus was my interest in psychology sparked. I am never content just to experience things like the communal self-disclosure of those meetings. Anything that so engages me I have to study. So the human mind became something to explore. By coincidence I was already signed up for a high school psychology class the next year, which was also fascinating, and I decided to major in it in college. That changed to Christian education the next year, however, though I kept psychology as a minor. There were a couple of reasons for the switch. One was that I could see myself in a church setting more readily than in a counselor’s office. The other was that I didn’t entirely trust psychology. I had been reading Christians who believed that our guide to human nature was supposed to be the Bible and that psychology was intruding on Scripture’s territory. There was something compelling to me about their arguments, and it is an issue I’m still wrestling with. Nevertheless, psychology still has a huge draw for me, and I do see a lot of benefit in it. Several topics in psychology capture my attention. One is psychotherapy, which is basically what drew me to psychology in the first place. Sitting in those youth camp meetings, I felt impelled to help the people who revealed their personal struggles, even though I had no idea how. Helping people is what I had in mind as a psychology major and even when I switched to Christian Education, although it would be a somewhat different format for my helping role. Psychotherapy was also my main point of tension with psychology. Christianity and psychology seemed to have competing ideas about what was wrong with people and how they could be helped. As I said, I’m still exploring this question. Many of the topics that fit under psychotherapy could fit just as well under spirituality or philosophy, so my categorization of some of these essays will be somewhat arbitrary. The psychology of personality has been one of my central tools in understanding human nature and in relating to the people around me. One of my friends got me into the Myers-Briggs personality theory our senior year in high school, and it was a major obsession of mine for the next year. Fortunately, the obsession was temporary. Myers-Briggs is helpful, but it isn’t everything. In any case, I am also intrigued by the Enneagram and am generally willing to try out any personality theory that comes along. The thing I like about these personality theories is that they represent systems of values and strategies for dealing with life. As you will no doubt discover if you keep reading this site, I am enthralled by systems, values, and strategies. Other facets of individual differences also interest me, like birth order and gender. The psychology of education grabbed me in the middle of my sophomore year in college when I got fed up with the anxiety of exams and decided to analyze what made school so stressful. That began a process of discovering how I learned and worked and what practices made a teacher helpful or unhelpful. But my interest in education is broader than a concern for my own stress levels. Personal growth is what engages me, both my own and other people’s. It’s an occupation that penetrates to the bedrock of my life and sends out tendrils to every part of it. One means of growth is education–growth by knowledge and interaction, two of my other pervasive concerns. I suppose this means I’m destined to become a teacher. Then there are a few other topics that wander through my mind. One is cognitive psychology, which has a natural tie-in to epistemology. Another is interpersonal psychology, which includes things like friendship and conversation (and personality, but I separate that one out). And then there’s linguistics, which isn’t psychology but is a social science, and I don’t have a better place to put it. I have a passing interest in other areas of social science as well, like anthropology. But even though psychology is one of my major interests, as with philosophy, I don’t know that much about it yet. 75509e99bfe078fdd6810988e4c3da77f43f7127 0 36 73 72 2014-05-07T03:57:51Z Andy Culbertson 1 1 revision: Import of WordPress content wikitext text/x-wiki Version 1.0, 3-20-05 There are many kinds of spirituality floating around out there–New Age spirituality, Buddhist spirituality, Hindu, Wiccan. You can even mix and match. Since I am a Christian (and a conservative one), the Christian variety is the kind that I pursue, so that is what you will find here. But even ''Christian'' spirituality comes in a wide array, and this fact is what has launched me on my current voyage. When I was young, I didn’t think about spirituality as a thing in itself. I just went about my business of going to church and listening to Christian radio and evangelizing my friends, and my spiritual life went rather well, at least by my standards then. But over time things fell apart. In high school my evangelistic activities took me into apologetics, which was so absorbing that I forgot all about basic things like praying and reading the Bible and, to some degree, even evangelism. Spiritually I dried up. I suppose my spiritual life was dependent on all the evangelism I was doing. Once that dropped off, prayer got boring, and the Bible no longer seemed relevant. I still cared about God; my relationship with him had just lost its earlier vitality. The groundwork for my spiritual reawakening was laid at [[Psychology Introduction|youth camp]] the summer after my junior year in high school, but my renewal really began halfway through my senior year. By a sort of accident I began corresponding with one of my friends at school, and she and I were able to encourage each other in some areas of insecurity. After two or three weeks of this, she wrote in one of her letters that she thought this accidental correspondence was “meant to be.” The idea intrigued me, so I started looking for other things that might have been “meant to be.” And I found them. This started me on an amazing, spiritual roller coaster ride. God became the Great, Good Conspirator controlling my circumstances behind the scenes to build me up and give me opportunities to minister to those around me. My relationship with God became more conversational. My prayers were now a matter of listening as well as talking. That is, I paid attention to what God might be saying through my thoughts and circumstances. I even began to read the Bible much more regularly and with an enthusiasm that had always been lacking, though my interpretation of the Bible was very subjective. Then began the Crisis. In the fall I went off to Wheaton, where I continued the same pattern of interaction with God. This was also the time I was introduced to Reformed theology. I had read a little about Calvinism two years earlier on the Internet, but that semester I had ''Theology of Culture'' with R. Scott Clark. He showed us not only the doctrine of election but also bits and pieces of the rest of Reformed theology. I never knew you could fall in love with a theological system, but I did. That class sent my thinking in a whole new direction; and like many converts to Calvinism, I felt like my theology had suddenly matured. That summer I read a lot of Reformed theology on the Internet. While doing a web search for Scott Clark, I found a group called the [http://www.alliancenet.org/ Alliance of Confessing Evangelicals]. He had written an article in their journal, ''Modern Reformation''. They were Reformed, of course, so I listened to them. Their main focus was not on theological instruction, however, but on cultural commentary, specifically commentary on the state of the evangelical church. It turned out there was not much about the contemporary evangelical movement that they liked. Contemporary worship music, listening prayer, “felt needs” evangelism, in fact anything that smacked of subjectivity was suspect. Christian spirituality, they said, was about the objective, historical, physical, earthy reality of Christ’s atoning work on the Cross, communicated through words, water, bread, and wine. And since at that point I implicitly trusted Reformed theologians, I adopted their critique. I can’t say their denunciation of subjectivity came as a complete shock. I had been questioning it myself. In my conversational relationship with God, I tried to be very sensitive to the Holy Spirit and listened very carefully to every little thought I had that sounded like a promise or a command. And I tried to have conversations with God during my quiet times. But I was never sure if the thoughts I heard were God or my mind’s own random productions; and in my conversations with God, my side of the conversation was a lot louder and clearer than God’s. After about a year and a half of trying to listen to God, I gave up and decided that if God was speaking to me, I couldn’t hear him very well. So when I came back to Wheaton, I had much to complain about, and I didn’t mind sharing. But still I was frustrated and confused. I couldn’t support any of the restrictive claims and criticisms I was making. I could only cite my Reformed teachers, and their arguments were curiously lacking in Scriptural argumentation. Essentially my new beliefs were just as subjective as my old ones, based only on the authority of the modern Reformers and the new values I had picked up from them. This threw me into an agonized confusion. I didn’t know how to be a Christian anymore, and I was no longer sure anyone else around me knew either. My confusion itself astonished me. I never expected to find so much diversity of opinion within Christianity. I was used to having my beliefs unsettled by atheists. But here were two ''Christian'' groups with diametrically opposed ideas about how believers should be carrying out their spiritual lives and ministry. Who was I supposed to believe? I wasn’t just going to leave it at that. No one I talked to had answers that satisfied me, so I concluded I had to find them myself. During Christmas break, I decided to put all of these issues together and figure out this question of Christian growth and experience. So I set to work cataloging my questions and recording my reflections in a notebook. It was sort of an extension of my journal and a precursor to my thoughts pages. Over the next many months I worked very hard at defining the differences between the “objectivists” and the “subjectivists,” as I called them. I also tried to define my own reactions to the issues, to lay out the possible answers, and to reason out what the Bible had to say about these things. Now at last I was getting somewhere! By the end of that summer, my confusion had begun to settle. While I hadn’t answered my questions completely, I had developed opinions I could live with, at least for the time being. I concluded that my Reformed friends had in many ways been too hard on evangelicalism. In some cases I thought they were too restrictive. In others I thought they were out of touch with the movement, at least its best sides. And in the case of my central struggle, listening prayer, I began to have doubts about my doubts. My argument against listening prayer was that since the source of inner voices was so uncertain, God wouldn’t use thoughts to convey information. Upon reflection, this struck me as a fairly shabby argument. And besides, some people simply had convincing experiences of hearing God speak to them through their thoughts! I was open to the possibility, then, that these other people’s experiences were valid and I was just too immature to discern God’s voice clearly. Since then my thoughts have been percolating, and my spirit of independent inquiry has been growing. My questions have changed, too. Since I had some provisional answers to the dilemmas from my crisis, my thoughts shifted to the general question of how one grows spiritually. I spent quite a long time at first fretting over the fact that I was not a very spiritual person. But over time I came to several decisions. First, since I didn’t even know how to become a spiritual person, worrying about it all the time was a waste of energy. I wasn’t about to give up on the idea of being a devoted Christian, but I figured (and hoped) that God was at least as patient with me as I could be with myself. Second, I wasn’t going to obligate myself to anyone and everyone’s ideas about what was spiritual, though I did listen more carefully to certain people. Third, it would be better to be somewhat systematic and purposeful in my investigations than to make desperate, haphazard guesses. Some of my more productive thoughts have revolved around certain other concepts that Wheaton introduced me to during my prior years of confusion. The main thrust of these ideas is that the church has a wealth of wisdom about the spiritual life hidden in the works of its ancient devotional writers. These were people who carefully observed the behavior of the soul and who seriously trained themselves to be godly by means of spiritual disciplines in a way that is rarely seen today. These writers aren’t the Bible, of course. Strictly speaking, they are only interpreters. But as people who have been shaped by Scripture’s values, they speak with some authority, both about Scripture and about human spiritual experience in matters that Scripture doesn’t directly address. They deserve careful consideration. So do many modern teachers, of course. I don’t think that wisdom passed from the earth with the eighteenth or nineteenth century. My penultimate goal is to develop a system for spirituality, as far as I’m able, and my ultimate goal is to live it. I don’t mean I want to “put God in a box.” I’m aware of that danger, and I believe it can be avoided. I hope so anyway. I thrive on systems. I also don’t think I have to have the whole system worked out before I begin to put it into practice. That would be disastrous because in a sense the system is never finished. The best course is to develop both theory and practice at the same time. But the point is that the theory serves the practice and not the other way around. 2e346a04005f05b1d4f08dd63049b8b4dc7b67fa 0 37 75 74 2014-05-07T03:57:51Z Andy Culbertson 1 1 revision: Import of WordPress content wikitext text/x-wiki Version 1.0, 3-20-05 Theology has gone on mostly in the background of my life. It’s not endlessly fascinating to me like other topics, but I still consider it important. I first noticed theology in high school when I read some discussions about Calvinism on an apologetics mailing list. I had grown up in a tacitly Arminian, Southern Baptist church, and Calvinism seemed rather repugnant to me. Still, when I read certain parts of the Bible, they did sound suspiciously Calvinist. So I got myself to the point of at least not ''minding'' Calvinist doctrines and then sat myself squarely on the fence. My first semester at college, in the midst of various discussions with my friends, I drifted off the fence and down onto the Reformed side of the lawn. By a happy coincidence, my professor for Theology of Culture happened to be ''very'' Reformed, and through his lectures I was introduced to the wonder of Reformed theology. Reformed theology inspired me. Its God was ''huge''. He was sovereign without limit, able to bring about all his purposes, utterly worthy of worship. Someone once observed that people who come into Reformed theology from other realms often describe their experience in terms of a second conversion. That’s certainly the way it was for me. The summer after that school year I didn’t find a job, so most of that free time was spent reading. There’s a cornucopia of Reformed theology on the web, and I just devoured it. One of my key sources was the [http://www.alliancenet.org/ Alliance of Confessing Evangelicals]. They were very helpful because they contrasted Reformed teachings with the kinds of ideas I had grown up with (and contrast is one helpful way to achieve clarity!). At my friend’s Presbyterian church there was a saying: “There’s no one more obnoxious than a newly converted Calvinist.” All through that next year I could have been a poster child for the Obnoxious Baby Calvinists’ Guild. I criticized Arminianism right and left. But I can never stay committed to any point of view for too long; I just think too much. So over time I mellowed out, partly because I came to believe that Calvinism wasn’t quite so earth-shatteringly important and partly because I was entering a more questioning period in general. Everything was up for review. Not all at once, however, so the opinions that had to wait in line, such as Calvinism, only got very quiet. That, in fact, is the situation I am in now. I still have my beliefs, but I also believe that true knowledge, especially theological knowledge, is pretty hard to come by. A lot of people are very confident that they have it, but confidence alone isn’t a very good argument. Yet despite the difficulty, I still hold on to the thought that the truth is findable and that it is important. So I will keep searching. d16555612c665f44818ef768b7b6e08f5cd0599a 0 38 77 76 2014-05-07T03:57:51Z Andy Culbertson 1 1 revision: Import of WordPress content wikitext text/x-wiki This is an index page from an old version of this site. [[Weird Stuff Introduction]] [http://del.icio.us/thinkulum/weird Weird Stuff links] === Paranormal phenomena === === Alternative science and spirituality === === Conspiracy theories === === Hoaxes, urban legends, and strange human behavior === 30917004f816e6b88db914f88a546d641e3ada8e 0 39 79 78 2014-05-07T03:57:51Z Andy Culbertson 1 1 revision: Import of WordPress content wikitext text/x-wiki Version 1.0, 3-20-05 I ''would'' spend all my time in the normal world of everyday experience, but it’s too boring. Sometimes I need a bit of strangeness injected into my life. Hence, this section. “Weird Stuff.” If anyone can think of a better name for it, please let me know. I’ve never had a paranormal experience, and I hope to keep it that way. I just like reading and hearing about it. Books and the Internet help with the first of those, and the radio helps with the second. As a child I would often end up in the paranormal section of the library, inspecting the picture of the Brown Lady or walking out happily with the Loch Ness Monster tucked under my arm. In my early teen years I listened to Bob Larson, a controversial Christian radio talk show host who dealt with these kinds of weird things. Occasionally he even talked to demons on the air when someone called in who was possessed, if you can believe that. I got my first doses of conspiracy mania from Marlin Maddoux on his radio show ''Point of View''. In high school I dropped everything for apologetics, but in college a friend brought me back by periodically alerting me to current events in paranormalia, such as the Hale-Bopp controversy. Then I discovered Art Bell while driving home after my late night job one summer. Art Bell hosted (and still does on the weekends) the popular paranormal radio talk show ''Coast to Coast AM''. This was also the summer I discovered ''Politics and Religion'', a talk show about the end times and associated conspiracies. Since then I’ve wandered through all kinds of weird territory, mostly on the web, picking up bizarrities here and there. I also took a class at Wheaton called ''Psychology and Contemporary Mysticism'', which dealt with a lot of these topics from a scientific and Christian perspective. Needless to say, I was fascinated. It was one of my favorite classes ever, and it has greatly influenced my thinking on the subject. I explore these strange stories and ideas partly for entertainment, partly to exercise my critical thinking skills, and partly to ponder the implications, if any of it is true. These purposes take different forms depending on the topic. === Paranormal phenomena === My views on the paranormal are somewhat complicated. I’m alternately skeptical and credulous. I do think that weird things go on in the world; I’m unwilling to discount ''everything'' I hear. But I am trying to learn to be more careful in my reasoning. My general rule of thumb is that paranormal believers conclude too much from the evidence, and skeptics don’t take enough of the evidence into account. This subject is also a theological obstacle course. The aspects of paranormality that I do accept I struggle to fit into my Christian world view. I don’t completely buy the explanation that all unusual experiences are demonic. But in any case, I compare the paranormal to science fiction or fantasy. Even if it’s not real, sometimes it’s fun to consider the possibilities. === Alternative science === Any realm of science you can think of has a fringe element. The nice name for this is “alternative science.” A couple of different things go on in this arena. One is the formation of alternate theories to explain established scientific data, like the “reciprocal system of theory,” an explanation of subatomic physics. Another is the investigation of anomalous phenomena or technologies, like antigravity and free energy machines. The nice thing about alternative science is that it purports to be science. Thus, you can subject it to scientific evaluation. On the other hand, I don’t know how much of this scientific evaluation actually goes on, since most scientists seem to think they have better things to do than addressing fringe claims. Whether the alternative researchers are right or wrong, this seems like a fruitful field of study for understanding the nature and culture of science. Alternative science also tends to be very hopeful. The knowledge and technologies many of these researchers are pursuing would have a profound and positive impact on human society. If they’re on the right track, I say more power to them. === Conspiracy theories === The conspiracy theories I’m especially interested in are the global kind. I don’t really care how the CIA is involved with drugs or who shot Kennedy. The future world dictators are the ones that pique my interest (more of my fascination with the fundamental). These theories usually involve organizations like the UN and the Trilateral Commission and groups like the international bankers. I’m ambivalent toward conspiracy theories. I tend to discount them out of hand, but I’m not sure whether I like them even as entertainment. It’s intriguing to think about the idea of secret decisions being made by high-powered men to alter world events. But conspiracy theories are pretty nasty things, when you think about it. These aren’t fictional characters the theorists are accusing; they’re real people. If the theory isn’t true, it’s tantamount to slander. When the conspiracy ''is'' fictional, however, I love it. ''The X-Files'' is one of my favorite shows, and I liked ''Nowhere Man'', too, the few episodes I saw. I should probably read some Robert Ludlum novels. === Hoaxes and urban legends === Hoaxes are an especially good critical thinking builder because they represent falsehoods that have already been discredited. There’s a lot to be learned from both hoaxers and the people who discredit them, as well as from the people who get sucked in. The topic of urban legends is pretty straightforward and uncontroversial. But urban legends do tend to be unusual, which is why they get circulated. Whenever I get e-mails about suspicious sounding stories, I always go straight to the Internet and see if it’s been recognized as an urban legend. Usually they’ve been debunked, but a few urban legends are true. Of course, there is a more serious side to all this. Some people are terrorized by their strange experiences, and some are slaves to paranoia. And from a Christian standpoint, spiritual deception in this domain is rampant. But to be honest, while I sympathize with the plight of such people, I think that freeing them is someone else’s ministry. I don’t have the spiritual or psychological fortitude for it. My service is to inform. … (Now watch me eat my words!) 4571d35c1d96ed55aad03242fdf585b408e68c71 0 40 81 80 2014-05-07T03:57:51Z Andy Culbertson 1 1 revision: Import of WordPress content wikitext text/x-wiki Version 1.0, 7-17-05 Here are some of my current theological positions. This outline comes from a book by Gregory Boyd and Paul Eddy called ''Across the Spectrum: Understanding Issues in Evangelical Theology'' and the online appendix to it ([http://www.gregboyd.org/ www.gregboyd.org]; see the “Books and Essays” section). I’ve rearranged the issues to follow the traditional categories of systematic theology. My purpose in writing this is to give theologically-minded people a quick overview of my distinctive beliefs. Thus I’m assuming you already know what most of these terms mean or where to find out, and I’m not covering the standard details that all Christians or all evangelicals believe. Even though I consider this my theology, most of these positions don’t have the status of a full belief. They’re more like unsettled opinions. I arrived at them either by upbringing or by a minimal to moderate amount of investigation or simply by subjective preference. They will all be up for review at some time in the future. Broadly speaking, I classify myself as an evangelical Protestant. More specifically, I’m a Reformed Baptist. That label ties together a number of views that are scattered throughout this list. === Prolegomena === ==== Theological method ==== # Deriving propositional truth from scripture (the traditional model) # Understanding the Bible’s story through the lens of modern-day culture (the postfoundationalist model) The traditional model. ==== Inspiration ==== # Without error of any kind (the inerrantist view) # Infallible in matters of faith and practice (the infallibilist view) Hmm, toughie. I’ve always believed in inerrancy, but now I believe the biblical writers held the same basic cosmology as their Ancient Near East neighbors, which might put me in the infallibilist camp, unless that’s considered accommodation. Whether there are actual errors in the Bible, wellll, I’ll say no, for now … === Theology proper === ==== Models of the Trinity ==== # The Trinity is analogous to the unity and diversity of the human self (the psychological model) # The Trinity is analogous to the unity of three people (the social model) The psychological model, but only because I find it intriguing. ==== Providence ==== # God is sovereign over all things (the Calvinist view) # God limits his control by granting freedom (the Arminian view) The Calvinist view. ==== Foreknowledge ==== # God foreknows all that shall come to pass (the classical view) # God knows all that shall be and all that may be (the open view) The classical view. ==== Genesis ==== # Created in the recent past (the young earth view) # A very old work of art (the day-age view) # Restoring a destroyed creation (the restoration view) # Literary theme over literal chronology (the literary framework view) The literary framework view, but if I had to pick something chronological, it would be the day-age view. ==== Noah’s flood ==== # Global (the traditional view) # Local This is really more of a biblical studies question, but since it’s in the book I’ll answer it anyway. I don’t know. I’ve always believed the global view, but the local view people have the kinds of arguments that convince me nowadays. Does it really matter? I would like to add one here that was not in Boyd and Eddy’s book, but it’s a fairly significant topic and goes along with my Reformed Baptist views: ==== Redemptive history ==== # Israel and the church are separate entities, and so are the Mosaic and new covenants (Dispensationalism). # Israel and the church are the same entity, but the Mosaic and new covenants are separate (New Covenant Theology). # Israel and the church are the same entity, and so are the Mosaic and new covenants (Covenant Theology). New Covenant Theology. It provides a good framework for the Baptist views on baptism and the Sabbath while not forcing us to be ridiculous about Israel and the church. (heh heh) ==== Christian demonization ==== # Christians cannot be possessed by demons # Christians can be possessed by demons I would say cannot, but really I have no idea. Kind of a random topic. === Anthropology === ==== The divine image ==== # The image of God is the soul (the substantival view) # The image of God is our God-given authority (the functional view) # The image of God is our relationality (the relational view) All of the above. Why in the world would you need to limit it to any of those? ==== The human constitution ==== # The twofold self: body and soul (the dichotomist view) # The threefold self: body, soul, and spirit (the trichotomist view) # The unitary self (the monistic view) Dichotomist. === Christology === ==== The Incarnation ==== # The unavoidable paradox of the God-man (the classical view) # Christ relinquished his divine prerogatives (the kenotic view) The classical view. === Soteriology === ==== The atonement ==== # Christ died in our place (the penal substitution view) # Christ destroyed Satan and his works (the Christus Victor view) # Christ displayed God’s wrath against sin (the moral government view) Penal substitution as a basis for Christus Victor, but moral government is an interesting possibility. ==== Salvation ==== # TULIP (the Calvinist view) # God wants all to be saved (the Arminian view) TULIP. ==== Santification ==== # Santification as a declaration by God (the Lutheran view) # Santification as holiness in christ and in personal conduct (the Reformed [Calvinist] view) # Santification as resting-faith in the sufficiency of christ (the Keswick “deeper life” view) # Entire sanctification as perfect love (the Wesleyan view) The differences among these seem very subtle to me, so it’s hard to choose. I suppose I’ll go with the Reformed view for now, since I’m Reformed in general and I don’t see why sanctification shouldn’t require hard work. ==== Baptism in the Holy Spirit ==== # People are baptized with the Spirit when they believe (the classical Protestant view) # The baptism of the Holy Spirit occurs subsequent to salvation (the subsequent Spirit baptism view) Classical Protestant. ==== Speaking in tongues ==== # Speaking in tongues is evidence that a person is filled with the Holy Spirit (the Pentecostal view [the initial evidence doctrine]) # Some people may be given the gift of speaking in tongues and others not (non-Pentecostal view) Non-Pentecostal. ==== Eternal security ==== # Secure in the power of God (the eternal security view) # The need to persist in faith (the conditional security view) Eternal security. ==== The destiny of the unevangelized ==== # No other name (the restrictivist view) # God does all he can do (the universal opportunity view) # Hope beyond the grave (the postmortem evangelism view) # He has not left himself without a witness (the inclusivist view) Restrictivist, but universal opportunity appeals to me. ==== Infant death ==== # Babies who die automatically go to heaven (the age of accountability view) # Baptized babies go to heaven; all others go to hell (the Augustinian view) # It depends on the faith or unbelief of their parents (a medieval and Reformed view) # Elect babies are predestined to salvation; nonelect babies are not (another Reformed [Westminster Confession] view) # Babies mature in the afterlife and then choose (the postmortem evangelism view) I have no idea, unfortunately. === Ecclesiology === ==== Baptism ==== # Baptism and Christian discipleship (the believer’s baptism view) # Covenanting with the community of God (the infant baptism view) Believer’s baptism. ==== The Lord’s Supper ==== # “This is my body” (the spiritual presence view) # “In remembrance of me” (the memorial view) Memorial. ==== The charismatic gifts ==== # The gifts are for today (the continuationist view) # “Tongues shall cease” (the cessationist view) Continuationist. (You were going to guess cessationist, admit it!) But I personally don’t exercise any charismatic gifts, and I don’t really fit in with the charismatic culture, although I find it interesting. ==== Women in ministry ==== # Created equal, with complementary roles (the complementarian view) # The irrelevance of gender for spiritual authority (the egalitarian view) Another toughie. My personality is very democratic, so I lean heavily toward the egalitarian view, but I’m uncomfortable with female head pastors. ==== Submission in marriage ==== # Wives must submit to their husbands (the complementarian view) # Gender-based authority was only cultural (the egalitarian view) As with the previous one, I want to say egalitarian, but I couldn’t prove it. ==== Christians and politics ==== # The church must transform and ultimately control politics (the transformational [Calvinist] model) # Christians should be wary of involving themselves in politics (the oppositional [anabaptist] model) # God works through the secular government and the church for different purposes (the two-kingdoms [Lutheran] model) I actually lean toward the Lutheran model, for no particular reason. === Eschatology === ==== Hell ==== # The unending torment of the wicked (the classical view) # The wicked shall be no more (the annihilationist view) The classical view, but annihilationism would be nice. ==== The book of Revelation ==== # The events spoken of in Revelation were all specifically fulfilled in the first century (the preterist view) # Revelation is a heavily symbolic dramatization of the ongoing battle between God and evil (the idealist view) # Almost all of Revelation records events that will take place at the end of time (the futurist view) # Revelation records the gradual unfolding of God’s plan for history up to the present (the historicist [Reformation] view) Preterist. ==== The millennium ==== # Raptured before the reign (the premillennial view) # Working toward and waiting for a coming reign of peace (the postmillennial view) # The symbolic thousand-year conquest of Satan (the amillennial view) Amillennial. ==== The rapture ==== # Christ will remove the church before the tribulation (the pre-tribulation view) # Christ will return once, after the tribulation (the post-tribulation view) Neither, since I’m amillennial, but if I had to pick one, it would be post-trib. be726f3eadabff9ca5850cd9ea4930146058023c 0 41 83 82 2014-05-07T03:57:51Z Andy Culbertson 1 1 revision: Import of WordPress content wikitext text/x-wiki Version 1.0, 5-13-06 [http://www.thinkulum.net/blog/category/obac/ Blog entries related to this essay] === Introduction === “On being a what??” Yes, an agnostic Christian. And yes, it is an oxymoron. But it will make sense once I explain it, though it might not mean what you think. Take the word ''agnostic''. Agnosticism is the view that we don’t know and perhaps can’t know whether or not God exists. But the word ''agnostic'' can also be used broadly to mean that one has no firm opinion on a topic, and that’s the way I’m using it here. By agnostic Christian, I don’t mean someone who isn’t sure about God but does like Christian morality—in that case I might use the term Christian agnostic. No, an agnostic Christian is a Christian who is simply uncertain about many things. And yes, that’s me. I am a Christian. But I am an ailing one. I am a Christian who doubts. It wasn’t always this way. I grew up in a Christian household and was baptized at seven. In early my teenage years I began to take my faith seriously, and as time went on, my spiritual vitality rose and fell in phases. In the earlier phases I had a sense of mission. I think of those as my golden years, when I was young and excited and, well, naïve. But as I learned more about Christianity and the world and myself, my clarity faded, and my enthusiasm followed. This trend has led to a period of uncertainty about my Christian faith, and this is where I find myself now. For a couple of reasons I tend to keep these things to myself. First, while some Christians are content to let doubters fight their own battles and come to resolution on their own, other Christians tend to become uneasy and to provide anxious and unhelpful responses. Then there are Christians (whom I haven’t spoken with much but have seen in action) who think the answers are simple, go into apologist mode, and offer arguments I’ve already dismissed. With these last two groups it’s easier just to avoid the subject. So I do. The second reason I usually keep things quiet is that my doubts are unclear even to me. They are complex, nebulous, and subtle, and until now, I hadn’t sat down to sort them all out. I didn’t arrive at these doubts through a systematic study of Christianity’s claims, or else they’d be nicely organized already. Instead they’ve arisen gradually and haphazardly over the past eight years or so as I lived my everyday life. But drawing random ideas out of my mind all in a tangle is not an effective way to present a complicated and controversial subject if I want to be understood, and I do want to be understood. Bringing up doubt opens up multiple cans of worms, and I’d rather not do that unprepared and bite off more (worms) than I can chew—which is not very many, believe me! So again, I avoid the subject. Sometimes the state of my faith does come up, however, and I’d like to be able to give a substantive answer without babbling incoherently. And if I want to make any progress in resolving my doubts, I’ll need a clear starting point. So for those two reasons, I’ve finally decided to turn on a flashlight, explore my foggy mind, and try to explain myself. This essay is addressed primarily to Christians, especially to Christians who know me, since they are likely to have an interest in my spiritual life and since I still generally approach these issues from a Christian perspective. I’ll start with a summary of my position, then lay out a three-part framework for understanding the discussion, walk through the details, and finally examine my options for the next phase of my journey. === A summary === As a Christian wrestling with doubt, I’m caught in a state of limbo. Doubt involves a certain tension. On the one hand I want to remain a Christian and to become a better one, for several reasons. First, I find much to value in Christianity. Second, I tend to take its basic tenets for granted. Third, I believe it does have some epistemic merit. Fourth, I worry about leaving it in error. Fifth, I don’t want to hurt the people I care about. And sixth, I’m sometimes very aware that I ''need'' God. On the other hand, various forces have been weakening my convictions and even pushing me in other directions. First, it seems extremely difficult or impossible to know what the correct version of Christianity ''is''. Second, I’ve always found it difficult to understand or engage with the experiential dimensions of Christianity and to progress as a Christian. That by itself isn’t a reason to give up, but it is a discouraging and demotivating factor. Third, even though I think Christianity has some epistemic strengths, some of its fundamental tenets seem hard or impossible to support. Fourth, naturalism often seems to me like a very plausible alternative to Christianity. And finally, since the source of my conservative evangelical Christianity is my upbringing, which is essentially arbitrary, I feel that I ought to investigate other theologies and worldviews out of a sense of intellectual duty. But none of these reasons takes away from my first statement, that I do want to remain a Christian. ''Both'' sides of this tension exist in my mind. Each surfaces at different times and in different ways. I aim to resolve this tension, though the tension is involved even in the attempt to resolve it. That is, I hope that the tension will be resolved on the Christian side, and I will give Christianity every chance I can, but I don’t feel it’s right to give it a free pass. Christianity will have to stand on its own merits. If it can, then hopefully I will have the awareness to perceive it. Even then, however, I’m left with the daunting task of sorting out my theology and spirituality. Although these questions are of vital importance to me, the difficulty of finding what I consider solid answers has reduced my passion for pursuing them to a few smoldering coals. I tried to sort everything out for several years, but after I’d had enough bewilderment I quietly shelved my search for answers and put my spiritual well-being on hold for a while. Right now I just sort of exist, and I pursue other interests, with these other issues rumbling just below the surface. But I hope that this essay will be a first step in resuming the search. === A three-part framework === The issues in this essay are rather complicated. So before I descend into the messy details, I’d like to lay out a conceptual framework so you can understand how all the pieces relate to each other and what their implications are. The framework has three parts: five characteristics of beliefs, three areas of Christian thought, and five epistemic problems that motivate and guide my search for truth, along with my methods for evaluating opposing views. In the rest of the essay I will be combining these factors and looking at how they show up in my life. ==== The nature of belief ==== Before I explain my model of belief, I’ll set out some rough definitions to get us going. A ''belief'', in very basic terms, is an idea that a person accepts as true. Various levels of belief are possible, and these could be described by other terms, but I’ll use belief as a catch-all in this essay. The concepts I want to differentiate more carefully, for the sake of my believing readers, are the varying degrees and types of non-belief, which I will call uncertainty, doubt, skepticism, and unbelief. ''Uncertainty'' is an indecision about whether to believe an idea. ''Doubt'' is a suspicion that an idea might not be true. ''Skepticism'' can be used in three senses: as a general strategy used in evaluating ideas, as a stance one takes toward particular ideas, or as a name for a specific view of the world. As a strategy, skepticism assumes that ideas are probably false until they have been proven true, rather than, among other approaches, assuming that ideas are true until they have been proven false. As a stance, skepticism is a stronger one than doubt. It is a confidence that a particular idea is either probably or definitely not true. And when speaking of it as a viewpoint, I use skepticism more or less as a synonym for naturalism. Here I’ll outline five main characteristics of beliefs according to my understanding. First, a belief is not only an idea a person has that something is true—it’s not merely a thought. It’s <span class="item">an idea that is integrated into the rest of a person’s life. The result is that the idea is connected to the person’s other beliefs and has effects in the person’s thoughts, feelings, and behavior. Let’s say a nefarious person has presented me with a large wicker basket that has a hole in the side. The hole reveals only darkness, so I can’t see what the basket contains, but the villain tells me that inside is a poisonous snake. He seems to be the kind of person who would keep such a dangerous creature on hand, so I believe him. Because of this belief, I interpret the hissing sound and occasional movement of the basket to be the work of the snake. I even imagine what the snake looks like as it slithers around and bobs its head menacingly inside the basket. These are thoughts. Suddenly the villain grabs my arm and tries to force my hand into the hole! In response, I am terrified—an emotion—and I resist—an action. I have an ''expectation'' that if my hand enters the basket, it will be bitten by the snake and I’ll die. And I have these interpretations, expectations, emotions, and physical reactions as a direct result of my belief that there is in fact a poisonous snake in the basket. This relationship between thoughts and the rest of one’s life is also how we can tell that someone is insincere. They say they believe one thing, but then they do things that conflict with that purported belief.</span> Second, <span class="item">beliefs can be simple, complex, or anything in between</span>. An example of a relatively simple one would be the belief that if a door is locked, merely turning the doorknob won’t let me open it. A prime example of a complex belief, and the one most relevant to this essay, would be a worldview—an interpretation of reality and human life as a whole—such as Christianity. The word ''Christianity'' is like a container for a lot of other ideas, each of which must be believed in for someone to say that they believe in Christianity. Third, <span class="item">beliefs are held for many different reasons</span>, some of which are better than others. A person can believe something based on varying degrees of evidence or for non-rational reasons, such as a sense of loyalty to other people who believe the idea. Sometimes an idea can be adopted for pragmatic reasons, such as when one is forced by dire circumstances to trust a stranger, and I suppose this could be called a type of belief. And often beliefs are based on assumptions. Here I’m defining ''assumption'' to mean an idea that is taken for granted without strong evidence to back it up. Sometimes an idea is assumed consciously and on purpose as a strategy for carrying on an investigation to see where the idea leads. But usually people’s assumptions are unconscious. People have many, many beliefs that either can’t be proven or that they simply haven’t taken the time or don’t have the time to prove. Fourth, <span class="item">beliefs can be arrived at in different ways</span>. For example, they can be taught as part of one’s upbringing. They can be formed as the result of an experience. Or they can be adopted after intentional study. Several paths can lead from a purposeful investigation to a conclusion and, if the conclusion is convincing to the investigator, a belief; and these paths correspond to the types of logical arguments. The kind that is most familiar to people is deductive reasoning (all men are mortal; Socrates is a man; therefore Socrates is mortal). But there are other kinds, and one that is especially relevant to this essay is known as abductive reasoning. Abduction is the process of finding the best explanation for a set of facts. In general my approach to searching for truth is abductive. Fifth, <span class="item">beliefs are held with different strengths</span>. At a certain degree of weakness, a belief might be considered an opinion. If a belief is held strongly, it’s usually not easy to change. For example, most people probably believe that the universe is very large. If you randomly stopped a person on the street and told them that the universe is actually quite small and asked them to just believe it, they would probably have a hard time fulfilling your request. They might imagine what the universe would be ''like'' if it were small, or they might ''say'' that they believed it, but deep down they would still believe that the universe is large. People can’t just hop from one belief to another and hold those beliefs strongly. What all this means for this essay is that I need to explain not only what I believe and what I doubt but also what ''kind'' of belief and doubt I have regarding those things. ==== Areas of Christian thought ==== Apologetics, theology, and spirituality are three major areas of Christian thought, and uncertainties can exist in all three. The fundamental issues of Christian belief are in the realm of <span class="item">apologetics</span>. Apologetic questions have to do with the foundational tenets of Christianity and whether Christianity as a whole is true. Does God exist? Is the Bible God’s Word? Is the Incarnation a coherent concept? <span class="item">Theological</span> questions have to do with the details of Christian belief, what the true nature or shape of Christianity is. What is the nature of the atonement? Does God know the future? What is the relationship between the Old and New Covenants? Should women be leaders in the church? <span class="item">Spiritual</span> questions have to do with the spiritual realities that relate to our own time and place—current events in the spiritual realm, you could say—as well as how theological truths should be lived out in general. What is God doing in the world? What is genuine prayer? How is my relationship with God? Do I even have one? I experience uncertainty in all three areas. I’m really using the term ''doubt'' as shorthand for a much broader set of difficulties. <span class="item">My problem isn’t just that I don’t know whether to remain a Christian. It’s that I don’t even know what kind of Christian to be if I stay one, let alone how to be a </span><span class="item_em">good</span> one. I’m in a general state of confusion. These three areas of Christian thought are interrelated and can’t be totally separated from each other. Thus as I explain my situation in each area, I’ll bring in aspects of the others that relate to it. In this essay my main concern is conceptual—what is the state of my faith right now? For some historical background on my relationship to these topics, see the introductions to the [[Christianity Introduction|Christianity]] section and the [[Theology Introduction|theology]], [[Hermeneutics Introduction|hermeneutics]], [[Apologetics Introduction|apologetics]], [[Spirituality Introduction|spirituality]], and [[Evangelism Introduction|evangelism]] subsections of my site (don’t worry, they’re shorter). ==== My epistemic situation ==== What is an epistemic situation? It sounds medical. Actually it’s philosophical. Epistemology is the study of knowledge, and something that is epistemic is something that has to do with knowledge or the process of knowing. In each of these areas—apologetics, theology, and spirituality—I’m asking three basic questions: Are my existing beliefs true? If not, what is? If so, what then? I have five epistemic problems that are motivating these questions and also making it difficult to answer them. The first problem is that <span class="item">my existing beliefs aren’t epistemically secure</span>. That is, they aren’t based on solid methods of establishing knowledge. Instead of secure epistemic foundations, such as a comprehensive network of sound arguments, my existing beliefs are based on my upbringing, my personal preferences, my simple intellectual dabblings, and my unwillingness to give them up just yet. Those might be okay to start with, but for me ultimately they aren’t good enough. My second problem is that <span class="item">I don’t know enough yet to make my beliefs more secure</span>. And there’s a lot to know. People have different ideas about how to establish knowledge, but for now, as I’ve said, I take a best-explanation approach; and to do a really good job of arriving at a best explanation, you have to survey all the possible explanations and determine at least three things about each one: how well it fits the facts it’s supposed to explain, how effectively it explains them (for example, does it extrapolate from the evidence to make predictions that can be tested?), and how internally consistent it is. A major part of determining those things is examining the arguments for each possibility, the rebuttals to those arguments, the arguments against each possibility, and the rebuttals to those. And you have to try to be fair and impartial when evaluating all these arguments. It’s a demanding task. I consider it also to be a part of what it means to be intellectually responsible, whereas making forceful assertions without examining all the available evidence would be intellectually irresponsible. My third problem is that <span class="item">when I encounter arguments from opposing sides, they tend to balance each other out</span>, and I’m no closer to the truth than I was before I heard them. This is where the agnostic part of being an agnostic Christian comes in. The world is complex enough that just about any view will be supported by some of the facts and contradicted by other facts. This is why, in a trial, both the prosecution and the defense are able to make a case. For any two opposing views, the evidence that appears to support the one will be facts that the other has to somehow explain away or incorporate into its system of ideas. When deciding between the two views, you have to look at how clearly the evidence supports the first view, how well the second view takes that evidence into account, how clearly the second view is supported by its evidence, and how well the first view takes that evidence into account. In some cases the truth is fairly obvious and there’s little debate. In areas of knowledge that are more remote or intangible, however, such as history or metaphysics, the evidence for both sides can be equally convincing (or unconvincing). This is the trouble I repeatedly have in the area of religion. The arguments within evangelical Christian theology, apologetics, and spirituality are ''sort of'' convincing, but other theologies and worldviews have good arguments too. So I’m still on a search (though a stalled one) for the best explanation, because the one I have doesn’t entirely stand out. My fourth problem is that <span class="item">I’m </span><span class="item_em">not</span> completely fair and impartial, which is one of the requirements for a search for the best explanation. I don’t want to leave Christianity. In fact, I want to become a ''better'' Christian. This is why I call myself an agnostic Christian and not a Christian agnostic—I’m fundamentally a Christian who has some agnostic tendencies and not an agnostic who just likes Christian morality. Now, from a Christian point of view, not wanting to leave Christianity is a ''good'' thing. Part of the essence of being a Christian is loyalty to God and to fellow believers, and that’s what I feel. It’s a large part of what keeps me a Christian, aside from a fear of judgment and of social pressure. But loyalty to a particular viewpoint isn’t all that good for intellectual inquiry, if your inquiry is about the truthfulness of that viewpoint. This is a conflict I call the <span class="item">loyalty-truth tension</span>. Sometimes the people and ideas you feel loyal to really are trustworthy and true, but sometimes they’re not, no matter how intensely you feel about them. And when they’re not, sometimes that feeling of loyalty can blind you to the truth. That’s why, when truth is your aim, loyalty can get in the way. When you’re loyal to something that really is true, of course, there’s no particular problem, although there could be if your goal is to be absolutely sure you have the truth, since to do that you’d have to examine other possibilities as if they could be true. In a certain sense this tension is a conflict between ''two'' loyalties, a loyalty to a particular conclusion and a loyalty to reason as a method for coming to conclusions. The conflict is that reason might lead you to some other conclusion than the one you want to be loyal to. It could be true that instead of loyalty to the conclusion, the other loyalty should be abandoned—the loyalty to reason—and some other method chosen for seeking truth. For now I trust reason, but this is a question I’ll need to explore. My fifth problem is that, even though I’m not completely impartial and I do want to remain and progress as a Christian, <span class="item">when I look at Christian theology, apologetics, and spirituality from an epistemological point of view, I’m not very satisfied with what I see</span>. This is one reason I’m asking these questions in the first place (are my existing beliefs true?, etc.). If our beliefs were all completely obvious, there would be no need to investigate them. Knowing the truth would be as easy as breathing. But that’s not the world we live in. The real world is something that has to be explained; the truth is something we have to find; and sometimes we turn out to be wrong and have to rethink our position. Various factors give us clues about whether we’re right or wrong about an idea. Here are three major steps for an idea that’s on the road from speculation to knowledge: First, the idea has to have meaning or definition. Otherwise we don’t know what we’re talking about when we try to express it. Second, the idea has to be coherent. That is, it can’t contradict itself. And third, the idea has to be attested by evidence. Now, I don’t necessarily mean the physical kind of evidence they pick up on ''CSI'', just that the idea needs to be supported by sound arguments, of which there are different kinds. I’ll have more on that in the essay’s conclusion. The problem is that when I look at Christianity, significant concepts within it seem to ''lack'' meaning, coherence, or evidence. The rest of this essay is devoted to explaining these observations, so I won’t go into them here. But they are the reason that my loyalty to Christianity and my loyalty to reason are in tension. If Christianity made complete sense to me, then there wouldn’t be a problem and I could get on with my life without worrying about such things. This lack of meaning, coherence, and evidence has a consequence beyond knowing if Christianity is true, which is that even if it is true, I don’t know what to do with it. How do I live as a Christian if I barely know what Christianity means or how it relates to the everyday world? I’ll explain this difficulty in the section on spirituality. To a certain degree I don’t know if these epistemic weaknesses are a problem with Christianity itself or a problem with my understanding of it. I’m like an airplane pilot who’s lost at sea and has encountered a foggy island, but all I can see are the tops of the mountains. Are those mountains connected by dry valleys? Or are they a series of unconnected peaks jutting out of the ocean? If I descend, will I be able to land? Similarly, are the terms of Christianity connected meaningfully to each other and to human life? Are the concepts that seem to be in conflict connected by bits of logic that I can’t see yet? Are the seemingly speculative teachings of Christianity connected to the real world by evidence? The situation is ambiguous until the facts make it clear, and as I’ve said, I don’t have enough of the evidence yet to know the answers to these questions. Anything can seem nonsensical if you know little enough about it. It’s fine to ask questions, but to find out if they can be answered you need data, sometimes lots and lots of it. Maybe I haven’t read the right books or had the right experiences. At the least, I can say there’s a disconnect between Christianity and my sense of reason. Maybe the fault is on Christianity’s end; maybe it’s on mine. To summarize my situation (because even I have trouble keeping this stuff straight), I am struggling to understand Christianity deeply while wrestling with issues of intellectual responsibility in the religious realm. I am an evangelical Christian, and I like being one and want to grow in my faith. But I see that the reasons I have right now for being a Christian aren’t entirely solid, and when I ask myself how reasonable (or livable) Christianity seems to me, the answers are discouraging. So I feel the need to step back and examine, as fairly as I can, the epistemic strengths and weaknesses of both evangelical Christianity and the alternative theologies and worldviews, so that I can come as close as possible to the best explanation for the world and human experience. My feelings of loyalty to evangelical Christianity and my tendency to see all viewpoints as equally plausible could get in the way of this search, although if Christianity is true, my loyalty to reason could get in the way of my loyalty to Christianity. Balancing those possibilities is a challenge. My questions can be boiled down to two: Is there a viewpoint that fits the facts of the world better than evangelical Christianity or than Christianity in general? And how do I go about investigating that question fairly while giving proper weight to the possibility that my current beliefs may be true after all? To summarize my methods, the goal of my search is to answer the following questions: (1) Are my existing beliefs true? (2) If not, what is? (3) If so, what then? The process of answering these questions involves surveying the ideas that are competing with those beliefs and answering at least three other questions about each one: (1) Does the idea have meaning? (2) Is it coherent? And (3) is it supported by the evidence? Examining the evidence relevant to an idea involves further questions: (1) How clearly does the evidence support this idea? (2) How effectively does the idea explain the evidence? (3) How well is the idea able to account for evidence that seems to contradict it? And throughout this process of investigation, four kinds of arguments need to be examined, whenever they’re available, about whatever point you’re investigating at the time: (1) arguments for the position in question, (2) rebuttals to those arguments, (3) arguments against the position, and (4) rebuttals to those arguments. Note that these are methods used in an intentional study and not necessarily in the haphazard reflection I’ve done so far. The rest of this essay is occupied with explaining how I’ve seen these questions show up in my thinking on theology, apologetics, and spirituality. One caveat before I go on. Some of my friends, knowing my preference for intellectual rigor, tend to assume that every opinion I express stems from some exhaustively researched, carefully reasoned study of the topic; and they might be tempted to think that’s what this essay represents. This is completely false. Intellectual rigor is unfortunately much more an ideal than a reality in my life. The purpose of this essay is to collect my hazy ''impressions'' of these issues and to draw out the principles that seem to govern them. The result will hopefully be a starting point for more rigorous study. I’ve worked hard to present these things in a logical and organized format so they will be easier for everyone, including me, to understand. But if you scratch the surface of all this clarity, you’ll find that it’s a thin layer on top of a sea of disordered vagueness. In other words, if you ask me questions about what I’ve written here, I might have to think for a while and get back to you (especially if it’s a request for examples—specific cases seem to flee my mind as soon as I’ve drawn conclusions from them). That’s how the whole process of writing this essay has been. I knew I had issues involving doubt, but to put together anything like a complete picture of the state of my faith, I had to spend a long time stirring the murky waters of my mind, collecting the thoughts that bobbed to the surface, and putting them together in a way that made sense. A lot of the details are still down in the depths. === Theology === ==== The problem—the too-fertile field of possibility ==== Since I’m already a Christian, I’ll start with issues internal to Christianity. These internal issues make up Christian theology—the Christian view of God, humanity, and the universe. There is a large set of important questions about the world that Christians have opinions on. Unfortunately, the set of specific beliefs that all Christians agree on is very small. They disagree on everything from the nature of the atonement and the authority of the church to speaking in tongues and styles of worship music. So which Christian answers are the right ones? What beliefs constitute the “one true theology”? The brief answer is I don’t know. Overall, I’m willing to affirm the core beliefs of Christianity—that God created the world; humanity is sinful; Jesus is the Son of God, died, rose from the dead, and will come again; and that we must have faith in him for salvation. But beyond those few central points of doctrine, I don’t know what to think. There are too many viewpoints within Christianity, and any choice seems arbitrary without more study than I’ve done so far. It’s not that I don’t have opinions. I do have theological [[My Current Theology|default positions]], derived from my upbringing and my own dabblings, and some of them I feel rather strongly about. But I’m very aware that with more study, I might change my mind about them. In the spirit of intellectual fairness, I am even willing to entertain the notion that orthodox Christian theology might misinterpret the Bible on some points and that the heretics might have been right after all, though I don’t think it’s likely. Sometimes I think that if I studied the Bible more extensively, I would arrive at satisfying conclusions, that the answers are ''there'' if you just think carefully enough. But sometimes (more often these days, I’m afraid) I think the answers just can’t be known. As I hear the arguments offered for various positions, the Bible seems ambiguous enough that it is very difficult or impossible to settle on one theological position while being fair to all the biblical evidence. But why would God give us such a long, drawn-out revelation of himself while leaving its meaning so unclear? ==== Theology and apologetics—the nature of the Bible ==== This question leads me to the intersection of theology and apologetics—that is, the relationship between determining what Christianity teaches and determining whether Christianity is true at all. The Bible is supposed to be a primary source of theological truth, but its ambiguity makes me wonder if the Bible is really a coherent document. Interpreters of the Bible disagree widely, but is it really just a problem of interpretation? Did the ''writers'' of the Bible agree? As a conservative Christian, my default answer is yes. Maybe the Bible’s meaning was clear when it was first written but it has been clouded by the distance of time and culture. Maybe God values the effort we put into understanding spiritual truth, and the struggle is more important than the outcome. And maybe the reason is simply a mystery kept hidden within God’s mind. But the persistence of these problems leads me to ponder the no answer too. And when I explore that answer, I see three basic possible explanations. Either the Bible was inspired by God but not in the carefully controlled way that conservative Christians think it was; God exists, but the Bible isn’t his Word; … or there isn’t a God to inspire it in the first place. In either of the last two cases, the Bible is merely a record of human speculation. I won’t leap to any of those conclusions, but I also can’t simply dismiss them. ==== Effects—avoidance and restraint ==== My thoughts on these questions are undecided enough that I tend not to think or talk about theology much. I almost think discussing theology is a waste of time, at least for me at this point in my life. It’s a field of study that is highly dependent on the conclusions from other fields; and until I’ve dealt with its prerequisites, I just can’t take theological discussions very seriously. First we have to establish that the ground of theology (Scripture) is reliable, and then we have to work out a reliable way (hermeneutics) to build a theology from that foundation. And I am very far from having accomplished either of these. I don’t even know if I ought to be a theological foundationalist. So I tend to avoid getting into theological discussions in the first place. When I do interact with people on these issues, my uncertainty causes me to restrain my emotions. I don’t want to press a point if I know I could easily be wrong about it. When people ask me questions about theology, I usually give noncommittal answers, as if I had little knowledge on the topic. In reality, I know enough to answer the question. I just don’t know enough to tell them which answer is the ''right'' one and defend it. And when I affirm my default positions with people who agree with them, I often feel like I’m only humoring them, since at the same time I’m thinking, ''I don’t really know if this is true, but I don’t want to sound like a heretic just yet''. But I’ve been trying to be more open about my uncertainties lately. The same hesitancy goes for living by these beliefs, which is where theology intersects with spirituality. I’m reluctant to pursue actions very enthusiastically when they are based on a belief with so much uncertainty behind it. Another idea might be true instead that requires a different response. In fact, I feel disingenuous when I try to enthusiastically embrace ideas I’m not sure I believe. So I generally don’t, and my spiritual life is correspondingly weak. I’ll have more on that in the spirituality section. If you’re a Christian, especially if you know me personally, you may feel disturbed by all this. That’s understandable. But don’t panic—I haven’t gone off the deep end yet. I’m only asking questions and raising possibilities, not stating conclusions. My concerns are real, but I’m in no hurry to abandon my roots. === Apologetics === Now, just to review, I am an evangelical Christian, and I like being one and want to grow in my faith. But various uncertainties have crept into my mind over the past several years, and in spite of my general contentment with being a Christian, I can’t just ignore them. My desire to remain and progress as a Christian and my wish to be true to my reason form a tension, a conflict in my mind, and I’d like to journey toward resolving it. So I’m trying to explain this tension and its various facets in this essay in order to give myself a starting point and to help me interact with people when the topic of my spiritual life comes up. As I’ve said, the state of my faith has not been very clear to me in recent years, but in the months I’ve spent writing this essay, I’ve been able to gather the following insights into my inner thoughts. ==== Overarching themes—abduction, naturalism, and the varieties of doubt ==== Good theology is important to me, but it isn’t enough. My concerns are more fundamental than merely wanting to define the details of Christianity. For the past few years I have been interested in developing my critical thinking skills and applying them to as much of life as I reasonably could. I’ve wanted to have rational reasons for holding my beliefs and to have ways of critically evaluating ideas to decide whether I should accept them. While it’s impossible to investigate ''everything'' rationally, I don’t want to intentionally exclude areas of life from that program. And that means that religion has to undergo scrutiny too. The upshot has been that, even without undertaking a concentrated study of these issues yet, my confidence in my Christian beliefs has gradually been eroding. In some ways this is nothing unusual. The more I learn, the more complicated the world seems, and the less sure I am of anything. Thus, I’ve been in a general trend of agnosticizing over the past several years. I don’t know the answers to society’s questions, and I’m not sure all of them ''can'' be known. I’m hoping this isn’t a permanent state, but it is the reality I’m facing right now. Since my doubts and questions come up randomly in the course of everyday life, I usually only think about them in disconnected bits and pieces, but there are several broad issues lying behind them—a best-explanation approach to reasoning, naturalism as a competitor to Christianity, and the variety of forms doubt can take. In general, I take an abductive approach to apologetic questions, as I do with most questions. Abduction is the process of finding the best explanation for a set of facts. In the case of a worldview, abductive reasoning would try to find the best explanation for all the facts in the universe, or at least the most important ones, whichever those are. Differing worldviews could thus be thought of as competing explanations for the facts of the universe and human experience. I believe this would correspond most closely to a cumulative case approach in apologetics. Given my analytical personality and science-oriented upbringing, when I consider the available options, I am much more tempted toward skepticism than toward another religion. So although in principle I think I should find out, I rarely wonder if, say, Hinduism is more warranted than Christianity. For me, the main competitor to the Christian explanation of the world is the naturalistic one. I tend to look at life from both of these perspectives in an inner dialog. For a while I wondered if this skeptical inner dialog meant I was maybe a budding atheist, but the thought of how that would hurt the people I cared about was painful to me. If someone falls away from the faith, they aren’t saved, and that can be terrible to contemplate. I couldn’t easily do that to my family and friends. But then I realized that part of the reason for my anguish was that I believed they could be right. ''I'' believed that apostasizing would mean judgment, and it seemed like a tragic choice to make. So why make it, if that’s still what I believed? And it wasn’t only judgment that bothered me. I felt like I would be hurting God if I concluded he didn’t exist. A contradiction, I know, but it brings out the fact that I hadn’t (and still haven’t) drawn that conclusion yet. In any case, I doubted I would be the kind of hardened atheist who sneers at all things Christian. I would more likely be a weak agnostic who was always hoping to find the missing piece of evidence for the Christian religion. From an intellectual standpoint, there isn’t a lot of difference between that and a weak ''Christian'' who’s looking for the missing piece of evidence. Blaise Pascal, the French mathematician and philosopher, argued that if you’re uncertain whether Christianity or atheism is true, it’s a safe bet to settle on Christianity, since if atheism is true, the Christians lose nothing, whereas if Christianity is true, the atheists lose everything. Pascal’s wager has some significant weaknesses, but for a case like mine it’s perfect. If it comes down to a choice between being a weak agnostic and being a weak Christian, I’ll side with Pascal and keep my Christianity for as long as it retains a glimmer of credibility. This is an example of how the loyalty-truth tension gets played out in my mind. Now, my doubts come in various forms. Often I’m essentially playing “what if” with myself. I think, ''What if the skeptics are right about such-and-such? How would they argue for it?'' And the skeptical arguments I come up with make sense to me. Then I wander out of that frame of mind and go back to taking Christian things for granted. Some of my doubts have more to do (for now) with the strength of the arguments we have for certain beliefs than with the beliefs themselves. After I had concluded that I didn’t ''really'' want to become an atheist, I took a brief inventory of what Christian beliefs I tend to take for granted and what things I actively doubt. What I still believe are the basic formal doctrines of Christianity. I take it for granted that the God of the Bible exists; that Jesus is the incarnate Second Person of the Trinity; that he was born of a virgin, died for our sins in some sense, and was raised from the dead; that he is sitting at God’s right hand and will return at some point in the future; that we must trust in him for salvation. That is, not only do I take these doctrines to reflect the true form of Christianity (see the theology section), but I also assume them to be true. I’m more uncertain about everything else. In practical terms the fact that I take these ideas for granted means that they form part of my mental picture of the world. When I think about the way things are, those features are there, however dimly I understand them and their implications. And they form the basis of my limited spirituality, which I’ll talk about in the spirituality section. You could say I’m a ''de facto'' fideist on these central points. I take them almost purely as assumptions, although I don’t believe that I should. Truthfully, that leaves me wide open to doubt in those areas (my theological default positions are even wider open). Once I do examine them critically, there’s every chance that my belief in them will fall apart. For the moment I tend to assume that somehow it all works out in Christianity’s favor, and from a Christian perspective I suppose this kind of weak fideism is okay for now. However, some of my doubts have become more entrenched. Compared to the things I take for granted, these more settled doubts seem limited in scope, but they come in at a fairly fundamental spot. Where my faith primarily falters is at the inspiration of the Bible. Since that’s my main area of doubt, I’ll take some time to explain it in depth. ==== Revelation—the central conflict ==== For me, the two competing explanations for the world are Christianity and naturalism. The Christian explanation of the world comes from God’s self-revelation and the human theology that is based on it. Hence, at least for me, the major battleground between Christianity and naturalism (or indeed any other worldview) is this revelation. Traditionally God’s revelation has been seen as coming in two forms, general revelation, which is God’s use of the natural world to display his existence and attributes, and special revelation, which is God’s communication in the form of written Scripture. Despite my belief in God, general revelation has for a long time seemed faint to me. It seems to me that few features of the universe are uniquely explained by Christian theism. When I’m thinking about the classical theistic arguments, then, I find most of them weak; and I wonder if, going only on the information in the realm of general revelation, deism or naturalism wouldn’t explain the world just as well. At the moment the only theistic argument that really appeals to me is the fine-tuning argument, which argues that conditions in the universe are just right for life to exist, and therefore the universe must have been designed. Special revelation is a much more complex issue than general revelation because the theological ideas it asserts are much more specific, there are many more of them, and they are wrapped up with all the complexities of human history and the process of recording that history in writing. One of the central Christian tenets is that the Bible is God’s Word. In keeping with my current attention to the justification of beliefs, my basic question here is why Christianity should be allowed such strong claims for its Scriptures. The Enlightenment began a concerted effort on the part of scholars to study the Bible as a merely human book like all other books. And the Bible certainly is a human book. If it were merely divine, it might have materialized out of nothing one day. But it was written by human beings. If the Bible is divinely inspired in some sense, then it would obviously be wrong to treat it as merely human. But here’s my question: ''How would we know?'' How can we tell the difference between a divinely inspired book and a merely human book? And how can we tell that the Bible is of the divinely inspired kind? It’s potentially a complicated question because the Bible wasn’t written in one day by one person. It was written by many people over thousands of years. How do we know that ''each book'' of the Bible is inspired? And ''each part'' of each book? At this point, I don’t know, and to take the whole Bible to be inspired ''just because'' a pastor or theologian says so seems like a rather tall order. Once skeptics have excluded God from the writing of the Bible and from history itself, they often feel the need to explain the supernatural elements in the Bible. Sometimes they seem to be grasping at straws, but other times their alternative explanations give me pause. I find myself wondering, for example, if skeptics are right when they claim that the story of the Exodus and of Israel’s special relationship with God was invented to justify the conquest of Canaan. Of course, there are less extreme positions one could take than the view that the Bible is only human or only divine. Christians believe it’s both, but they vary in the way they define the Bible as God’s Word. The strongest form of the claim is probably dictation theory, in which God simply “whispered in the ear” of the biblical writers and they wrote down whatever he told them. The Bible shows obvious signs of the normal human processes of writing a book, as even conservative evangelicals agree. The question is what the relationship is between the human writing and the divine message. If God didn’t hand every word to the writers, then how did they get their information about the invisible spiritual realities they wrote about? I believe some liberal Christians hold that the Bible writers were simply theologians trying their best to interpret the awesome events they had witnessed. The question of the writers’ sources for spiritual knowledge repeatedly enters my mind, and it leads me to wonder if maybe the liberals are right. Maybe the Bible was only indirectly inspired through the events that prompted its writing rather than directly in the process of the writing itself. And along with this more lenient view, I wonder if it isn’t more sensible just to admit errors here and there. I’m not saying definitely. Just maybe. Doesn’t throwing out inspiration have serious consequences for the rest of Christian belief? It does look that way. But does that mean we should hold on to it? I have trouble moving in that direction epistemically. It seems wrong to say, “We need Christianity to be true; therefore the Bible must be true.” We could say other things like, “There’s evidence that the Bible is true; therefore the Bible is probably true,” or even, “We have reason to believe that Christianity is true; therefore the Bible is probably true.” But simply rejecting one position because it’s dangerous to another position won’t work. This is another manifestation of the loyalty-truth tension. In this case we would be taking a logically questionable step in order to preserve the belief that has our devotion. Even though this doubt about inspiration is more persistent than many of my others, I’m not usually thinking all this when I actually read the Bible. I tend to read it as if it’s God’s Word. I assume that the writers at least knew what they were talking about, even if I don’t. So at times I think of the Bible as innocent until proven guilty (of being merely human) and at others guilty until proven innocent. It’s a strange case, I know. ==== Intellectual base covering ==== There are other things to doubt, of course. Skeptics sometimes argue that various Christian doctrines are logically incoherent or that if he exists, God cannot be truly good because of the suffering in the world or because some of his actions in the Bible appear morally objectionable. These issues are important, and since I think Christianity needs to be examined, I intend to deal with them, but they aren’t my primary concern right now. Similarly, it may be that neither Christianity nor naturalism is true but some other religion or secular worldview is. The intellectually responsible course would be to try to investigate all the options. But I can’t do everything, and to be honest it would be more out of a sense of duty than genuine interest. Being fair to the various possibilities while balancing my time is something I’ll have to figure out as I go along. ==== The persisting converse—tenacity and apologetic potential ==== But for now and the foreseeable future, I remain a Christian. These questions don’t mean I’m about to plunge into atheism. Abandoning Christianity still seems very wrong to me; I’m not about to do it glibly. In fact, it would take a long time and a lot of work for me to conclude that Christianity simply cannot be believed, and despite my history with apologetics, I feel like I’ve barely started. This tenacity is part of my approach to managing the loyalty-truth tension. I don’t think of sticking with Christianity as just a safe bet on eternity. To a certain degree loyalty can be a benefit in the search for truth. The thing you’re loyal to might turn out to be true after all, in which case if you drop it at the first sign of trouble, you might miss seeing the key pieces of evidence that would convince you. So since I still take Christianity seriously, dismissing it prematurely is one error I want to avoid. And in any case, I don’t see Christian apologetics as completely devoid of promise. There’s the fine-tuning argument for God’s existence that I mentioned earlier. Jesus’ resurrection is supported by some interesting arguments. Conservative scholars’ arguments for the Bible’s historical reliability usually impress me, and so do the insights of contemporary Christian philosophers of religion. And believers have some striking stories about their experiences of God that I’d like to explore and examine. === Spirituality === In case you’re memory’s getting foggy, I am an evangelical Christian, and I like being one and want to grow in my faith. But various uncertainties have crept into my mind over the past several years, and in spite of my general contentment with being a Christian, I can’t just ignore them. My desire to remain and progress as a Christian and my wish to be true to my reason form a tension, a conflict in my mind, and I’d like to journey toward resolving it. So I’m trying to explain this tension and its various facets in this essay in order to give myself a starting point and to help me interact with people when the topic of my spiritual life comes up. As I’ve said, the state of my faith has not been very clear to me in recent years, but in the months I’ve spent writing this essay, I’ve been able to gather the following insights into my inner thoughts. ==== Evangelical spirituality in a nutshell ==== Now I’ll bring the discussion into the most personal domain of the three, the spiritual. First, a technical description: In the evangelical spirituality I’ve spent the most time with, the goals of spirituality are spiritual growth and the enjoyment of a relationship with God. Spiritual growth has various causes and occurs in the context of this relationship. In general, it happens when the individual comes to a realization about some issue, often through an experience of interaction with God, that leads to a change in attitude or behavior. These realizations and interactions with God can be spontaneous, or they can be brought about when the Christian engages in certain practices that foster spiritual growth, such as prayer, Bible reading, worship, fellowship, and the sacraments. In some way, both God and the believer play a causal role in spiritual growth, though the ultimate cause is God. The results of spiritual growth are that the person increasingly embodies and displays certain positive character traits, such as patience, compassion, boldness, holiness, and closeness to God. Collectively these traits are known as godliness. I believe this pattern describes evangelical spirituality in general, and it might reflect Christian spirituality outside evangelicalism too. In the realm of spirituality, my uncertainties seem to exist in layers. ==== Spirituality itself—the mystery of meaning and the perplexities of practice ==== My problems begin with the fact that, for various reasons, this system of spirituality has never worked very well for me. For one thing, <span class="item">I’ve rarely been able to engage in spiritual practices like prayer and Bible reading in a way that was meaningful to me</span>, and as I see it, meaning is a prerequisite for their effectiveness. Here I’m using the term ''meaning'' somewhat differently than I used it in my framework. There it meant “definition.” Here, by ''meaningful'' I mean that an idea has implications for the other facts of the world or of an individual’s life in ways that are emotionally significant to that person. Without going into my theory on emotions (and making this essay even longer), I’ll say that the Bible is an emotional book; Jesus himself had emotions; and if we are to become like him, we have to learn to see in the world the same meaning that he saw in it. And as far as I can tell, getting to that point typically means having emotionally significant experiences with the ideas we’re meant to find meaningful. For various reasons, I haven’t made it very far down that road yet. The paths I’ve tried didn’t seem to lead anywhere, and now I’m back to the place I started. Part of the problem I have finding meaning is that the world of the Bible seems remote. The Bible was written to people whose circumstances and concerns were very different from mine. It’s difficult for me to feel inspired by their stories. I even have trouble responding emotionally to the Bible’s depictions of God, such as Isaiah’s vision in Isaiah 6. They’re dramatic, but I have trouble wrapping my mind around them. Maybe if I could expect to encounter God in those ways in my own life, I could relate to them better, but to my knowledge such experiences are very rare in the modern world (and, granted, were rare even back then). Meaning also eludes me because the practices I’ve always been told to pursue and the spiritual messages I’ve been told to draw strength from have never quite made sense to me. Sometimes this is because the language people use is barely comprehensible. Christians often speak poetically about God and the Christian life, and I usually find it hard to correlate their imagery with real life actions and experiences. It lacks meaning in the sense of definition. Other times it’s because I have trouble getting the concepts themselves to make sense. That is, they seem to lack coherence. I especially have this problem with prayer (e.g., if God already knows, why pray?) and the idea that we can trust God to take care of us (what about Christians starving in Africa?). A second reason evangelical spirituality hasn’t worked well for me is that <span class="item">some of its directives seem unworkable</span>. That is, they seem generally coherent, but they don’t seem practicable, although since they’re supposed to be put into practice, this could be considered another type of incoherence. If not truly unworkable, they’re at least outside my realm of experience. Here I’m thinking mainly of the idea of a conversational relationship with God, which is actually a fairly fundamental concept in the evangelical scheme of things. Then there’s <span class="item">the sheer difficulty of the highest Christian principles</span>. Christianity entails a very different way of life from the one that comes naturally. It’s really ''hard'' to trust God completely. It takes a lot of courage to be willing to sacrifice everything for someone else’s good. Sometimes I wonder if it’s even possible to be both a devoted Christian and a human being, but some people seem to manage it. A common theme in most of my difficulties is the fact that <span class="item">God is a very unusual person, so unusual that he’s hard to relate to</span>. All the other people I relate to have bodies, which means I can have direct, two-way communication with them. But God is a spirit. He is invisible, inaudible, and intangible, and for the most part we must relate to him indirectly through the Bible and perhaps other people and the natural world. So I find some of the personal relationship language we use misleading. I acknowledge that there may be aspects of spirituality I haven’t experienced, but relating to God is extremely different from interacting with humans. I would venture to say that this by itself makes having a close relationship with God something we have to work hard to learn, assuming that a personal relationship really is the goal. ==== Spirituality and theology—an unfinished puzzle ==== So that’s the first layer, my general spiritual deficiency. A second layer that makes resolving the first one more difficult is my state of theological uncertainty. Even though most theological debates tend to be abstract, they do have practical implications, if only for the ways we worship and pray. And some of these debates relate directly to spirituality, such as the question of miraculous gifts and the nature of sanctification. Then there are more subtle questions that don’t make it into the theological top 100 but still make a difference in the shape of one’s spirituality. A fairly basic question that seems to fit into this category is, what is God like? I don’t seem to understand God very well. Is he interested in the small details of our lives or only in his grand, missional purposes? Is he strict with his children or lenient? In the Bible, he reacts in different ways to different people and circumstances, and I haven’t sorted it all out yet. I don’t understand him well enough to know what he might be thinking, feeling, and doing in response to me and ''my'' circumstances. And it seems to me that if I’m going to respond to ''him'' appropriately, those are pretty important things to know. There’s more to living the Christian life than knowing God’s thoughts and actions, however. Not every reaction we have to God will be appropriate. Sometimes our instinctive reactions are influenced by sinful attitudes and motivations. And even when sinful attitudes and motivations aren’t obviously getting in the way, it can be easy to get confused. There are a lot of pieces in the Christian life to keep track of. You can’t apply the same spiritual principle naïvely across all situations. For example, if you sin against someone, you can confess it to God, receive forgiveness, and experience the relief and joy that brings, but after that you can’t simply walk up to the other person and act as if the past is happily behind you. You have to respect the fact that you’ve wronged them, humbly reconcile yourself to the other person, and restore the relationship. As I see it, the Christian life is like a complex skill that is foreign to us at first and has to be learned through practice. In many ways I’m still at a beginning, uncoordinated stage, and I don’t even have a clear picture of how all the pieces fit together. I’m assuming optimistically that they do fit together and that everyone basically agrees on how, or at least that the truth is discernable. Since I currently avoid trying to answer theological questions, my spirituality doesn’t have much of a theological shape. In the areas of spirituality that I do try to put into practice, I’m working from a few default positions. They work okay for the low level I’m at, but I suspect I’ll feel more internal pressure to answer the theological questions once I pursue my spiritual life more seriously, and then I’ll need to work through issues of theological method, as I mentioned earlier. “Theological method?” you say? “I thought you were being practical in this section.” Well yes, dealing with theory does seem like a step back when I’m trying to put my faith into action. But when the people I go to for guidance disagree with each other, I need some way to decide between their conflicting words of advice. I could flip a coin or rely on my feelings or just pick one, and in fact I might end up doing that on some occasions. But generally I’d like to make a more informed decision, and in theology I’m not sure how to do that yet, if it can be done at all. ==== Spirituality and apologetics—the inspiration of the Bible and the interpretation of experience ==== Then while all that is going on, in float my apologetic doubts—the question of whether Christianity is even true. Since I pretty much take basic Christianity for granted, this isn’t as big a problem as it could be, at the moment, but it is an obstacle. The difficulty comes from two angles. The first is <span class="item">the inspiration of the Bible</span>, which I covered in the apologetics section above. The question often comes to my mind, where did the writers get their information? It’s hard for me to worship God on the basis of what goes on in the spiritual realm or God’s agenda in history when I find myself wondering how the Bible writers could know those things. The second angle is <span class="item">the nature of the spiritual</span>. Since it’s invisible, inaudible, and intangible, I sometimes wonder if it’s even there. Or at least if it’s the way Christians describe it. Christians often describe the inner and outer events of their lives in terms of divine action. I call these events psychological and circumstantial miracles, respectively. The miracles that people usually think of are what I call physical miracles. Physical miracles are the most confirmable, at least in principle, but they are the least common. Most of the time when believers describe God at work, they’re telling the story of a psychological or circumstantial miracle. They tell of a change in their character when they converted, for example, and they attribute it to the work of the Holy Spirit. Or they relate the story of a bad situation in which a remarkable coincidence got them off the hook or gave them an insight into their lives, and they say God was working behind the scenes to make it happen. They even describe the situation in metaphorical terms, as if God were visibly, audibly, tangibly interacting with them. Now, it may be perfectly true that these ''are'' supernatural events and that psychological and circumstantial miracles ''do'' occur all the time. But when I have my skeptic hat on, when I’m in the mode of wanting to make sure what I believe is true, I often wonder if we aren’t just letting our imaginations run away with us. Human beings are interpreters. They compulsively look for patterns and reasons and meanings, and they sometimes find them where they don’t exist. Couldn’t it be that coincidences sometimes just happen, and people then find meaning in them that isn’t there? And how do we know that the psychological changes Christians describe can’t be explained as merely psychological rather than supernatural? This last question is important from two perspectives. From an apologetic perspective, if we can’t distinguish supernatural psychological events from natural ones, then we can’t use them as evidence for the supernatural. And from a spiritual perspective, if we can’t tell the miraculous psychological events from the ordinary ones, then it’s impossible to know if we’ve really had a special experience of God or if we only think we have. I especially wonder if it’s is all in our heads when I think about the fact that believers come up with positive explanations for both good and bad events. God is either blessing them or teaching them a lesson, but he never lets them down. How would we know if he had? It’s as if God’s faithfulness is nonfalsifiable. Predictably, it’s hard to have a spiritual life when you suspect that any spiritual meaning you find in your experiences might be illusory. ==== Effects—inertia, isolation, and laissez-faire evangelism ==== The result of all this is that I haven’t seen much spiritual growth in my life. I’m a decently good person, but you don’t have to be a Christian to be decently good. It seems to me that true spiritual growth should make one shockingly good, and I’m not that. It should at least bring you to a point that you wouldn’t have reached through the normal process of maturing. But when I look at my life, I don’t see much that’s specifically Christian about the ways that I’ve grown. And beyond general moral character, I also don’t see much progress in the ways I relate to God—worshiping, trusting, loving him, and so on. I admit, some of my behavior is motivated by a desire to obey Jesus. And it may be that some of the growth in my life has been supernatural and that God has worked in ways I’m not seeing right now. But in general, my progress in the spiritual life is lacking. These uncertainties and deficiencies also make fellowship with the Christian community difficult. I feel somewhat like an outsider in that way, but not a total outsider, more like someone on the periphery—a tangential Christian, you could say, or a minimalist Christian. People make statements about how God works in our lives or some other spiritual topic, and sometimes I can simply accept what they’re saying, but often I think, ''Well, maybe''. In those cases I can’t really share in their feelings of inspiration or add to them with insights or experiences of my own. In fact, sometimes I have to hold my tongue because I don’t want to ruin the moment with a discussion of my doubts. But it’s not only skepticism that hinders my fellowship. It seems that the standard levels of spiritual understanding or experience that evangelicals tend to expect from each other, I just don’t have, at least not in a way I can affirm with conviction. If I’m expected to give input in a spiritually oriented setting, I usually come up with something marginally acceptable and avoid talking about my real issues. These uncertainties and deficiencies, along with my uncertainties in theology and apologetics, also make it difficult to recommend Christianity to others, simply because I’m not quite sure what I’m offering, why they should believe it, what it’s supposed to do for them, or what they should do once they have it! I’m exaggerating somewhat, but since I don’t have a clear idea of what’s true right now, that’s my gut reaction when I think about evangelism. It’s one thing to believe Jesus is the Son of God for my own, idiosyncratic reasons. But to assert that belief as a fact to someone else is to imply that I can give reasons for believing it that should be adequate for anyone. I’m not to that point yet, so when I try to advocate Christianity to other people I feel at best clueless and tentative and at worst a little guilty. After all, implying that something is plainly true when I know I can barely defend it is tantamount to lying. ==== The persisting converse—vestigial spirituality and Christianity’s merit ==== Despite my confusion and doubt, I do still have my own, limited sense of spirituality. That’s why I described myself as a minimalist Christian. I am sometimes able, in the moment, to forget about my doubts and engage Christianity with the thin film of understanding that I have of its significance for my life. I still talk to God as if he is listening. My prayers are hardly profound; there is little emotion invested in them, and I don’t take extended time out specifically to pray. But I do speak (or rather think) to God briefly at random times because I think of him as being present and available to hear me. I still think of God as arranging my circumstances to foster my growth. I try to stay grateful for what I have and the good things that happen. I still take communion, and I take that time to reflect on Jesus’ death and my life and what might make the Lord’s supper as a ceremony mean something to me (''that'' been a lifelong struggle). I still participate in worship music. I do it rather mindlessly most of the time, and usually I see the lyrics more as nice ideas about God than as specific facts about him that I can wholeheartedly affirm, but sometimes the words mean something to me. Overall I do want to follow Jesus. And when I’m feeling especially in need of protection or comfort or forgiveness, it becomes very important to me for God to exist and to be with me and on my side. In those times, I experience my relationship with God as a need rather than as an obligation or an abstract ideal. Even with all my reservations, I still think that as a philosophy of life, Christianity in some forms has a lot to recommend itself. For instance, it has a very high view of human dignity and actually has a metaphysical reason for it (that humans were created by God in his image), whereas any naturalistic view of human dignity would have to be somwhat artificial and tenuous I think. Along with that, Christian teachings explicitly promote the formation of caring communities. Meanwhile, its Scriptures present a grand, intricate story with a richness of insight and symbolism that has allowed it to form a large part of the Western way of thinking (I can appreciate the depth and breadth of this story even if it doesn’t affect me as much as I’d like). And rather than calling suffering an illusion or telling people to rid themselves of desire, Christianity acknowledges and embraces the full range of human experience. The desires and behaviors it deems sinful, it views as corruptions of more basic aspects of human nature that it then tells us to put to higher uses (even if that’s really hard to do!). Not only does Christianity acknowledge and embrace human experience, but it amplifies and transforms it by relating that experience to a transcendent personal being. So a desire for safety becomes a trust in God’s providence. A need for personal purity and for harmony with others becomes a need for divine grace and reconciliation with God and his family. A desire for significance and purpose in life becomes a devotion to God and involvement in his activities in the world. Any positive event becomes an occasion for praise and thanksgiving to God. A time of suffering becomes an opportunity to identify with the sufferings of Jesus and to receive divine comfort that we can then pass on to others. A fear of death becomes a hope in eternal life—and not a disembodied spiritual existence, but a full-fledged life lived out in immortal bodies and in direct, unhindered fellowship with God. And this hope isn’t based on mere speculation but on an event in history—the resurrection of Jesus himself. It sounds great. Now I just have to figure out what it means, if it’s true, and how it all works out in practice! You could say I’m a seeker, though one who is beginning on the inside of Christianity rather than outside it. Maybe the best witness I can give right now is to the value of Christianity if true, and my best invitation is either to plunge right in or to embark on a journey of discovery. Join mine, if you like. === The way forward === What am I saying by all this, and what am I not saying? Well, if you haven’t caught on by now, I’m ''not'' saying that Christianity isn’t true and these are the reasons why. I’m only describing my current state of mind. I’m not saying these difficulties are insurmountable and I’m ready to deconvert. For all I know, the answers could be right in front of my nose. This essay is just an acknowledgment of work that needs to be done. It’s a midpoint, not an end point. Since I still consider these questions vitally important and there’s still so much I don’t know, there’s really nothing else to do but to pick up the search again. But where will I go from here, and how will I get there? In terms of that question, this essay is also something of a crossroads. I find several forces at work in my mind, pushing me in different directions. My desire to remain a Christian competes with my doubts and my sense of duty to investigate all the options and evaluate them impartially. And my desire to progress in some direction is impeded by a sense of futility and the distraction of other interests. ==== The problem of motivation ==== You would think that with all these vitally important issues unresolved, I would be desperately scouring the library for answers, having nervous breakdowns, and so on. But I’m not, and there are several reasons for this. First, I’m used to these questions. I’ve been looking into issues of apologetics, theology, and spirituality on and off for a long time, so this is all kind of old hat to me. Now, back when I was in college and first discovering that Christians disagree with each other about everything—even basic, important things like how to live as a Christian—I ''was'' in crisis. But eventually I decided that it wasn’t helpful to take everything so seriously and be confused and panicked all the time; that no matter how desperate I felt, I wasn’t going to find the answers I needed overnight; and that I could live some form of the Christian life even before I had all the answers. So I calmed down and settled into the search. And then a while after that, I got tired of repeatedly believing people’s opinions and then realizing I didn’t have proof for them; and with school in the way I didn’t have time to investigate everything seriously, so I put it all on hold until I could give more attention to it and then went on with my life. Second, I’m lacking one of the factors that causes people to go into a panic when they have doubts in the first place. That is the feeling that their Christian faith is their most cherished possession and they couldn’t bear to live without it. I used to have the same feeling, but as I’ve said, my grasp on the meaning of Christianity for my life has weakened considerably. I do think Christianity is deeply meaningful, but mostly in an abstract sense. My task is to discover or rediscover that meaning. I’m ''pursuing'' a sense of Christianity’s value rather than trying to preserve a sense I already have. But if it turned out that Christianity wasn’t true and naturalism was, well, it probably wouldn’t be that much different from my experience of life right now, aside from any social pressure I would then feel to continue espousing Christianity. As I keep saying, however, hopefully that won’t be the case and I will be awakened to more of the reality of God in my life. Finally, since I tend to be equally convinced by the arguments on all sides of an issue—or rather, since I tend to feel that the evidence for any position on a debatable issue is too weak to be conclusive—I have this feeling that the answers can’t be found, which makes me much less eager to try. I think that’s what drove me in my earlier forays into apologetics, theology, and spirituality—the idea that the answers were there to be found. I had been promised buried treasure, so I dug as fast as I could. And I did find a few gold coins and some nickels and dimes, but not the rich trove I was expecting. Some of the gold coins weren’t even real; they were just those chocolate coins with the gold-colored wrappers. Tasty, but not as valuable as they looked at first. So now if I keep digging, it will be because I’m forcing myself, because I know it’s important to see if anything is there, not because I have a good idea of the spectacular things I’ll find. Meanwhile, other things in my life that seem more achievable are attempting to attract my attention. So my mind isn’t roiling with all these doubts and questions. What I do feel is a subtle pressure in the back of my mind to get these issues resolved. I feel like my life can’t truly progress in any fundamental sense until I do, though I expect to be addressing them ''as'' the rest of my life progresses. ==== Paths to knowledge ==== Let’s assume that I can push through my lack of motivation and get somewhere with my questions. How should I proceed? Well, guess what. Not only do people have different ideas about ultimate truth, they even have different ideas about how to find it. It’s one of the basic epistemological questions: What are the sources of knowledge? For the answer to this, the primary options in the history of philosophy have been the senses and reason, as preferred by empiricism and rationalism, respectively. But there are other possible sources of knowledge. One is mystical experience—direct encounters with God or the infinite, whatever the mystic understands that to be. And another source is the pronouncements of an authority, such as the Bible or the church councils. The investigative approach that’s considered the proper one depends somewhat on the worldview you’re aiming for. Naturalism would call for something like empiricism, while certain Eastern philosophies would consider mysticism a more appropriate vehicle for truth. But I suspect that opinions differ within those worldviews. I know they differ within Christianity. Yes, Christians disagree on their basic epistemology along with everything else. Some emphasize the use of evidence because of the fact that Christianity is a historical religion. Others attempt to rely solely on an authoritative source for their spiritual information—the Bible and perhaps the church. And some believe that the spiritual nature of our relationship with God means that our faith should rely on mysticism. Which view is right? Who knows. I’ll figure it out later. For now I can only be what I am, and what I am is an American who grew up in a scientifically minded household and has had two decades of thoroughly Western education. For most kinds of knowledge I trust introspection, analytic philosophy, and the scientific method. I also like to explore new ideas and try to keep an open mind, though I like to come to conclusions eventually. That’s my basic methodological starting point. As I go along I’ll investigate others. But, obviously, one thing I won’t do is to simply take anyone’s word as the absolute truth without discussion. I’ve tried that already. I would like to mention one other path to knowledge that I’m borrowing from Dallas Willard, among others. He says, “[Jesus’] way is self-validating to anyone who will openly and persistently put it into practice.” The idea is that as we practice Jesus’ way of life, “we gain insight into how and why his path works and receive a power far beyond ourselves” (“Foreword,” ''The Spirit of the Disciplines''). C. S. Lewis expands this to a general principle in “Meditation in a Toolshed” (''God in the Dock''). Looking ''along'' a beam of light toward its source gives you a very different experience and body of knowledge than merely looking ''at'' it. Being open to experiences gained through action can lead to new understanding. Now, I can’t say that I’m open to every experience under the sun. But as long as I’m trying to gain a better grasp on Christianity and to find as much truth in it as I can, I might as well include Christian practice among my research methods, especially since Christian practice is one of the puzzles I’m trying to sort out. And even though I won’t just take people’s word for it when they give me their views, I might try out their ideas experimentally. What will I study? For now I plan to concentrate on the topics that are the most uniquely Christian and the most fundamental to investigating worldviews and Christianity in particular. That means I’ll be looking at the issues surrounding the authority of the Bible and probably the church, the life and teachings of Jesus, the resurrection, miracles, some of the theistic and atheistic arguments, religious pluralism, and the nature of religious knowledge. And I’ll explore Christian spiritual formation. Yes, this could all take several lifetimes. I’ll try to reach some conclusions before then! I’ll probably put off theological debates until later, such as the mode of baptism or even Calvinism and Arminianism. There are also some apologetic debates I’ll put off, such as creationism. I see theistic evolution as a legitimate option, though if I ever thought I’d become an atheist, I’d need to study this issue to make sure creationism could be safely buried. ==== Loyalty and truth revisited ==== And how will I reconcile my loyalty to Christianity with my desire to find the truth, whatever it might be? It may be that they are simply incompatible and that I’ll have to alternate between wanting to believe in Christianity and being coldly indifferent to it as I consider the merits of other options. But a search for truth isn’t the kind of task that requires swinging back and forth between absolute acceptance of a possibility and absolute rejection of it. There’s a wait-and-see element. In this respect a sporting event offers a helpful parallel. The fans are cheering for their own team, and throughout the game they are clearly biased toward their victory; but if by the end of the game their team has clearly lost, they’re not going to pretend that they’ve won. In my case I’m not the most energetic fan, but I still want Christianity to win. Even though my faith has been eroded and dispirited, I still think Christianity holds some promise, and I consider it the richest and most noble thing around, so I want to give it the best chance I can. I might not stay an inerrantist. I might not even stay an evangelical, though that would be nice. But I hope my investigations will allow me to remain within Christianity for as long as possible, which of course, in the Christian scheme of things, is forever. 52f5a9824b2ad31b13c511915723c9f8003a8abe 0 42 85 84 2014-05-07T03:57:51Z Andy Culbertson 1 1 revision: Import of WordPress content wikitext text/x-wiki Version 1.0, 6-6-06 === [[On Being an Agnostic Christian#Introduction|Introduction]] === The [[On Being an Agnostic Christian|original version]] of this essay is very long, which I know is a barrier to reading it. So here’s a shorter version. The structure of this essay mostly follows the structure of the longer one, so if you want more explanation on a point I raise here, see the same section in the original. The section headings link to the same sections in the longer version. Also note that there are a few extra sections in the original that I had to cut out. I describe myself as an agnostic Christian because I’m uncertain about many aspects of my faith, yet I still consider myself a Christian. My doubts throw the future of my beliefs into question, but my hope is to stay a Christian and to grow in my faith. I wrote this essay to give myself a clear starting point for future study and for interacting with other people on my spiritual state. === [[On Being an Agnostic Christian#My_epistemic_situation|My epistemic situation]] === Basically, I am struggling to understand Christianity deeply while wrestling with issues of intellectual responsibility in the religious realm. I am an evangelical Christian, and I like being one and want to grow in my faith. But I see that the reasons I have right now for being a Christian aren’t entirely solid, and when I ask myself how reasonable (or livable) Christianity seems to me, the answers are discouraging. So I feel the need to step back and examine, as fairly as I can, the epistemic strengths and weaknesses of both evangelical Christianity and the alternative theologies and worldviews, so that I can come as close as possible to the best explanation for the world and human experience. My feelings of loyalty to evangelical Christianity and my tendency to see all viewpoints as equally plausible could get in the way of this search, although if Christianity is true, my loyalty to reason could get in the way of my loyalty to Christianity. This is a conflict I call the loyalty-truth tension. Balancing those possibilities is a challenge. Theology, apologetics, and spirituality are three major areas of Christian thought, and uncertainties can exist in all three. === [[On Being an Agnostic Christian#Theology|Theology]] === ==== [[On Being an Agnostic Christian#The_problem.E2.80.94the_too-fertile_field_of_possibility|The problem—the too-fertile field of possibility]] ==== Theological questions have to do with the details of Christian belief. Christians disagree with each other about almost every theological question. So which views are the right ones? Overall, I’m willing to affirm the core beliefs of Christianity, but beyond those any choice seems arbitrary without more study than I’ve done so far. I do have theological [[My Current Theology|default positions]], derived from my upbringing and my own dabblings, and some of them I feel rather strongly about. But I’m very aware that with more study, I might change my mind about them. I might even side with the heretics on some issues, though I doubt it. Sometimes I think that if I studied the Bible more extensively, I would arrive at satisfying conclusions, that the answers are ''there'' if you just think carefully enough. But sometimes (more often these days, I’m afraid) I think the answers just can’t be known. ==== [[On Being an Agnostic Christian#Effects.E2.80.94avoidance_and_restraint|Effects—avoidance and restraint]] ==== My thoughts on these questions are undecided enough that I tend not to think or talk about theology much. I almost think discussing theology is a waste of time, at least for me at this point in my life. To make any real headway I’d need to work out my hermeneutic and other issues of theological method. The same hesitancy goes for living by these beliefs, which is where theology intersects with spirituality. I’m reluctant to pursue actions very enthusiastically when they are based on a belief with so much uncertainty behind it. So I generally don’t, and my spiritual life is correspondingly weak. === [[On Being an Agnostic Christian#Apologetics|Apologetics]] === ==== [[On Being an Agnostic Christian#Overarching_themes.E2.80.94abduction.2C_naturalism.2C_and_the_varieties_of_doubt|Overarching themes—abduction, naturalism, and the varieties of doubt]] ==== Apologetic questions have to do with the foundational tenets of Christianity and whether Christianity as a whole is true. For me, the main competitor to the Christian explanation of the world is the naturalistic one. I tend to look at life from both of these perspectives in an inner dialog, though for now I ultimately side with Christianity, if only because it’s a safer bet. Some of my doubts have more to do (for now) with the strength of the arguments we have for certain beliefs than with the beliefs themselves. The beliefs I have in mind are the basic formal doctrines of Christianity. You could say I’m a ''de facto'' fideist on these central points. But I do want to investigate them rationally, so I can only hope that a good case can be made for them. However, some of my doubts have become more entrenched. Where my faith primarily falters is at the inspiration of the Bible, which I’ll explain in more detail below. ==== [[On Being an Agnostic Christian#Revelation.E2.80.94the_central_conflict|Revelation—the central conflict]] ==== One of the central Christian tenets is that the Bible is God’s Word. If the Bible is divinely inspired in some sense, then it would obviously be wrong to treat it as merely human. But how can we tell the difference between a divinely inspired book and a merely human book? And how can we tell that the Bible is of the divinely inspired kind? If we acknowledge that the Bible was inspired, what does that mean? One more liberal option is that the Bible writers were only indirectly inspired. They were simply theologians trying their best to interpret the awesome events they had witnessed, and God’s revelation was in the events rather than in the writing. It’s a possibility I’m considering. Even though this doubt about inspiration is more persistent than many of my others, I’m not usually thinking all this when I actually read the Bible. I tend to read it as if it’s God’s Word. I assume that the writers at least knew what they were talking about, even if I don’t. ==== [[On Being an Agnostic Christian#The_persisting_converse.E2.80.94tenacity_and_apologetic_potential|The persisting converse—tenacity and apologetic potential]] ==== These questions don’t mean I’m about to plunge into atheism. At this early stage in my search, that would be premature. This tenacity is part of my approach to managing the loyalty-truth tension. If the thing you’re loyal to is true after all, then you can miss that fact if you abandon it at the first sign of trouble. And in any case, I don’t see Christian apologetics as completely devoid of promise. The fine-tuning argument for God’s existence still appeals to me. Jesus’ resurrection is supported by some interesting arguments. Conservative scholars’ arguments for the Bible’s historical reliability usually impress me, and so do the insights of contemporary Christian philosophers of religion. And believers have some striking stories about their experiences of God that I’d like to explore and examine. === [[On Being an Agnostic Christian#Spirituality|Spirituality]] === Spiritual questions have to do with the spiritual realities that relate to our own time and place—current events in the spiritual realm, you could say—as well as how theological truths should be lived out in general. In the realm of spirituality, my uncertainties seem to exist in layers. ==== [[On Being an Agnostic Christian#Spirituality_itself.E2.80.94the_mystery_of_meaning_and_the_perplexities_of_practice|Spirituality itself—the mystery of meaning and the perplexities of practice]] ==== My problems begin with the fact that, for various reasons, the evangelical system of spirituality has never worked very well for me. For one thing, I’ve rarely been able to engage in spiritual practices like prayer and Bible reading in a way that was meaningful to me, and as I see it, meaning is a prerequisite for their effectiveness. The world of the Bible seems remote, so I have trouble connecting with it; and many Christian practices and messages have never quite made sense to me. A second reason evangelical spirituality hasn’t worked well for me is that some of its directives seem unworkable. They’re at least outside my realm of experience. Here I’m thinking mainly of the idea of a conversational relationship with God. Then there’s the sheer difficulty of the highest Christian principles. Christianity entails a very different way of life from the one that comes naturally. It’s really ''hard'' to trust God completely. It takes a lot of courage to be willing to sacrifice everything for someone else’s good. A common theme in most of my difficulties is the fact that God is a very unusual person, so unusual that he’s hard to relate to. Unlike the human beings we normally interact with, he is invisible, inaudible, and intangible, and for the most part we must relate to him indirectly through the Bible and perhaps other people and the natural world. ==== [[On Being an Agnostic Christian#Spirituality_and_theology.E2.80.94an_unfinished_puzzle|Spirituality and theology—an unfinished puzzle]] ==== A second layer that makes resolving the first one more difficult is my state of theological uncertainty. I don’t seem to understand God well enough to know what he might be thinking, feeling, and doing in response to me and my circumstances, which is important for knowing how to respond to him. But even when I know that and I’m not encumbered by obviously sinful attitudes and motivations, it can be easy to get confused. There are a lot of pieces in the Christian life to keep track of. As I see it, the Christian life is like a complex skill that is foreign to us at first and has to be learned through practice. In many ways I’m still at a beginning, uncoordinated stage, and I don’t even have a clear picture of how all the pieces fit together. ==== [[On Being an Agnostic Christian#Spirituality_and_apologetics.E2.80.94the_inspiration_of_the_Bible_and_the_interpretation_of_experience|Spirituality and apologetics—the inspiration of the Bible and the interpretation of experience]] ==== Then while all that is going on, in float my apologetic doubts. The difficulty comes from two angles. The first is the inspiration of the Bible, which I covered in the apologetics section above. It’s hard for me to worship God on the basis of what goes on in the spiritual realm or God’s agenda in history when I find myself wondering how the Bible writers could know those things. The second angle is the nature of the spiritual. Since it’s invisible, inaudible, and intangible, I sometimes wonder if it’s even there. Christians often describe the inner and outer events of their lives in terms of divine action. But sometimes I wonder, couldn’t it be that coincidences sometimes just happen, and people then find meaning in them that isn’t there? And how do we know that the psychological changes Christians report can’t be explained as merely psychological rather than supernatural? ==== [[On Being an Agnostic Christian#Effects.E2.80.94inertia.2C_isolation.2C_and_laissez-faire_evangelism|Effects—inertia, isolation, and laissez-faire evangelism]] ==== The result of all this is that I haven’t seen much spiritual growth in my life. I’m a decently good person, but I don’t see much that’s specifically Christian about the ways that I’ve grown over the years. These uncertainties and deficiencies also make fellowship with the Christian community difficult. People make statements about how God works in our lives or some other spiritual topic, and sometimes I can simply accept what they’re saying, but often I think, ''Well, maybe''. In those cases I can’t really share in their feelings of inspiration or add to them with insights or experiences of my own. My uncertainties in spirituality, along with those in theology and apologetics, also make it difficult to recommend Christianity to others, simply because I’m not quite sure what I’m offering, why they should believe it, what it’s supposed to do for them, or what they should do once they have it! ==== [[On Being an Agnostic Christian#The_persisting_converse.E2.80.94vestigial_spirituality_and_Christianity.E2.80.99s_merit|The persisting converse—vestigial spirituality and Christianity’s merit]] ==== Despite my confusion and doubt, I do still have my own, limited sense of spirituality. I am sometimes able, in the moment, to forget about my doubts and engage Christianity with the thin film of understanding that I have of its significance for my life. I still talk to God as if he is listening. I try to stay grateful for what I have and the good things that happen. I still participate in worship. Overall I do want to follow Jesus. And I still think that as a philosophy of life, Christianity in some forms has a lot to recommend itself. Among other things, it amplifies and transforms human experience by relating that experience to a transcendent personal being. So a desire for safety becomes a trust in God’s providence. A need for personal purity and for harmony with others becomes a need for divine grace and reconciliation with God and his family. A fear of death becomes a hope in eternal life—and not a disembodied spiritual existence, but a full-fledged life lived out in immortal bodies and in direct, unhindered fellowship with God. And this hope isn’t based on mere speculation but on an event in history—the resurrection of Jesus himself. It sounds great. Now I just have to figure out what it means, if it’s true, and how it all works out in practice! === [[On Being an Agnostic Christian#The_way_forward|The way forward]] === Since I still consider these questions vitally important and there’s still so much I don’t know, there’s really nothing else to do but to pick up the search again. For now I plan to concentrate on the topics that are the most uniquely Christian and the most fundamental to investigating worldviews and Christianity in particular. That means I’ll be looking at the issues surrounding the authority of the Bible and probably the church, the life and teachings of Jesus, the resurrection, miracles, some of the theistic and atheistic arguments, religious pluralism, and the nature of religious knowledge. And I’ll explore Christian spiritual formation. Even though my faith has been eroded and dispirited, I still think Christianity holds some promise, and I consider it the richest and most noble thing around, so I want to give it the best chance I can. I might not stay an inerrantist. I might not even stay an evangelical, though that would be nice. But I hope my investigations will allow me to remain within Christianity for as long as possible, which of course, in the Christian scheme of things, is forever. [http://www.thinkulum.net/blog/category/obac/ Blog entries related to this essay] def5fb22374fb3b8c6ce2b158153b239ba657873 0 43 87 86 2014-05-07T03:57:51Z Andy Culbertson 1 1 revision: Import of WordPress content wikitext text/x-wiki Version 1.0, 4-29-07 Sher, Barbara. [http://www.amazon.com/Refuse-Choose-Revolutionary-Program-Everything/dp/1594863032/ Refuse to Choose! A Revolutionary Program for Doing Everything That You Love]. Emmaus, PA: Rodale, 2006. (also available in [http://www.amazon.com/Refuse-Choose-Interests-Passions-Hobbies/dp/1594866260/ paperback] with a different subtitle) === Summary === Scanners. You probably know some. Scanners are people who have many interests and a strong desire to pursue them all, and in many cases they try, flitting from one job or project to the next. In a society in which people are defined by their careers, this characteristic puts them in tension with the people around them, who want to know why they can’t just pick an occupation, stick with it, and make something of themselves! Barbara Sher, a Scanner herself, identified this group of people in her work as a life coach. She recognized that they shared gifts that were more valued in earlier periods of history than they are now, and so their tremendous potential is left untapped because modern culture provides them no guide for making the most of their talents. Thus, her task in this book was to define what a Scanner is, explain why it’s okay to be one, and give Scanners a manual for achieving the goal that sets these people apart—to do everything in life that they love. Along the way she identifies roadblocks and offers creative tools for sidestepping them. The book is divided into two parts. The first part deals with the question of what a Scanner is and the basic problems that any Scanner might face: Scanners tend to feel that they’re deficient because they seem so scattered. They’re often afraid that they’ll waste their lives. Many fear that committing to a job will keep them from following their interests. Some are just too busy for extra pursuits. Some feel so overwhelmed by their interests that they can’t begin to follow any of them. Some are too intimidated by their projects to start anything. And some begin lots of things and never finish them. The second part divides Scanners into nine types organized into two broad categories—Cyclical Scanners and Sequential Scanners. Cyclical Scanners have a limited number of interests that they return to repeatedly, while Sequential Scanners move from one interest to another and leave the old ones behind. Within each category Sher sorts the types by how often they switch interests. Each type gets a chapter, which discusses the distinguishing traits of that type; its unique motivations; and the life design models, careers, and tools that will allow Scanners of this type to do everything that they love. Life design models are comprehensive ways of organizing your time, tasks, and environment that naturally fit your goals and styles of working. In a word, this book is terrific. Barbara Sher’s writing is engaging, her descriptions true to life, her advice comprehensive and practical, and her outlook inspiring. The book could serve as a model for other self-help works. I have no real criticisms, only a few clarifications and issues for further discussion. Sher has a website with a forum for just such discussions at [http://www.barbarasher.com/ www.barbarasher.com]. This isn’t really a review, since I was too impatient to tidy it up much. The following is more a collection of notes I took on my reactions and reflections while reading the book. === Good things === Sher’s writing style is personal and engaging. Like many self-help authors, she addresses the reader directly and reveals her principles through stories. In her case they are largely accounts of her experiences as a life coach or other conversations she’s had with Scanners. But what makes Sher’s book so compelling is her blend of profound optimism and intense practicality. She believes unwaveringly in the goodness and potential in being a Scanner, in spite of all appearances and obstacles, and this is because she’s seen what Scanners can do and has a comprehensive plan for making it work. One Scanner, Ella, told Barbara about a story she heard when she was young called ''Rusty in Orchestraville'', “about a little boy who couldn’t make up his mind which instrument he wanted to learn, and so he ended up not playing anything and couldn’t be part of the orchestra.” Barbara replied, “In my experience, Rusty becomes a famous conductor. He needed to study all the instruments, because his instrument is the whole orchestra” (35). I’m not sure Ella’s recounting accurately captures the message of the story (see the description [http://www.317x.com/albums/l/alanlivingston/card.html here]), but Barbara’s version is an apt image for the role of Scanners in the world. Another is, “You have the eyes to see what many people miss” (43). She responds to the conventional wisdom about “buckling down” and devoting your life to one thing by demonstrating that it just isn’t true, noting trends in modern society as well as examples of successful Scanners throughout history (xiii–xiv, 115–116, and chapter 4). She has ''tons'' of ideas for getting things done, and they seem like they could really work, because they’re based on her years of experience talking and working with dozens of Scanner clients, friends, and acquaintances. An example of a good idea that struck me: “Sometimes you simply take an armful of books home from the library and read the introductions, the final chapters, and the index at the back. I get insights into very complex books I’d never be able to read all the way through” (236). I did this kind of thing once sort of by accident, and it was an effective way to get an idea of the subject. It would be worth being more intentional about the technique. This book will open your mind to possibilities (and jobs) you never knew existed (see pp. 254ff). For example, you could get a job as an expediter. They do all the tedious, bureaucratic things that their bosses don’t have time for, and sometimes they have to wait in line for hours to do it, which gives them plenty of time for Scannery things like reading (265). She asks a lot of good, probing questions. For example, to help Wanderers tie their random interests together, she has them ask during any activity that attracts them, “What element, if it were missing, would have made my exploration uninteresting?” (213). She is very thorough in her advice. She anticipates a large variety of problems that Scanners will encounter when trying to become more productive and offers many practical techniques for overcoming them, and she even recognizes when a particular tool won’t do the whole job. For example, in chapter 7 she introduces the Backward Planning Flowchart tool for identifying the steps toward reaching a goal, but then she notes that identifying these achievable steps won’t necessarily make the goal seem easier to reach. It might actually make the goal more intimidating! There can be a huge psychological leap between planning and acting. So you need to identify what mental obstacles are still holding you back and look for other tools that will help you through them, many of which she provides in other parts of the book. “Almost no one stays at one career ‘forever’ anymore” (50). One person I talked to about this point said that some fields suffer because people leave their jobs so quickly, and she was thinking specifically of public education. With a high turnover rate, there’s no consistency, and it’s hard to get things done within the field. I think this problem can be avoided in many cases with things like the LTTL system—Learn, Try, Teach, Leave (58–59). I love this idea, by the way, such a tidy way to be temporary. As long as the important policies and plans of an organization stay constant, the people can change, as long as each new person is competent. At certain points Sher brings up practical caveats to her “do what you want” philosophy, such as the fact that you sometimes do have to finish things even when you’ve gotten bored with them. Then she gives tools for dealing with that too (113–115), though “when it comes to your own projects, who cares?” (36). And even though she’s spent the whole book saying things like, “Start everything. And don’t bother to finish ''any'' of it” (110), she closes with an epilogue on the idea that “As enthusiastic as you may be about every passion, an active mind doesn’t get refreshment from producing nothing. Scanners actually grow tired when they’re underused. So you’ll have to give hard work another look, because inside you there are highly original works waiting to be brought into the world. Nothing will do that but starting and finishing at least one of them—or all of them, one at a time” (249). The point of this book isn’t that Scanners are just fine exactly as they are. They do need to be reshaped a bit, but the general thrust and contour of their life is all right. They have a valuable and truly different core. It just needs to be disciplined a little—''but'' in ways that are most natural for a Scanner while still being effective. (243) Throughout the whole book the key productive finishing skill for Scanners is the ability to pass on what their minds have collected in some way, through either writing, speaking, or creating. It’s not ''really'' okay ''just'' to learn or experience. (243) === Issues to discuss === ==== The Definition of a Scanner ==== She quotes a Scanner: “If I have to slow down or use only one part of me at a time, I become bored, worse than bored—I feel like a part of me is dying on the vine” (28). I think this is what makes the difference between Scanners and other people. When describing the essence of a Scanner and contrasting them with Divers, it’s not enough to say that Scanners can’t have fewer interests or restrict themselves to one. For all we know, they may just be intractably undisciplined. But this part of my experience as a Scanner suggests that there’s something more going on. It’s the profound sense of withering when I’m deprived of my projects that makes me think all these interests are ''vital'' to me and that they’re not just whims I can’t resist. ==== The Goodness of Scannerhood ==== Barbara talks about the relief that Scanners felt once she began identifying them as such. “The realization that their behavior was different—because they were actually genetically different—explained so much that it was accepted right away” (xv). This genetic difference hasn’t been proven, but it certainly seems genetic anyway. That by itself doesn’t mean the genetic difference is a ''good'' one. Being a Scanner could be a congenital disability or character flaw, like having anger management problems. We have to evaluate Scannerhood based on its ''effects''. This, of course, she does throughout the book. Scanners are multitalented people who have a lot to offer the world ''because they are Scanners''. They do have some disadvantages, but these can be overcome by the use of all these great tools. Scanners do need some discipline; they need to be shaped, but not fundamentally changed. Their contribution to the world is not hindered by the fact that they pursue many interests. “To be honest, the elated reaction of people who realized they were Scanners came to me as a surprise at first. I had no idea that simply knowing there was a name for them would cause such a complete turnaround in their outlook and feeling of self-worth” (24). Again, not enough to prove it’s good. Part of their relief was probably from the name itself. It sounds like a personality type. If instead she said, “You have Scanneritis,” they might not be so happy, because that sounds like a disease to be cured. Of course, she does say in the next sentence, “Now I’ve seen over and over what amazing things a Scanner can do with nothing more than simple permission to be herself.” ==== Rewards and Durations ==== “When you lose interest in something, you must always consider the possibility that you’ve gotten what you came for; you have completed your mission. … That’s why you lose interest: not because you’re flawed or lazy or unable to focus, but because you’re finished” (31). “The reason you stop when you do: You got what you came for” (103). I think there’s a difference between what my emotions came for and what my mind came for. Sometimes I get bored with what I’m doing because I’m tired of working, and sometimes I’m just tired of looking at the same project after so long, though I think those are a more temporary and superficial type of boredom. But these projects are important to me on a larger level, so I want to finish them. Usually this is either because later projects are intended to be built on them or because they fulfill some deep purpose I have for my life. It’s if I ''gave up'' on them that I’d feel a loss of meaning. So what if what you came for isn’t enough? What if your feelings of excitement enjoy discovery but your sense of civic duty likes giving back what you’ve learned, but you lose steam simply because it’s hard work and takes a long time? What’s the tool for ''that''? But while feelings can’t indiscriminately be a good clue to Rewards, I think there’s merit to Barbara’s approach. There’s a certain kind of deeper boredom that can be a good clue. The clue comes when continuing the project isn’t just tiresome but actually ''feels pointless'', as Barbara mentions a few paragraphs before: “It was the riveting experience of confronting something he’d never imagined before. That was the only part he really cared about. What followed felt pointless.” Another caveat is that often I leave a project simply because I get distracted by other projects. I might still be perfectly interested in picking it back up if I thought about it, but often I don’t think about it. I wonder if this fits into Durations and Rewards or if it’s a separate issue, probably the latter. “When you’re getting your Reward from any activity, you always feel happy, absorbed, energetic. And when you are satisfied, or the Reward diminishes, you get bored. It’s as natural as sitting down to eat when you’re hungry and leaving when you’re full” (32). Hmm, when I’m done eating I feel satisfied, not bored. If I kept eating after that I might feel unpleasant, though perhaps not bored, unless I was just tired of tasting the same food. Hard work doesn’t always make me feel happy, absorbed, and energetic, but surely it’s important for many projects. I guess if you’re just trying to discover what makes you tick, those happy feelings are good ones. Satisfaction could also be a good clue, but that implies having reached a goal or at least a saturation point. Sometimes it happens on its own, and then using it as a clue would only require paying attention. Sometimes it requires having a goal to reach. But if you don’t have a good sense of your Rewards, maybe you’re not yet in a position to set the right goals. Maybe part of this exercise should be to evaluate the project goals you do set and your motivations for them. Are you, for example, just trying to fulfill someone else’s expectations? Just trying to be complete? Once you reach your goal, what then? would be another good question. In one example, Barbara relates a conversation with Meg, who wished she had stuck with Spanish, even though it bored her after a year, because then she’d be somewhere by now, such as being a teacher. But when Barbara pressed her, Meg admitted that would bore her too (214). Paying attention to your happy feelings is also good for identifying the kinds of projects that would let you just play, which is something Sher thinks Scanners should be allowed to do. Many of the common Rewards (33–34) are true for me in degrees. Maybe a five-point Likert scale would be good here. ==== Scanners and School ==== What does a Scanner major in? Barbara talks about what she did (“I gave up and took an easy major, anthropology … and with some disappointment, I went for the grades-and-graduation thing like everyone else.” [xii]), but what would she have done had she known all about being a Scanner back then? ==== Cathy Goodwin’s Review ==== I am not a career counselor, but Cathy Goodwin is, and she has [http://www.amazon.com/gp/discussionboard/discussion.html/ref=cm_rdp_st_rd/002-7195016-9929633?ie=UTF8&amp;ASIN=1594866260&amp;store=yourstore&amp;cdThread=TxJ98AUVMQFE8H&amp;reviewID=R3KTCC78R4ZL5Y&amp;displayType=ReviewDetail reviewed] Sher’s book on Amazon. Her review is not as glowing as mine, but it is probably more realistic. 6eff6c8130be36f47ad557f7eea99206dab79a79 0 44 89 88 2014-05-07T03:57:51Z Andy Culbertson 1 1 revision: Import of WordPress content wikitext text/x-wiki Version 1.0, 5-12-07 In addition to the inspiring stories, perspective-altering advice, Life Design Models, and career possibilities Barbara Sher serves her readers, ''Refuse to Choose'' also contains about forty tools that Scanners can put to work when they need a little organization or motivation. These tools are listed in an index in the back. Unfortunately, in spite of the creative names she has given them, I had a hard time remembering when I should use each tool. Hence, I have added descriptions of the circumstances in which each tool would be helpful, based on Barbara’s discussions. {| class="wikitable sortable toptextcells" |- ! If ! Then You Need The ! See Page(s) |- | You don’t finish what you start because you don’t have a clear sense of direction | 15-Month Goal Calendar (use it with the Rotating Priorities Board) | 152 |- | You have many interests that you’d like to explore deeply, but you don’t have time | 20 or 30 Three-Ring Binders | 84, 157–158, 174, 253 |- | You have ideas you want to put into action, but you’re anxious about it and/or you have trouble keeping in mind what you need to do | Appointment Planner (use it with the Success Team) | 95 |- | # You’re disorganized and spend too much time getting the materials together for your projects, or # You find that you’ve neglected your projects for a while and you miss them | Avocation Station (use it with the Setup) | 153–156 |- | You think about your ideas but don’t get around to doing anything about them | Backward Planning Flowchart (use it with the Real Deadline) | 91–95, 97, 98 |- | You are interested in practically everything and you want to study each of those things deeply, but that’s impossible, so you don’t do any of it | Big List | 77–79 |- | You feel you can’t pursue your interests because it would be irresponsible | “Busting Open Either/Or Thinking” Game | 127–128 |- | # You’re trying to decide on a (temporary) career, or # You want to explore a variety of new fields or jobs | Career Tryout | 56–57, 207 |- | Ideas enter and leave your mind too quickly without being written down, so you forget them, can’t show them to anybody, can’t do anything with them, and start to forget who you are | Catalog of Ideas with Potential | 244–245 |- | You have an idea for a project | Da Vinci Write-Up (use it with the Scanner Daybook or the 20 or 30 Three-Ring Binders) | 11–17, 110, 243–244 |- | You live two lives, and you want to keep your gear for your other life in one place while you’re waiting to get to it | Destination Steamer Trunks | 139–140 |- | You’re doing a project you intend to finish, and you need a little pressure to keep you going | Down-to-the-Wire Tear-Off Calendar | 251 |- | You want to find out what your interests have in common so you can find a job that matches that theme | “Everything I Don’t Want” List | 216–217 |- | You can’t fit all your interests into one job (and maybe you don’t want to be pressured to do those things anyway), yet you still need to pay the bills | Good Enough Job | 60, 136–137, 143, 159, 233–235, 264 |- | You can’t keep track of your ideas or follow up on your interests | Interest Index Binder | 83–84 |- | # You need to test your Setups, or # You have neglected your projects and you miss them | Kitchen Timer (use it with the Avocation Station) | 155 |- | You want to find a career that can use all your experiences, or you’d like to find a theme to your interests, but you tend to get lazy about writing | Letters from the Field (use it with the Web E-mail Account) | 189–190, 225 |- | You need to adjust your environment, schedule, and/or career to give you the ability to pursue all your interests | Life Design Model | 128–129 |- | You finish a project, either completely or via a Scanner’s Finish, and especially if you aren’t used to appreciating your own wonderful mind or you think you never accomplish anything | Life’s Work Bookshelf | 112–113, 210, 236–237, 252 |- | You’ve started a lot of projects you haven’t finished and your home is cluttered with them, and you’re embarrassed by it | Living Quarters Map | 17–19 |- | You’re afraid of committing to a job long term because you know you’ll get bored with it | LTTL (Learn, Try, Teach, Leave) System | 58–59, 169–171 |- | You have a lot of stress and anxiety because you’re so busy all the time | Micro Nervous Breakdown | 66–67 |- | You keep accumulating a variety of skills and experiences, but it would look bad to put them all on your résumé | Never-Ending Résumé | 188 |- | # You’re very busy and you want to capture your ideas while you’re out and about, and especially if # You need to take a break now and then to think about something else | Portable Dream Deck (use it with the Alternating Current Life Design Model or just by itself) | 69, 167 |- | You finish a project, either completely or via a Scanner’s Finish, and you want a creative way to display it | Private Museum | 237 |- | You have interests that are too 3-D to put in a binder | Project Box | 157 |- | You need some accountability to keep you moving toward your goal | Real Deadline | 91, 94, 95, 97, 99, 250–252 |- | You can’t decide if your idea is a good or bad one just by thinking about it | Reality Research | 97–99 |- | # You feel guilty about jumping from one thing to another, especially if you don’t finish your projects, # You want to design a life that will fit your particular interests, or # You want to know how far to pursue an interest, especially if you’re afraid you have too many | Rewards and Durations | 29–36, 38, 79–81, 103, 117 |- | You’re juggling several projects, and your interest level for each one is unpredictable, so you don’t know how to prioritize them from day to day | Rotating Priorities Board (use it with the 15-Month Goal Calendar) | 152–153 |- | # You feel ashamed of the way you dabble in many different subjects, and you avoid getting involved in new subjects because you have too many interests and projects already, especially if you haven’t finished the ones you’re working on, # You tend to get ideas and then lose them, # You’re doing a Scanner exercise from ''Refuse to Choose!'' or taking notes on something Scanner related, # You’ve been neglecting or undervaluing certain sides of you, # You want to understand what interests you, what causes you to lose interest, and the way your mind works, # You want to capture the excitement you feel when coming up with a project, # You want to preserve your ideas for posterity, # You’ve been too busy to come up with any projects or to let your mind wander, # You just want to have fun in Scanner fashion, # You want to find a theme to your interests, or # You’re returning to Scanner mode after doing your Best Work | Scanner Daybook (use it with the Da Vinci Write-Up) | 11–20, 24–25, 33, 36, 57, 68, 77–79, 105, 109, 110, 140, 155, 156, 165, 167, 198, 209, 213, 225, 244–245, 252 |- | You have several projects you want to work on, but you can’t organize your time well enough to juggle them | Scanner Planner (use it with the School Day Life Design Model) | 146–148 |- | You have a project that you feel bad about not finishing, but you’re not interested enough to keep working on it | Scanner’s Finish (use it with the Life’s Work Bookshelf) | 111–112, 210 |- | You’re really busy and have only two minutes here and there to work on your projects | Setup | 69–70, 153 |- | # You finish a project (typically something you’ve made) and you want to show off the results, or # You need some accountability to keep you moving toward your goal | Show-and-Tell Party | 237–238, 250–251 |- | You want to learn and do a lot of different things, and you think informal learning would work better than college classes | Soiree | 230–231 |- | You learn something that calms your Scanner Panic | Sticky Notes | 47 |- | You need accountability and moral support to keep you moving toward your goal | Success Team | 92, 94–95, 99 |- | You keep accumulating a variety of skills and experiences, but it would look bad to put them all on your résumé | Three Scanner Résumés | 266–267 |- | You’re afraid you’ll never get to do everything you want to do | Wall Calendar Poster | 45–47, 138–139, 140 |- | You need a convenient place from which to write your Letters from the Field | Web E-mail Account (use it with the Letters from the Field) | 189–190, 225 |- | You think you haven’t accomplished much in your life | “What Have I Done So Far?” List | 24–25 |} c9b2ca6838e9db34778ab99a949cd15071af4c88 0 45 91 90 2014-05-07T03:57:52Z Andy Culbertson 1 1 revision: Import of WordPress content wikitext text/x-wiki === Links === # [http://maps.google.com/maps/ms?msa=0&amp;msid=111762791336614627847.0004387a4fbb10bd55916 The Map] # [[Recommended Preachers Online: The List|The List]] === Motivations === As I reflected on my lack of spiritual vitality earlier this year (2007), I concluded that it would help to have more Christian input into my mind. Once a week at church and an occasional devotion wouldn’t cut it. To keep my mind on spiritual things, I needed to hear the Christian message more often. One easy way for me to do that is to listen to online Christian audio, so I set out to collect some. === Procedure === As things usually go with me, the project quickly expanded beyond all reasonable proportion, and instead of gathering two or three sources I could rely on for insight and inspiration, I decided to find as many as I could, searching in a comprehensive and semi-systematic fashion. And by comprehensive, I mean searching every city (above a certain size) in every state in the US. And then expanding to other English-speaking countries after that. That’s what I’m shooting for anyway. In reality I’ll search until I get tired of it. At some point I may expand the project to include speakers that aren’t attached to a church. My overall procedure is to take the states in the order of their importance to me and search for churches by city, starting with the largest. I didn’t start out this way—I tried alphabetically first, so the map began with some random churches in Alabama—but officially the first state in the list is Illinois, and the first city is Chicago. And then along the way I’ve thought of churches in other states I knew I wanted to include, and I’ve listened to sermons at my friends’ churches from around the country, so I’ve interrupted my orderly progression to add some of those. Normally I would keep a list like this in my bookmarks, but since the data was geographical, I thought it would be fun to make a Google map out of it, which I have linked to above. My bookmarks are holding the raw results of my search, and to make my decisions, I’m taking more detailed notes in a Zoho Creator database. === Benefits === In addition to collecting more listening material than I could ever possibly take in and stimulating my thoughts and feelings on spiritual matters, this project has come with some unexpected side benefits. One is that I feel more connected with different parts of the country. If Birmingham, Alabama, comes up in a conversation, I can think, Ah, I know something about Birmingham. I’ve listened to some good preachers there. If a natural disaster sweeps through, I can wonder how my churches there are doing. If on a Sunday I’m traveling in an area that has churches on my list, I can visit one of them and gain a more personal connection. If I have a friend who needs a church, I can refer them to my list, if I’ve covered their area; or I can take the project on a detour through their city to see what I can find. For my friends who go to churches on my list, it gives me a little more of a connection with them and more topics for conversation. And finally, this project lets me exercise one of my joys in life, which is to find hidden treasure and share it with people who might not have found it otherwise. Some of the preachers in the list are well known, but there are pastors out there who are unknown but still good, and they deserve a wider audience. So by posting my discoveries online, I can hopefully give them a bit more exposure and put a few more people in touch with their unique perspectives and good preaching, and the happiness and well-being in the world can be increased. :) === Criteria === This list is extremely subjective. While there are a few things I look for, I don’t apply a rigorous and objective rubric to each church. The question that determines whether a church makes the list is, Would I listen to this preacher regularly? If the answer is probably or yes, they go on the map. (If it’s maybe, I come back to it later and listen to a sermon or two more to decide.) So this is not a list of all the good churches in the world or even all the good preachers, just the ones I have personally found to be especially worth listening to so far. Obviously someone else would have a different list. Also, since most of these decisions are based on a single sermon, I will take a church off the list if I change my mind about it on later listenings. I do keep my ears open for a few basic characteristics. I prefer speakers who have a more natural speaking style, as opposed to a highly affected one. I gravitate toward thoughtful pastors who are speaking to audiences who already have the basics of Christianity under their belt and who are looking to live it more effectively. I like hearing preachers who express the Christian message in new ways, rather than delivering the same old content with the same old language. And I appreciate a balance between exegesis and application. If it’s unbalanced, I’d rather it be on the application side. I am also a conservative Protestant, so you will see a clear bias toward this category in my list, which also I think comes from the fact that they seem to care more about preaching and getting their message out into the public. Since there are potentially thousands of preachers who fit these criteria, I also keep a few limiting questions in mind: Is this speaker unique enough to stick in my mind? Is he or she easily ignorable (by being overly academic, rambling, or boring in some other way)? Does the speaker express a lot of opinions I disagree with without adding anything to my understanding? Is this speaker annoyingly liberal or conservative? I am more tolerant of conservatism, but I will turn them off if they’re too simple minded for me. And although I am fairly ecumenical, I skip over churches that don’t fit into what I would consider orthodox Christianity, so no Mormon, Christian Science, or Unitarian churches. Seventh-Day Adventists are a little too iffy; they’re out too. Most of these criteria can be overridden by others in particular cases. Sometimes I can overlook an affected speaking style if the preacher is especially reflective. Or I can forgive a simple message if I feel inspired by the speaker’s sincerity. And I also look for certain specific preaching styles that I wouldn’t normally listen to because occasionally I do feel like listening to them. Sometimes I’m in an “old time religion” mood, for example, which is normally when I turn on Family Radio, even though Harold Camping is kind of a heretic. And of course my friends’ churches get special consideration. ;) Though they are not automatically included. -.- Even if they’re the preacher. === The List === The list linked to below corresponds to the placemarks on the map. It should be updated often while I’m on this project, except when I take breaks to concentrate on other things, and the changes will be reflected on the Recent Changes page and in the corresponding “all updates” feed. The churches on this page are arranged by state, then by city, then by church name. The Google map list is arranged in the order in which I added them. [[Recommended Preachers Online: The List|The List]] 72cb322c5ec0ae5908669aea39b34cde334cb966 0 46 93 92 2014-05-07T03:57:52Z Andy Culbertson 1 1 revision: Import of WordPress content wikitext text/x-wiki === Links === # [http://maps.google.com/maps/ms?msa=0&amp;msid=111762791336614627847.0004387a4fbb10bd55916 The Map] # [[Recommended Preachers Online|Explanation]] === The List === {| class="wikitable sortable toptextcells" |- ! Church ! Pastor(s) ! City ! State ! Notes |- | [http://www.ebcathens.com/ Emmanuel Baptist Church] | David Carpenter | Athens | AL | |- | [http://www.shadesmountain.org/ Shades Mountain Bible Church] | Ron Gannett | Birmingham | AL | |- | [http://www.stpetersbhm.org/ St. Peter’s Anglican Church] | John D. Richardson | Birmingham | AL | I really placemarked this because Lyle Dorsett sometimes preaches. |- | [http://www.twickenham.org/ Twickenham Church of Christ] | Brad Cox | Huntsville | AL | |- | [http://www.freepres.org/church.asp?trinity Trinity Free Presbyterian Church] | Myron Mooney | Trinity | AL | |- | [http://www.trinitychurchonline.org/ Trinity Church] | Ian Cron | Greenwich | CT | |- | [http://www.saint-peters.net/ St. Peter’s Anglican Church] | Eric Dudley | Tallahassee | FL | |- | [http://www.ctkfoxvalley.org/ Christ the King Church] | Ken Carr | Batavia | IL | |- | [http://www.allsaintsorthodox.org/ All Saints Antiochian Orthodox Church] ([http://ancientfaithradio.com/specials/allsaints/ Audio]) | Patrick Henry Reardon | Chicago | IL | |- | [http://www.chicagochurch.org/ Chicago Church of Christ – Chicago Ministry Center] | Jeff Balsom, Todd Fink, Randy Harris, Jim Lefler | Chicago | IL | |- | [http://covenantchicago.org/ Covenant Presbyterian Church of Chicago] | Aaron Baker | Chicago | IL | |- | [http://www.edgebapt.com/ Edgewater Baptist Church] | Jim Shedd | Chicago | IL | |- | [http://www.firstbaptist-chicago.org/ First Baptist Church of Chicago] ([http://www.fbcpreacher.com/ Audio]) | Jesse M. Brown | Chicago | IL | |- | [http://www.moodychurch.org/ The Moody Church] | Erwin Lutzer | Chicago | IL | |- | [http://www.churchrez.org/ Church of the Resurrection] | Stewart E. Ruch, III | Glen Ellyn | IL | |- | [http://www.gcvalley.org/ Grace Church of the Valley] | Clark Richardson, Mike Hill, Jerry Kennell | North Aurora | IL | |- | [http://www.kishwaukeebiblechurch.org/ Kishwaukee Bible Church] | Frank Yonke, Steve Leston, Ron Spiotta | Sycamore | IL | |- | [http://www.friendsofthesavior.org/ Church of the Savior] | Bill Richardson | West Chicago | IL | |- | [http://www.blanchardalliance.org/ Blanchard Alliance Church – Wheaton] | John Casey | Wheaton | IL | |- | [http://www.hopeingod.org/ Bethlehem Baptist Church] | John Piper | Minneapolis | MN | |- | [http://www.whchurch.org/ Woodland Hills Church] | Greg Boyd | St. Paul | MN | Okay, yes, he’s an [http://www.theopedia.com/Open_theism Open View] theologian. But other than that he’s really good! |- | [http://www.parksidechurch.com/ Parkside Church] | Alistair Begg | Chagrin Falls | OH | |- | [http://www.salemalliance.com/ Salem Alliance Church] | John Stumbo | Salem | OR | |- | [http://www.pcpc.org/ Park Cities Presbyterian Church] | Joseph “Skip” Ryan (formerly) | Dallas | TX | |- | [http://www.stonebriar.org/ Stonebriar Community Church] ([http://www.insight.org/ Audio]) | Chuck Swindoll | Frisco | TX | |- | [http://www.christchurchplano.org/ Christ Church Plano] | David H. Roseberry | Plano | TX | |- | [http://advancedministry.com/sites/index.cfm?i=1148 Bethany Community Church] | Richard Dahlstrom | Seattle | WA | |- | [http://www.jesusfellowshipofbelievers.com/ Jesus Fellowship of Believers] | Tim Dodson | Menomonie | WI | |- | [http://www.immanuelwestbend.org/ Immanuel Church] | Rich Vincent | West Bend | WI | |} 3aa672ebaccee3a7a66e07c15bc53449a11577b0 0 47 95 94 2014-05-07T03:57:52Z Andy Culbertson 1 1 revision: Import of WordPress content wikitext text/x-wiki Version 1.0, 1/1/2010 It’s the start of a new year, and you may be thinking about reading through the Bible. If you’d like a more vigorous reading plan than usual, try this one. It’ll take you through the whole Bible in 90 days. If you want to do a “quick” overview study of the Bible, this is one way to make your way through it. If you are creating a long Bible-related work, such as a commentary, this list may also be suitable for dividing your work into more manageable volumes. Each day’s reading is not of equal length. I tried to avoid ending a day’s reading in the middle of a narrative or discourse or starting it in the middle of one book and ending in the middle of another, which meant stretching some readings and shrinking others. I also used whole chapters throughout the plan so it could easily be used with audio Bibles, which are often divided by chapter. The days cover about 5,000 to 10,000 words each, with most in the 7,000- to 8,000-word range. For most people 5,000 to 10,000 words translates into about 30 minutes to an hour of reading. {| class="wikitable sortable toptextcells" |- ! '''Day''' ! '''Text''' |- | 1 | Genesis 1-16 |- | 2 | Genesis 17-28 |- | 3 | Genesis 29-39 |- | 4 | Genesis 40-50 |- | 5 | Exodus 1-13 |- | 6 | Exodus 14-27 |- | 7 | Exodus 28-40 |- | 8 | Leviticus 1-15 |- | 9 | Leviticus 16-27 |- | 10 | Numbers 1-10 |- | 11 | Numbers 11-24 |- | 12 | Numbers 25-36 |- | 13 | Deuteronomy 1-11 |- | 14 | Deuteronomy 12-26 |- | 15 | Deuteronomy 27-34 |- | 16 | Joshua 1-12 |- | 17 | Joshua 13-24 |- | 18 | Judges 1-12 |- | 19 | Judges 13-Ruth 4 |- | 20 | 1 Samuel 1-15 |- | 21 | 1 Samuel 16-31 |- | 22 | 2 Samuel 1-12 |- | 23 | 2 Samuel 13-24 |- | 24 | 1 Kings 1-7 |- | 25 | 1 Kings 8-14 |- | 26 | 1 Kings 15-22 |- | 27 | 2 Kings 1-13 |- | 28 | 2 Kings 14-25 |- | 29 | 1 Chronicles 1-9 |- | 30 | 1 Chronicles 10-20 |- | 31 | 1 Chronicles 21-29 |- | 32 | 2 Chronicles 1-16 |- | 33 | 2 Chronicles 17-32 |- | 34 | 2 Chronicles 33-Ezra 10 |- | 35 | Nehemiah |- | 36 | Esther |- | 37 | Job 1-21 |- | 38 | Job 22-42 |- | 39 | Psalms 1-22 |- | 40 | Psalms 23-41 |- | 41 | Psalms 42-72 |- | 42 | Psalms 73-89 |- | 43 | Psalms 90-106 |- | 44 | Psalms 107-125 |- | 45 | Psalms 126-150 |- | 46 | Proverbs 1-16 |- | 47 | Proverbs 17-31 |- | 48 | Ecclesiastes-Song of Songs |- | 49 | Isaiah 1-12 |- | 50 | Isaiah 13-27 |- | 51 | Isaiah 28-39 |- | 52 | Isaiah 40-53 |- | 53 | Isaiah 54-66 |- | 54 | Jeremiah 1-10 |- | 55 | Jeremiah 11-23 |- | 56 | Jeremiah 24-31 |- | 57 | Jeremiah 32-39 |- | 58 | Jeremiah 40-49 |- | 59 | Jeremiah 50-Lamentations 5 |- | 60 | Ezekiel 1-15 |- | 61 | Ezekiel 16-24 |- | 62 | Ezekiel 25-36 |- | 63 | Ezekiel 37-48 |- | 64 | Daniel 1-6 |- | 65 | Daniel 7-12 |- | 66 | Hosea |- | 67 | Joel-Obadiah |- | 68 | Jonah-Zephaniah |- | 69 | Haggai-Malachi |- | 70 | Matthew 1-16 |- | 71 | Matthew 17-28 |- | 72 | Mark 1-7 |- | 73 | Mark 8-16 |- | 74 | Luke 1-8 |- | 75 | Luke 9-18 |- | 76 | Luke 19-24 |- | 77 | John 1-10 |- | 78 | John 11-21 |- | 79 | Acts 1-14 |- | 80 | Acts 15-28 |- | 81 | Romans |- | 82 | 1 Corinthians |- | 83 | 2 Corinthians |- | 84 | Galatians-Ephesians |- | 85 | Philippians-2 Thessalonians |- | 86 | 1 Timothy-Philemon |- | 87 | Hebrews-James |- | 88 | 1 Peter-Jude |- | 89 | Revelation 1-11 |- | 90 | Revelation 12-22 |} 4c92a362a679a4ed388a856e30910ee905bc7536 0 48 97 96 2014-05-07T03:57:52Z Andy Culbertson 1 1 revision: Import of WordPress content wikitext text/x-wiki Version 0.1.0, 2012-03-29 === Motivation === My mind is like a murky lake. Along the shore are ropes leading into the water, and at the submerged end of each rope is a net. The ends I can see are questions life asks me that I need to answer from the contents of my mind, and the nets contain the answers I can provide. The ropes are of different lengths, and the nets are of different sizes. The big nets contain detailed and extensive answers, and the small ones contain little but ignorance. The short ropes lead to answers I know that I know and can pull to shore readily. The long ropes are the scary ones. Until the nets have emerged, I never truly know how long the ropes are or what will be at the end. Maybe the nets will have the answers I need; maybe they’ll be disappointingly, frighteningly lacking. Maybe the nets will reach the shore by the time I need the answers; maybe the ropes will be too long for the time I have to pull them. I don’t know how much information is in my mind to meet the needs of the moment or how long it will take to retrieve it. All this would be fine, except that most of the things I like to do—synthesizing and discussing ideas, programming, being a resource of information for people—require a memory that is clear and reliable, if I want to do them well. And I do. Plus, I like the sense of clarity, awareness, and familiarity I get from knowing things about the world around me. I’ve had this gripe against my mind for over a decade, and I’ve finally decided to do something about it. I’m studying memory improvement techniques. It’s turning out to be a much more complex topic than I expected, but at this point I’ve gotten far enough to shape my basic ideas on the subject and to form some goals. So to give myself a milestone and something to show for my work so far, I’m writing for you this summary. Since this is an interim report, I’ll continue to develop these ideas as the project progresses. The concepts, terms, organization, and agenda are all subject to change. === Sources === Where am I getting my information? Two kinds of sources interest me: reports of scientific research on memory and popular memory improvement literature. I look at the research because I want my techniques to be grounded in reality rather than marketing hype. And I look at the popular literature because it offers creative examples for applying the techniques, which I can then analyze and generalize to create a more expansive and flexible system. For this project I started on the research end of the spectrum with Kenneth Higbee’s ''Your Memory: How It Works and How to Improve It'' and some of Alan Baddeley’s much more recent ''Your Memory: A User’s Guide''. At some point I would also like to read ''Mnemonology'' by James Worthen and R. Reed Hunt, which I found while writing this essay, to see how my ideas about the principles behind mnemonics stack up against actual research. But in this summary I’ll mainly be citing Higbee and my own experience, because the material I’ve read in Baddeley has been more specialized and not as applicable to the topics I’m covering here. On the popular end, so far I’ve only dabbled in a few books and articles. === Overview === My project has a relatively narrow focus. Memory is a pervasive part of everything we do in everyday life, and there are several types of memory. But while it’s all important, I want to focus on ways to memorize information for long-term recall. I’m partly aiming for a computer programming approach to human memory. Programming is an excellent grid through which to examine many areas of life, especially areas that involve problem solving or designing systems that will perform tasks intelligently. It’s helpful for these purposes because it involves breaking down a domain into parts, relating them logically, and performing operations on them to achieve specific goals. It’s concrete and practical. Programming is especially good for dealing with human memory because computers have their own form of memory, and the tasks we need to perform with both types are largely the same. We need to store information, modify it, and retrieve it in various arrangements, though human memory certainly works differently from computer memory in some major ways. I’ll draw out these ideas as I go along. My overall approach is to view memory as an interconnected set of components that can nevertheless be treated modularly so they can be assembled to solve a large variety of problems. I divide my analysis of memory into three parts: the basic components that are involved storing and retrieving information in memory, the basic skills of memorization that use these components, and the ways we can apply these skills to various memory tasks. === Components of Memory === By the components of memory, I mean the basic structures we create with information in the mind and the basic operations we perform to store and retrieve it. Memory is a set of subsystems rather than a single structure in the brain {Higbee 2}, and each system handles a different type of information, such as visual or verbal {37-38}. It would be great if I could use the brain’s organization to lay out the principles of memory here. But I don’t know nearly enough about how memory is organized in the brain, and I’m not sure neuroscientists do either {Baddeley 11}. So I’ve attempted to come up with more of a functional framework for arranging the common memory principles and techniques. Most of psychology is about identifying the mind’s API, the things we do from the surface of the mind to achieve the effects we want, regardless of how the brain is doing things on the back end. Still, knowing the implementation can be useful, so I like to hear about the progress neuroscience is making on memory. To memorize information for recall, you’ll need to transfer it from '''short-term''' to '''long-term''' memory. Short-term memory lasts only a few seconds and can contain only around seven items at a time. If the information in short-term memory goes through an encoding process, it’s stored in long-term memory and can potentially be accessed for a lifetime {Higbee 19, 20, 23}. To make this transfer, you’ll need to put to work several factors. So far I’ve grouped them into three categories: description, significance, and maintenance. You’ll need to notice important characteristics and associations of the information, you’ll need to signal to yourself that the information is worth remembering, and you’ll need to keep your memory equipment in working order. The first two, which I’ll call the memorization components, relate to working with specific items of information, and the last relates to the overall operation of your brain’s memory systems. For this summary I’ll only discuss the memorization components, because I’ve done almost no research on the maintenance component, factors such as diet and rest. ==== Description ==== My view is that the mind '''stores''' information by indexing it according to its '''properties''' {50}, which amount to a description of the item. It '''retrieves''' information when it receives a reminder, which gives it one or more properties to search by. Memory researchers call the reminders '''cues''' {26}. A word, for example, is often recalled based on its first letter, its sound, or its meaning {30}. This is why you can often recall a word by reciting the alphabet, looking for the word’s first letter {100}. You can also see this property indexing at work when you remember the wrong word and find that it resembles the word you’re looking for in one or more of these ways. ===== Items ===== For the purposes of this project, an '''information item''' is any set of information you’re treating as a unit. It’s actually a stretchy concept. Our minds can almost always subdivide information into smaller pieces or group it into larger ones. Whatever you’re treating as a unit at the time is an item in that context. This expandability of information is a very important feature that makes it possible to create all kinds of useful associations for memory, as we’ll see later. Some information is easier to think of as a single, simple unit, such as the translation of a single English word into another language, and some is easier to think of as a group of smaller items, such as a grocery list or a whole chapter of a book. I’ll call the simple items '''unitary''' items and the groups '''collective''' items. Since pretty much any information can be subdivided, it’s technically all collective. But these categories are meant to help you in memorizing. Hence, the way you categorize any particular item is somewhat subjective and relative to your purpose for it at the time. I’ll explore the ways these categories can help you later in the essay. What kinds of information items are there? An item can be something more like an object or something more like a sentence, and really you could look at any item as one or the other. So you might memorize the flag of each country and treat each flag as an object, but in the back of your mind, you’re also memorizing a statement that goes something like, “The flag of Algeria looks like this.” ===== Properties ===== A property of an item of information is anything you can say about it. Really it’s just another piece of information that’s somehow related to the item you’re dealing with. In fact, I think of an item of information as being completely made of its properties. An information item is a set of information that someone has bundled into a package and maybe given a label, which is just another one of its properties. For the purposes of memory, there are at least a couple of ways to look at properties. You can think of a property as a handle for an information item that the mind can grab when it’s looking for the item. And you can also think of properties as parts of the item that you can then focus on as items in themselves. I also like to think of properties as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Resource_Description_Framework RDF] triples. That is, a property can be stated in terms of three parts: a subject, a predicate, and an object. For example, one property of tree bark is that it’s rough. That is, it has a texture of roughness. “Tree bark” is the subject, “has a texture of” is the predicate, and “roughness” is the object. Splitting up a property in this way can help you think about enhancing and organizing the material you’re studying, which I’ll cover below. I divide properties into a few somewhat fuzzy categories to help me get a handle on them. One division is between internal and external properties. An '''internal''' property is any characteristic that the item has on its own. I’ll call internal properties '''features'''. An '''external''' property is any connection it has with other information. I’ll call the external properties '''connections'''. If I’m looking at a tree, one of its internal properties is that it has green leaves. An external property might be another tree it reminds me of. Another division I make is between natural and incidental properties. '''Natural''' properties are related to the item’s meaning, and '''incidental''' properties are any other kind. For example, a natural internal property of the word ''horse'' would be its definition in a dictionary or an image of a horse. An incidental internal property would be the way the word looks in a particular font. A natural external property would be the fact that a jockey rides a horse. An incidental external property would be the fact that horse and helicopter start with the same letter. The fact that an item’s storable properties can stray so far from its typical meaning becomes very useful when you’re memorizing information that has very little significance to you or that has no logical structure, such as a list of random words. Memory researchers call these incidental external properties '''elaborations''' {Higbee 94}. We will see this feature of memory come into play when we discuss mnemonics. ===== Storage ===== I also divide memory storage activity into two categories, '''active''' and '''passive'''. These categories apply to both description and the other memorization component, significance. Even without consciously trying, your mind engages in memorizing all the time. For example, people tend to remember where they were when a national tragedy took place. It might not always be the memorizing you expect or need, but you can take advantage of this passive activity and use it to supplement your conscious memorizing. ===== Retrieval ===== As I mentioned above, the mind retrieves information when it receives a reminder, called a cue. A cue is anything that either reminds you there’s something you need to remember or simply reminds you of something you do remember. It’s like a question for you to answer or a sentence with a blank to fill in. It provides you with some of the properties of the information and leaves you to find the rest of the item. As with everything else, I divide retrieval of information into several categories. First, like storage, retrieval can happen passively or actively. I’ve observed that cues tend to happen in chains—one thing reminds you of another, which reminds you of another, and so on—and the chains tend to start with cues from your surroundings. The cues that bring up information from your mind without any effort from you are triggering '''passive''' retrieval. When the cues remind you of your need or desire to remember something and then you search your mind for the information, you give yourself a series of cues that could trigger your recall, and this search is a process of '''active''' retrieval. These cues can be either '''parallel''' or '''chained'''. That is, the cues may be independent of each other, or each cue may remind you of the next. It can also happen at different levels of consciousness. '''Explicit learning''' is retrieval with a conscious awareness that you’ve recalled something. '''Implicit learning''' is retrieval that happens unconsciously; you simply act on the information you’ve retrieved without being aware that you’ve retrieved anything {Baddeley 21}. And retrieval can happen more or less completely. '''Recall''' is the fullest level of retrieval, in which the whole item or set of information is brought to mind with only a starting cue. '''Recognition''' is less complete and more or less amounts to identifying the information you’re viewing as information you’ve seen before. Rate of '''relearning''' measures a subtle level of retrieval, in which you’re able to relearn information you’ve learned before in less time than you took to learn it at first. Your mind retains traces of the material from the first learning effort, so it doesn’t have to do as much work to learn it to the level of recall again {Higbee 26-27}. In this project, as I’ve said, I’ll be focusing on conscious storage for recall. Memory researchers have terms for several patterns of recall. When recall happens because it has been intentionally cued, they call it '''aided recall'''. Recall that happens in any order and without a specific external cue is termed '''free-recall''' {26}. Recall seems to be easier when it’s aided {100}, so it’s best to concentrate on memorizing specific properties of an item so they can reliably serve as cues. Most of my project will concern this strategy. When you recall items in a specific order, memory researchers call it '''sequential learning'''. When one item cues your recall of a second, they call it '''paired-associate learning''' {26}. Most of the memory techniques I’ve seen amount to different forms of aided recall using paired-associate learning. Even sequential learning can be reduced to a series of paired-associate tasks, where each item is the cue for the next in the list {133}. ===== Interference ===== A persistent problem for memory is what memory researchers call interference, the problem of confusing parts of something you’ve learned with parts of something else you learned before or after it {34}. This is different from the problem of strong emotions blocking your ability to learn or recall things, which I talk about in the “External emotional significance” section below. That could be seen as another type of interference, but memory researchers don’t call it that. To combat interference, each item you memorize needs to be unique in a memorable way. That is, it needs to have a unique set of properties. You can think of the items of information as being assigned unique addresses in your memory. The address is made of the item’s unique combination of properties. If two items aren’t meant to live at the same address, assign them different enough sets of properties that they’ll stay separate in your mind. Part of this memory improvement project will be to come up with ways to do that. ==== Significance ==== The second major aspect of memorization I identify is significance. For the mind to memorize something, it has to believe that it’s worth remembering. Here are some of the ways that can happen. Again, I’ve grouped them so they’re easier to remember. My categories for significance are familiarity, emotion, expression, timing, and interaction. Some of the categories from the description discussion apply to various aspects of significance as well—passive and active, internal and external. I’ll expand on them in the sections that follow. An item can gain significance as you discover its properties, such as other items that connect to it. For example, a man’s name may mean nothing to you and be quite forgettable until you learn he’s a brother you never knew you had. This ability of one item to elevate the significance of other items will be very important for the memory techniques I discuss later. ===== Familiarity ===== One obvious type of familiarity is '''knowledge'''. Information you’ve learned before is generally more significant to you than new information. This is important for two reasons. First, if you’ve already learned an item but you don’t remember it well, it will still be easier to learn than information you’ve never seen before {27}. Second, as we’ll see in the observation section, you can use more significant information, such as items you’ve already learned, to increase the significance of other information you’re learning {47}. A different type of familiarity that carries significance is '''sense'''. That is, information you can understand is usually more memorable than nonsense. I think of sense as a type of familiarity in that you understand a piece of information when it conforms to your existing, familiar patterns of thought as well as connecting with your prior knowledge. ===== Emotion ===== Emotion can lend great significance to information, making it easy to remember, though in some cases emotion can be a hindrance to memory. The emotion involved doesn’t need to be intense for it to help memory. In fact, it can be very slight. It just needs to be enough to make the material stand out as important in some way. Emotion that’s too intense may distort your understanding of the information anyway. ====== Internal emotional significance ====== In terms of emotion, I define '''internal significance''' as significance that is derived from the item’s properties. Internal emotional significance means that the item has properties that catch your attention. The information could be funny, surprising, fascinating, outrageous, impressive, disgusting, frightening, exciting, sensible, or touching, for example. Any property of the information—internal or external, natural or incidental, passive or active—can have significance that aids in remembering that information. Uniqueness, or novelty, while most important for separating similar information, also adds an element of significance to the information, if the item is unique in some way that feels significant {107}. It carries a sense of specialness: This item is worth paying attention to because it is one of a kind. On a subtler level, simply having a purpose can make an item more significant, even if it gets its purpose simply from being placed in a list or given a name. These features convey the sense that the item is supposed to be there. Internal emotional significance can be active or passive. Passive significance is reflected in the simple experience of emotionally reacting to the information you’re studying. The information is the type that is already important to you. Hence, I call this kind of significance '''reaction'''. Again, it doesn’t have to be a strong reaction, just a distinct one. A reaction doesn’t necessarily cement the details in your mind, so you may need to supplement your reaction with specific memorizing techniques, but it makes a difference. Taking the right '''attitude''' toward the material you’re learning is one example of active internal emotional significance. That is, you purposely see the information as significant. To do this, you take an interest in what you’re learning. You look for ways the information could be interesting or important or cause some other reaction in you, whether through the information’s features or connections, even though those ways aren’t obvious to you at first. ====== External emotional significance ====== I define external emotional significance as significance that the learner imposes on the information, whether actively or passively, because of the way the learner is feeling apart from the information itself. I haven’t explored this topic very far, and the books I’ve read don’t really cover it, so I’ll just mention it briefly. On the passive side, strong emotions, such as during a traumatic experience, can cement even random facts into your mind. In addition, events that happen directly in relation to the material you’re learning will often lend them significance. For example, the embarrassment of getting an answer wrong in front of other people makes the right information feel very important, and afterward it tends to stick in the mind! Similarly, the shift from confusion to understanding can give an item significance. Once an incomprehensible item makes sense, the feelings of relief and inspiration you get from finally understanding it can make it more significant. Necessity is another factor that can catch your attention. If the information is simple enough, knowing you need to know it can make it more memorable. Unless the necessity comes with a lot of stress, that is. Stress works against memory, which I discuss below. On the active side, you may be able to set an emotional tone for your study time via music, narrative, or some other form of art, and as you interpret the information by that mood, you may see new properties of it pop out as significant. But emotion also can hinder learning. In particular, stress works against both memorizing and recalling things {64-66}. I believe this is partly because stress and other strong emotions draw your attention away from what you’re learning and recalling, but I suspect there are other processes at work as well. My experience is that the mind can lock up under stress {Gladwell}. ===== Expression ===== The mind has several ways of taking in and processing information: visual, verbal, musical, narrative, kinesthetic. I’ll call them modes of expression. Some of these types of information are more memorable than others. It differs from person to person, but there are some trends. Visual information, for example, especially spatial, tends to be very easy for most people to remember {Higbee 37-39}. ===== Timing ===== I’ve encountered a few observations related to the timing of memory storage and retrieval relative to other things. I’ll probably try to generalize these later. You remember items in a list more or less easily depending on their position in the list {53}. You remember better things you learn just before sleeping and less well things you learn right after sleeping {44}. Most forgetting happens soon after learning. The rate slows down and levels off after that {35}. ===== Interaction ===== Your interaction with the material over time, even without any notable emotion, can lend the material significance. ====== Attention ====== Paying attention to the material you’re learning is one of the most basic and important ways of creating significance for it. Of course, you have to pay attention in order to notice things about the information and build up its properties in your mind {59}, but attention also clues your mind in that the information is important. This goes for any active part of memorization. ====== Repetition ====== I define '''repetition''' as repeated storage of an item in memory. Memory researchers know that spaced repetition is a key factor of learning {78-80}. I don’t know how it works out neurologically, but my interpretation is that being exposed to the same information repeatedly over a long period of time clues the mind in that it’s important. Many people think this type of repetition is what memorizing is. Reading over the information a few times is their only technique. But by itself, it’s really a very flimsy one, and we have many more resources at our disposal for planting information firmly in our minds {62}, which of course are the subject of this project. ====== Recitation ====== I define '''recitation''' as repeated retrieval of an item from memory. It seems to me that forcing yourself to recall information using spaced repetition is even more effective than simply exposing yourself to the information {83}. This is why flashcards are an effective study tool. === Memory skills === We can make use of these memorization components by exercising various skills. I don’t think I’ll have a real grasp on this section until I’ve experimented much more with different learning techniques. But I’ve grouped the skills I’ve found so far into several interrelated categories that loosely form a sequence: focusing, observing, selecting, enhancing, organizing, associating, rehearsing, and searching. The first of these is a general skill, the next several are storage skills, and the last is a retrieval skill. To memorize for long-term recall, you need to corral your attention, ask yourself questions about the information, pick out the information you need to know and the other information that will help you remember it, get the information into an easily memorizable form, arrange it all so you can easily link the information together, mentally form the connections, cement the connections over time, and then search your mind for the information when it’s time to recall it. In reality when studying various types of material for different purposes, you’ll mix these skills together rather than following them in a set sequence. ==== Focusing ==== Attention is a fundamental requirement both for active memorizing and for retrieval. So the first set of skills you’ll want to employ are those that focus the attention. The goal with these practices is to remove external and internal distractions. For external distractions, you’ll need to find a place and time that will keep you away from them. Find a quiet spot in the house, turn off the TV, go to the library, whatever circumstances you find the least distracting. You may have to observe yourself for a while and experiment with different setups. I like to sit in my car in a parking lot when I’m doing work that requires concentration. For internal distractions, you’ll need to settle or temporarily put aside disruptive thoughts and emotions. As I mentioned above, strong emotion, especially stress, can be a distraction from learning. So it pays to learn to relax and to remove stressors from your life. Relaxation techniques such as deep breathing exercises can go a long way to calm intrusive emotions. For thoughts that pull you away from the task at hand, it helps to write them down or tell them to someone, at least in summary form. That gives the part of your mind that’s concerned about them the assurance that you’ve given those thoughts some of the attention they deserve and that you’ll deal with them later, even if you haven’t completely resolved them now. And if you’re feeling worried about your memory’s performance when it’s time for recall, then the answer is to build your confidence. Your general confidence in your memory will grow as you practice the skills over time, especially when memorizing ''isn’t'' crucial. Then when you need to memorize something and the stakes are higher, studying to the extent that you overlearn the material will build your confidence that you know it, which will reduce your stress when it comes time to recall it {64-66}. Even if potential distractions are nearby, you may also find certain physical conditions for your study session that put you in a frame of mind for concentrating, such as playing certain kinds of music or simply sitting at a desk or in a room that over time you’ve associated with focused work {69}. In addition to removing distractions, you can help yourself focus by your attitude—gaining an interest in the material you’re learning. This has the added benefit of making the material more significant, which will make it easier to remember {70-71}. You can do a number of things to create interest while studying, which I’ll talk about below. But it can help to start the study session by reminding yourself of the reasons focus and interest are important. And if you can find reasons that are actually important to you personally and not simply reasons other people have for learning, that will be more convincing to you. ==== Observing ==== The rest of the skills relate to working with the specific information you’re memorizing. '''Observation''' is the skill of directing the attention to the specifics of what you’re learning, now that you’ve focused that attention. It’s the skill of noticing an item’s properties, both internal and external (its features and connections). These are the handles you’ll use to retrieve the information, and the main purpose of observation is to prepare the material you’re learning for planting in your mind via association and rehearsal. For this skill, keep in mind that I’m using the word ''item'' flexibly. An item can be anything from a single word to a whole book, to use a verbal example. An item can be subdivided into other items so you can concentrate on memorizing them separately, or it can be combined with other items to form a new whole, a process I’ll cover in the association section below. Before an item is subdivided, you can think of its sub-items as some of its properties. One good way to direct your attention is to ask yourself questions. A question is a type of cue. It gives you a set of properties and prompts you to find the item that matches them and to answer with a label that represents the item. The difference between an observation question and a recall cue is that when you’re observing, you’re looking for items in the material you’re studying as well as in your mind. Since observation plays a part in several of the other memorization skills, questions are a tool that will appear in several of the following sections. ==== Selecting ==== The most straightforward task related to observation is what I’ll call '''selection'''. This is the skill of identifying which information is worth noticing. Two other questions will help you discover which information that is. First, what do you need to know from this set of information? Or coming at it from the other side, what cues do you expect to receive for recalling the information? And second, what information will help you remember it? The answer to this one encompasses at least two types of information. One type is information that’s significant to you, since we can use that to raise the significance of less memorable information. The other type is information that may be in your mind at the time you need to remember the item, such as another item you’ve just recalled. This information can act as a cue if you’ve associated it with the item in question. These two types of information worth noticing are another example of an internal-external division. The cues (which tell you what you need to know) indicate what information is important to your circumstances (which are external to you), and significance indicates what information is important to your mind (which is internal to you). Of course, the same information may be important to both. I’ll call the cue-based information '''important''' information and the significance-based information '''memorable''' information. ===== Important information ===== Two main reasons for observing properties that are related to your expected cues are, first, to make sure you cover everything you need to learn and, second, to decrease your mental load by ruling out the things you don’t. A first natural question is what your expected cues ''are''. That is, what do you expect to encounter that will prompt you to recall this information? If the cues aren’t immediately obvious, try approaching the answer by asking yourself what context you’ll be in when you need to recall the information, such as an exam, a meeting, a party, or traveling. In an exam, the cues will be the test questions. In a meeting, they might be questions posed by the other attendees or simply the invitation to begin giving a presentation. At a party, they could be the greetings of the other guests, which would prompt you to recall their names and other information about them. While traveling, the cues might be landmarks, which would prompt you to recall the need to turn, stop, or look for the next landmark. Once you know the recall context and the types of cues you’ll encounter, you can imagine yourself in that context and begin to list the specific cues you expect to find. For example, who specifically will be at the party? What questions will likely be on the exam? What will the people in the meeting want to know? And once you have the specific cues, you can observe the responses to them that are available in the information you’re studying. ===== Memorable information ===== You will naturally react to much of the information you encounter. This information is already memorable to you, and you probably won’t have trouble remembering at least the gist. The skill is to notice these reactions when they happen so you can take advantage of them to add significance to the rest of the information. You can observe your reactions as you view each item for the first time, asking yourself how you’re reacting to this item, or you can review your reactions after you’ve seen all the material, asking yourself which items you recall reacting to. Observing your reactions is useful because if you can draw your attention to information that’s significant to you, you’re more likely to recall it when you’re looking for ways to make the other information more memorable. ==== Enhancing ==== For the material that doesn’t seem very memorable, you’ll need to associate it with other information that is memorable or with information that draws out its significant aspects. The actual association will come later. First you need to pick out the specific memorable information to associate the forgettable item with. Since this skill involves expanding on each item in various ways and since ''elaboration'' is already taken, I’m calling it '''enhancement'''. I call the items that will make the item in question more memorable '''helper''' items. When you’re looking for helper items, first tell yourself that there is something interesting about the information, even if you can’t see it yet. Then with that attitude in mind, do some more observing. Sharpen your observation of the information’s features and expand your awareness of its connections. You can do this by asking more questions: How does this information make sense? Understanding is typically an important first step in committing an item to memory. What interests other people about this information {72}? Assume they have a good reason! Why was this information included? Assume it has a real point! How does it relate to other items in the material? It may help to think in terms of relations like causation, implication, similarity, and contrast. What does the information remind you of that’s already familiar to you {53}? This question will be important again when you’re using the skill of translation, which I’ll describe in a later section. The answers to most of these questions don’t have to make sense. Certainly you should try to understand the material’s actual meaning. But the mind can invent connections that are significant without being logical {94}. Bizarre juxtapositions tend to be memorable, for example {107}. To use our terminology from earlier, an item’s properties can be natural or incidental, so feel free to take advantage of both. ===== Translating ===== One important type of enhancement is '''translation''', creating an item that you intentionally view as equivalent to the original item. You can think of translation in terms of the RDF triples I mentioned earlier. An item can be linked to its properties via different relationships. These are the predicates of the triples. The causation, implication, similarity, and contrast from the enhancement questions above are some possible relationships. Equivalence is another one. In this relationship, the property specifies another item, a '''substitute''' item, that stands for the one you’re studying {109}, which I’ll call the '''target''' item. In identifying this property, you’re translating the item you’re learning into the substitute item. If the substitute item is very memorable and it cues you to remember the original item, then it makes the original item easier to access in your memory. This is the idea behind many mnemonic techniques and systems. What kinds of items would you need a substitute for? Generally, any item that you expect not to be memorable, anything that seems boring or meaningless to you. More specifically, researchers have found that most people have a harder time remembering words than images, and abstract words such as ''timeless'' tend to be harder to remember than concrete words such as ''apple'' {38, 57}. People also find proper names hard to remember {192}, even though names are concrete in a way, since they usually represent people and physical objects. What kinds of substitutes are helpful? A substitute should have at least two characteristics. First, it should have some kind of connection to the target item that makes sense to you. That is, it should share some properties with the target item that are significant to you. For example, you could choose a substitute that sounds similar to the words of the target item, such as substituting ''celery'' for ''salary''. Or you could choose a substitute that symbolizes the target, such as imagining a set of balancing scales for the term ''justice'' {109}. It’s important for the connection to be meaningful. If you choose a completely arbitrary substitute with no meaningful connection, it will be hard to remember the connection, and the substitute won’t be able to act as a handle very well. Or if you memorize that meaningless connection well and then you run across a target item that the substitute would work much better for, you might confuse the new target with the old one when you’re using the substitute for recall. It’s not important for the connection to be meaningful to everyone, only to you, unless you want the substitute to make it easy for everyone to memorize the item. The second characteristic of a substitute is that it should represent the target item uniquely. If you choose a substitute that could be tied to a lot of different items, it might be hard to remember which item you need at the time. For example, if you’re memorizing the word ''frozen yogurt'' and you picture a bowl of it, you might accidentally recall the word ''ice cream'' if you don’t encode more carefully while you’re learning it {119}. The substitute isn’t meant to be a definition of the target item, only a cue. Its relationship to the target item can be purely incidental. It’s only a handle for pulling the information into your conscious mind. Once it’s there, you can put the substitute out of your mind for the moment and think about the target information normally. This approach lets the substitute do its job of adding significance to meaningless information while keeping the substitute from getting in the way of using the target information itself. The substitute item will often be in another mode of expression from the original item. It can be helpful to augment your learning by translating the information into the most memorable modes for you and even into multiple modes. Most mnemonic systems are based on translating verbal information into mental images {103}. And in addition to visualizing the information, you might also want to vocalize it, speaking the items out loud. I often struggle to find a substitute word as quickly as I need in order to memorize things on the fly. I would like to get better at this. It would help to memorize a lot of substitute words beforehand so I don’t have to be creative in the moment when I’m frantically trying to memorize the material in front of me. I want to write a program to create a dictionary of substitute words and phrases for names and common words. I also want to identify commonly used elements, such as days of the week and family relationships, that I can make a special effort to memorize. You can also take a poetic or musical approach, giving the material a rhythm, making it rhyme {111}, setting it to music, or all three. And if you can, perform this poetry or music for yourself out loud so that your mind can more fully encode the experience. Since most mnemonic systems take a visual approach and not everyone is visual {118}, I would like to find or develop a system along these auditory lines. The things I’d have to collect would be common rhyming words to translate harder words into, rhymes for commonly needed words, common poetic meters, and familiar melodies. The musical system could also use different aspects of music to encode things, like intervals, chords, keys, time signatures, and key signatures, if those things would be memorable. It would be good to see research about that. I would also like to explore a kinesthetic approach to memorization, though I’m not sure what it would look like, maybe creating actions that you associate with the information and arranging the actions into sequences to represent the relationships between the items. Sign language might be helpful here. ==== Organizing ==== The purpose of organizing is to bring together items that will help you remember more of the material. As I said in the selecting section, if you’re memorizing a set of information, you’ll often want each piece of information to remind you of other information in the set. You’ll also want more significant items to prop up the less significant ones. Thus, it helps to see them close together so you can easily associate them later. One type of organization is to group the items. If the items are related logically and you’re free to rearrange them, then you can group the information by category {51}. This gives you a chance to associate the category with all the items within it. Restating pairs of items as RDF triples could reveal categories you can group the information into, if the RDF idea helps you. Another type of organization is to arrange the items in a logical sequence, which lets you associate each item with the next in the sequence {133}. As you’re organizing, there are at least two other general questions to keep in mind. One is which item you should remember first when recalling a set of items {135}. And the other is how you’ll know when you’ve recalled everything you need from the set. To answer the second question, you can observe the total number of items in the group, or if they form a list, the last item in the list. Once you’ve recalled that number of items or that last item, you’ll know you’re done {133}. ==== Associating ==== '''Association''' is the skill of mentally assigning properties to an item. Or to say it another way, it’s cementing multiple items together in your mind. You can associate as many items as you want, but for simplicity we’ll assume it’s two. You can associate the information actively or take advantage of the passive associating your mind is already doing. ===== Active association ===== As I understand it, the way to associate two pieces of information is to create a new whole that incorporates both of them. The new whole, of course, is another item with its own set of properties. You’d think this would just give you more to study and take up more time. The goal, though, is to create associations that are memorable enough that you won’t need to spend much time studying them {166, 180}. There are several types of wholes you can form through association. If you’re visualizing the items, the new whole could be a scene in your imagination that features the two items interacting {104-105}. If the information is purely verbal, it could be a sentence or rhyme that incorporates them {111}. Another type of whole is a sequence of events that the mind groups together. I place classical and operant conditioning in this category. Pavlov rang a bell and then fed his canine subjects, so later when he rang the bell again, the dogs expected food. Simply grouping the items can tie them together, at least in short-term memory. If you’re memorizing a series of digits, such as a telephone number, then grouping them into chunks of two or three can keep them in your short-term memory longer. Memory researchers call this practice '''chunking''' {20}. Chunking can also let you create more complicated associations. You can chunk items together that you have associated with other items. For example, an '''acronym''' is a chunk of letters—a word—whose letters represent other words. Once you remember the word, you can break it down into its letters and remember the other words the acronym is associated with {98}. One effective visual way to establish associations in your mind is to group the information spatially. Group the items you’re associating into different regions of a page or some other surface. Along these lines, you could create a map that relates the items to each other in some way, using geography as a metaphor if the information isn’t geographical. Grouping the items physically is effective because the mind remembers at least basic spatial relationships very easily {150-152}. Another mode of expression that serves in association is storytelling. Humans are narrative beings. We naturally think in terms of coherent sequences of events, and we care about them, especially when they have to do with us. So one type of association that can add significance to the material you’re learning is telling a story that incorporates it {135}, especially a story that relates to your life. It doesn’t have to be realistic, just memorable. ===== Passive association ===== Even without consciously trying, your mind associates things all the time. You can take advantage of passive association by controlling the context in which you learn things. In particular, your mind associates things in your environment with things you’re doing. So if you’re studying for a test, it can help to study in the room you’ll take the test in. The features of the room may remind you of the information you studied there. The same goes for when you’re rehearsing for a performance {67-68}. And as usual, your mind isn’t picky about whether the associations make sense. Most of these associations will probably be for incidental rather than natural properties. Since interference is always a problem, it helps to memorize different pieces of information in different settings, whether different locations entirely different parts of the place in which you’ll be recalling the information {76-77}. That way, if you remember where you were when you learned that thing you’re trying to recall, there’s a chance something about that setting will cue your recall of the information. Making use of passive association is easiest to do with your external context—where you are—but it also includes your internal context—what state of mind you’re in. It also helps to try to learn the material in the same mental condition in which you’ll recall it (the same mood, for example). So if you’re going to be sober when you take a test, don’t be drunk while you’re studying for it {69}. ==== Rehearsing ==== Even the most memorable information will fade over time and become hard to recall if left alone. So in addition to enhancing and associating the information, you need to '''rehearse''' it. Rehearsal can take the form of both repetition and recitation, but recitation will cement the information in your mind more quickly. You can rehearse through recitation in a number of ways, such as using flashcards or having another person quiz you. But the basic procedure is to present yourself with a cue and then take a few seconds to try to recall the corresponding items. Then receive feedback on your result. If you were able to recall something, check the answer to see if you were right. If your recall was wrong or you couldn’t recall the item at all, use the feedback as a way to repeat your mental storage of the information, maybe looking for a new way to enhance it. Then cue yourself for the information again later. Feedback both lets you assess your knowledge and sustains your interest in the material {72-73}. Forgetting takes a certain shape over time. You forget most of what you learn right after you’ve seen it for the first time. After that the rate at which you forget the material slows down and levels off {35}. So your first study session should be a review of the material right after you first encounter it {89}. Learning also takes a certain shape over time. Your study sessions for the material should be frequent at first, but you can space them out more and more as your recall of the material becomes easier {89-90}. There are several algorithms for this kind of spaced repetition that can help you schedule your learning, such as the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leitner_system Leitner system]. ==== Searching ==== The mind stores information by indexing it by its properties. These properties are handles you can grab to retrieve the information as you search your mind for it based on those properties. So when you want to recall something and it’s not coming to mind right away, you can try to find it by suggesting properties to yourself that the information might have and seeing if the suggestion brings the information to the surface. Try to think of as many related types of information as you can, and one or more may trigger the memory. For example, if you enter a room and don’t remember why, look around the room in case your purpose was related to any of the objects in it, retrace your steps in case your previous locations gave you a reason to enter the room, and remember what you were talking or thinking about {Higbee 211}. Kenneth Higbee calls this the “think around it” technique {55-56}. === Applications === The components of memory I’ve discussed can be put together and applied to various problems that require memorization. Programmers sometimes write cookbooks that contain example code. The examples solve common problems in a particular language that don’t have immediately obvious solutions. Using the elements of memory in the above analysis as a rudimentary mental programming language, I’d like to do the same for common memory tasks. These applications can be built up in layers, with simpler applications becoming components in more complex ones. I’m organizing this section around tasks rather than the techniques that accomplish them, because each task can encompass a number of techniques. Since this essay is a summary and I haven’t thought very far about most of these applications, I’ll only cover them briefly here. ==== Holistic information ==== This category includes memorizing text, images, concepts, and music. With this type of information, it doesn’t work well to break it into a list of small components and then string them together with a series of associations, as in the mnemonic systems below. You have to recall it rapidly and fluidly, sometimes even nonlinearly, so it needs to be stored efficiently as a whole unit. You can think of it as assigning a single value, such as a string, to a variable. One good tool for rehearsing text is the [http://bencrowder.net/blog/2011/03/erasure/ erasure method], where several words are erased at random from the text before each repetition. This allows the surrounding words to serve as cues for a word that’s been erased. ==== Dates and times ==== One useful element to encode mnemonically is dates and times. This gives you a way to timestamp your memories, plans, and any other time-specific information. It would be an essential component of any mental task management system. The technique I have in mind would be to encode each component you needed (day, month, year, hour, minute, etc.), and then associate them all together. Then associate the whole clump with whatever information you want to timestamp. ==== Names and faces ==== Remembering names and faces is a very popular use for memory techniques {Higbee 194}. People are very important, but names by themselves are fairly meaningless, and faces can often look alike to the untrained eye. The techniques for remembering them are apparently the same from book to book. The idea is to find a visualizable substitute word for the name and associate it with a distinguishing feature of the face {194-198}. But I have my own spin on the details, and maybe some of the books take this approach too. It can be hard to recognize a distinguishing feature unless you know what the nondescript version would look like {Redman 1-2}, and it’s also harder to identify features when you don’t have a vocabulary for them {Higbee 191}. So I’d like to try using the techniques of caricature artists and, if I’m feeling really enthusiastic, the vocabulary of forensic artists {George chapter 1} to locate and name what’s unique about a person’s face. One benefit of having a technical vocabulary is that you can use substitute words for those terms and associate them with the substitute word for the person’s name. If you’re not very visual, this could be a helpful technique. ==== Experiences ==== There are a number of reasons you might want to remember your experiences in detail. For example, you might want to relive your good memories, which can happen more vividly if you remember more about them. It also gives you a better story to tell. If you’re giving eyewitness testimony, you can provide a better account. And if you’re learning a skill, remembering your mistakes and successes with the skill is important. Probably some of the important factors in remembering experiences are knowing in advance what kinds of things to observe in your experiences, having a reliable way to represent sequence relations to yourself (i.e., this event followed that event), and developing the habit of reviewing the experience right after it happens. ==== Complex sets of information ==== This is often a facet of studying for a school or certification exam, but complex information shows up other places too. Many people’s jobs involve knowing complex webs of facts and concepts. What are the best ways to organize and memorize these webs? ===== Mnemonic systems ===== A mnemonic (pronounced without the first m) is any method for aiding the memory, though most researchers define it more narrowly in terms of elaborations, aids that rely on what I’ve called incidental external properties. Kenneth Higbee helpfully distinguishes between single-purpose mnemonics, which he calls '''mnemonic techniques''' and general-purpose ones, which he calls '''mnemonic systems''' {Higbee 94-95}. An example of a single-purpose mnemonic is using the acronym HOMES to remember the Great Lakes: Huron, Ontario, Michigan, Erie, and Superior {98}. Much of this essay has dealt with the principles that seem to lie behind both types of mnemonics. In this section I’ll talk about mnemonic systems. Memory specialists describe a number of mnemonic systems you can use to memorize certain kinds of lists. Higbee includes five mnemonic systems in ''Your Memory'': Link, Story, Loci, Peg, and Phonetic. The Link system involves visualizing each item of a list and associating that item with the next item in the list {133}. The Story system involves creating a story that incorporates each item in sequence {135}. The Loci system involves memorizing a series of familiar locations, such as the rooms of your home, and then visually associating each item of a list with one of those locations {145}. The Peg system involves memorizing substitutes for a set of numbers or letters and then visually associating each list item with the corresponding number or letter substitute in sequence {157-161}. The Phonetic system involves memorizing a set of consonant sounds for each digit (0-9), translating any numbers you’re memorizing into the consonant sounds of their digits, adding vowel sounds to create words, and, if the numbers are meant to give order to a list, visually associating each list item with the word representing its number in the sequence {173-178}. One aspect of memorizing complex information is to mnemonically create data structures in your mind, the kinds of data structures that are fundamental to programming. Higbee’s five systems fall under the categories of linked lists (Link, Story) and arrays (Loci, Peg, Phonetic). But there are other data structures: stacks, queues, multidimensional arrays, hash tables, heaps, graphs, weighted graphs, and various trees (binary, red-black, 2-3-4) {Lafore}. We can find ways to organize and associate information to mentally build these and any others we need. The key to creating these mental data structures and inventing others is to break them down into sets of key-value pairs. To memorize the pairs, you associate the key with the value using the techniques from the association section above. Even a simple scalar variable is a variable name paired with the value assigned to it. The set of variables in a running program can be thought of as a hash table with the variable names as the keys. And you can think of an array as a hash table with the index numbers as the keys. If you’re using the data structure in a larger context and you might confuse its items with data from another structure, you could encode the keys using a different method or category (such as using animals for one variable’s keys and plants for another’s), or you could include the variable name with each key. So if you’re using a visual mnemonic technique, you’d create one image that incorporates your substitute images for the variable name, the key, and the value. This last technique treats the key as an address for the value. The value lives at key X within variable Y. You can extend this technique to account for data structures with several levels, such as trees or multidimensional arrays. This approach also treats the data structure like a database table with a primary key made up of several fields. In addition to creating the data structures themselves, it’s important to know basic algorithms for inserting, deleting, sorting, and searching for items in them, so I’d like to develop mental versions of those tasks too. ===== Rehearsal ===== Another aspect of memorizing complex information is to drill yourself, such as with with flashcards, which are an easy way to take advantage of spaced repetition. People normally use flashcards to study binary facts, such as sets of foreign vocabulary words. But as we’ve seen, key-value pairs can represent most types of information. This includes the points in an outline, the relationships in a concept map, or the cells in a table. So you could conceivably use flashcards to memorize these types of charts as well. I’d like to program a tool that will convert things like outlines and tables into flashcards. ==== Studying for an exam ==== My first motivation for learning about memory was to study more effectively for tests and not worry that I didn’t know the material. Studying effectively turns out to be a complex process of planning your study time and place, taking on the right attitude, organizing the material, and using effective memory techniques. Some type of chart would be helpful in making decisions about these steps. ==== Task management ==== My latest motivation for learning about memory has been to supplement the productivity system David Allen describes in his book ''Getting Things Done'' (often abbreviated GTD). Allen emphasizes recording your tasks in an external system, such as a planner, that is organized by context, because you can’t rely on your mind to remember everything you need to do when you’re in the right time and place for doing it {Allen 16, 21-23}. I think that the way GTD brings together the concepts of context, next actions, and horizons of focus is brilliant and very effective for helping to stay on top of one’s internal and external commitments. I also agree that an external system is easier to rely on than the mind. But is it really true that the mind is useless as a task manager? I think that using memory techniques creatively, it’s possible to do GTD mentally. For example, you could create a substitute item for each context and associate it with your list of next actions for that context, which you could memorize using the Link system. But at the very least, you can use memory techniques to remember tasks long enough to write them down later if you come up with them in the shower. === Next steps === My next step is to begin experimenting with memory techniques by memorizing things that are important to me. I’ll especially concentrate on finding substitute words and developing techniques for selecting, enhancing, and organizing. === References === “Leitner system.” Wikipedia. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leitner_system http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leitner_system]. “Resource Description Framework.” Wikipedia. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Resource_Description_Framework http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Resource_Description_Framework]. Allen, David. ''Getting Things Done''. New York: Penguin, 2001. Preview at [http://books.google.com/books?id=iykLVJAK49kC http://books.google.com/books?id=iykLVJAK49kC]. Baddeley, Alan. ''Your Memory: A User’s Guide''. New illustrated ed. Buffalo, NY: Firefly, 2004. Crowder, Ben. “Erasure.” BenCrowder.net. [http://bencrowder.net/blog/2011/03/erasure/ http://bencrowder.net/blog/2011/03/erasure/]. George, Robert M. ''Facial Geometry: Graphic Facial Analysis for Forensic Artists''. Springfield, IL: Charles C Thomas, 2007. Gladwell, Malcolm. “The Art of Failure.” New Yorker, August 21, 2000. [http://www.gladwell.com/2000/2000_08_21_a_choking.htm http://www.gladwell.com/2000/2000_08_21_a_choking.htm]. Higbee, Kenneth. ''Your Memory: How It Works and How to Improve It''. 2nd ed. New York: Prentice Hall, 1988. Preview at [http://books.google.com/books?id=N6FPQzBpheEC http://books.google.com/books?id=N6FPQzBpheEC]. Lafore, Robert. ''Data Structures and Algorithms in Java''. 2nd ed. Indianapolis, IN: Sams, 2003. Redman, Lenn. ''How to Draw Caricatures''. Chicago: Contemporary, 1984. Worthen, James B. and R. Reed Hunt. ''Mnemonology: Mnemonics for the 21st Century''. Essays in Cognitive Psychology. New York: Taylor &amp; Francis Group, Psychology Press, 2011. 63d3f0962f157a168815c9dcb48b1db9451d88f6 6 49 99 2014-05-07T04:06:52Z Andy Culbertson 1 Me in 2005 wikitext text/x-wiki Me in 2005 dae1fc7970c01286b84600e91e09af58a6c5fc65 0 21 101 43 2014-05-07T04:24:07Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the Site category. wikitext text/x-wiki Version 1.1, 5-1-05 Welcome to my web journal and site updates page. And now, a history lesson. Many eons ago I ran across an online diary on somebody’s Geocities site. I didn’t think much of it and didn’t even bookmark it (which is strange for me), but I filed it away in my memory and moved on. A couple of years later a random person read my website and recommended Xanga to me. I registered and then completely forgot about it for a long time. I didn’t actually pay attention to things like online diaries and weblogs until a few days after September 11th, when I Googled my way into a message board for online diarists. In one thread they had been discussing the attacks while they were happening. The transparency and emotional energy of their posts gripped me. But still I moved on. A few months later I was looking up ''Choose Your Own Adventure'' books on Google and wandered into an entry from a diary called [http://urbanality.diaryland.com/ urbanality]. This time it stuck. The entry was so inviting that I had to read the whole thing. I read all the archives, and I discovered once again something I often forget, that people can be utterly fascinating–as individuals, not just as abstractions. Online diarying looked so fun that I had to try it myself. So I signed up with [http://www.diaryland.com/ Diaryland], urbanality’s host, and typed away. I called it ''Taran, Assistant Pig-Keeper'' because I had just read the ''Prydain Chronicles'' by Lloyd Alexander. Then my friend at work [http://www.xanga.com/home.aspx?user=thisismyfathersworld April] started a weblog at Xanga. This brought my attention to the large number of Wheaton students who had Xanga blogs. An online community of which I could be a part! So I revived my neglected Xanga account. I like the blog format better than the diary format because the entries in a blog are more accessible, but I don’t like the way most people keep their archives. Blogs are typically arranged in reverse chronological order so that the most recent entry is at the top. This makes sense if you’re a visitor checking for the latest happenings. It does not make sense if you’re a visitor reading through the whole series of them from the beginning. You have to read backwards. Therefore, ''my'' archives will be arranged in chronological order! You may feel perfectly free to start at the top of the page like a normal reader of English. As I stated at the beginning of this intro, this blog is a combination web journal and site updates page. That keeps things simple, and simplicity is something this site can always use more of! I may keep my other blogs going for now, and if so, I’ll keep everything unified by posting links to those entries in the ''Thinkulum'' blog. Also, you should notice in my blog’s navigation links that I have a page for links to other people’s sites. There you will find some terrific people I know online and off who have websites. When you want to read about somebody’s life but get tired of mine, you can visit ''them''. :) Enjoy! [[Category:Site]] 81723bf8daa4ec732206996c0232d3d61f4e7a40 136 101 2014-06-01T04:38:35Z Andy Culbertson 1 Updated the contents. wikitext text/x-wiki Many eons ago I ran across an online diary on somebody’s Geocities site. I didn’t think much of it and didn’t even bookmark it (which is strange for me), but I filed it away in my memory and moved on. A couple of years later a random person read my website and recommended Xanga to me. I registered and then completely forgot about it for a long time. I didn’t actually pay attention to things like online diaries and weblogs until a few days after September 11th, when I Googled my way into a message board for online diarists. In one thread they had been discussing the attacks while they were happening. The transparency and emotional energy of their posts gripped me. But still I moved on. A few months later I was looking up ''Choose Your Own Adventure'' books on Google and wandered into an entry from a diary called [http://web.archive.org/web/20040828024837/http://urbanality.diaryland.com/ urbanality]. This time it stuck. The entry was so inviting that I had to read the whole thing. I read all the archives, and I discovered once again something I often forget, that people can be utterly fascinating–as individuals, not just as abstractions. Online diarying looked so fun that I had to try it myself. So I signed up with [http://www.diaryland.com/ Diaryland], urbanality’s host, and typed away. I called it ''Taran, Assistant Pig-Keeper'' because I had just read the ''Prydain Chronicles'' by Lloyd Alexander. Then my friend at work April started a [http://web.archive.org/web/20060831002854/http://www.xanga.com/home.aspx?user=thisismyfathersworld weblog] at Xanga. This brought my attention to the large number of Wheaton students who had Xanga blogs. An online community of which I could be a part! So I revived my neglected [http://web.archive.org/web/20050530103126/http://www.xanga.com/home.aspx?user=Skygazer Xanga account]. I blogged at Xanga until about the time I set up my new site here in March 2005. In recent years blogging has become a really big deal alongside other kinds of social media. While some bloggers are still online diarists, many bloggers are like syndicated columnists for newspapers, delivering informed opinions on the relevant events of the day, which sometimes consist of the posts of other bloggers. This interaction turns the various blogging communities into something like distributed forums with short threads but long posts, unless you count the comments. I like this new ecosystem, but it's not something I can participate in very well. I react to things too slowly, writing takes me too long, and my ideas aren't formed or informed enough to give me something worthwhile to say about whatever's happening at the moment. I'm more of a topical thinker, and I use writing to work out my ideas, much like other people use talking. Since exploring the world of software engineering I've also learned the value of iterative development, releasing products early and often, even if they're in rough form. So I've added a wiki to my site so I can make use of these considerations. I don't have to think much about the timeliness of my writings because a wiki tends to be oriented around topics rather than dates. Wikis also tend to encourage the growth of an article from a seed and, if they know where to find the updates feed, let the readers watch the growth. Blogs encourage the writer to plant fully fruited trees, and if they feel compelled to improve on earlier trees, they have to graft the branches on messily and hope the readers go back and notice. Wikis also tend to offer a few more pathways between trees via tools like "[[Special:WhatLinksHere/Blog_Introduction|What links here]]." Some people have interesting lives full of family members who say funny things or travels to unusual places. My life is pretty pedestrian. And since my ideas are what I really care about and my everyday experiences aren't, you'll probably find me posting much more to my wiki than my blog, which for now will mostly contain updates about what I've been posting to the wiki. [[Category:Site]] 5d7d3398ed403a5b7c83a485cc9cfef63200eca3 0 17 102 35 2014-05-07T04:24:30Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the Site category. wikitext text/x-wiki 3-20-2005 Here is a picture of me: <center>[[File:me2.png]]</center> Yeah, I wear dress clothes all the time because I’m too lazy to change when I get home. I bought the wall hanging from some Kenyan librarians my boss hosted when I worked at the college library. [[Category:Site]] 1134b9201cf6a8355b63ca8d32d43b2c431454d7 0 29 103 59 2014-05-07T04:29:55Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the Site category. Removed wiki-incompatible formatting from the contact info. Changed the numbered lists to bulleted. wikitext text/x-wiki Version 1.4, 7-29-06 Hello. Welcome to my website. It’s here as a repository for the things that I like, things I think, things I’ve written, collected, created, or experienced. === Content === What you will find here: essays of various sorts, random musings, reviews and commentaries, a weblog, collections of links and other things, reference materials, creative projects. I am interested in a lot of stuff. This means that I am almost never bored. Distraction is the more typical problem. It also means that there’s a lot to keep track of, so I’ve tried to keep things organized here. The difficulty is that most of my interests are interrelated and could fit into more than one category. So if the organization seems odd, that’s why. I also tend to use my terms broadly for the sake of cramming as much into the category as possible. My interests come and go in phases, so at various times some parts of the site will be updated a lot more than others. To give you a context for understanding what I post here, I’ve written introductions to most of the sections of the site. These explain basically how I got into the subject, my general take on it, and what my specific interests are. === Updates === My site will be updated very sporadically. To save yourself the trouble of checking my updates page all the time and being constantly disappointed, you can either reading my RSS feed or subscribing to my e-mail updates. If you’re into RSS (and why in the world wouldn’t you be?), you can get my blog’s RSS feed [http://www.thinkulum.net/blog/wp-rss2.php here]. I recommend [http://www.rssbandit.org/ RSS Bandit]. Alternatively, you can have my blog updates e-mailed to you by signing up here: E-mail: You’ll get a confirmation e-mail with a link to click, and then you’ll be subscribed. Don’t worry. I hate spam. Your e-mail address won’t be shared with anyone. If you want to contact me, you’ll have to wait till the bottom of the page to find out how. ;) === Title === What is a “thinkulum” anyway? Um, well, it’s a silly pun. According to Merriam-Webster, a vinculum is a “a straight horizontal mark placed over two or more members of a compound mathematical expression and equivalent to parentheses or brackets about them” or more generally, “a unifying bond.” In Star Trek, it’s the part of a Borg ship that connects the minds of all the drones on the ship and organizes their collective thoughts. The Thinkulum is a web space in which semi-organized and interconnected thoughts are collected in concrete forms. === Me === A little about myself, in bullet point fashion. ==== Circumstantial ==== * My name is Andy Culbertson. * I was born on March 7, 1978. * I have two parents, a brother, and a sister, who are both younger. * I am from Texas, but that is incidental. There is nothing Southern about me. * I am a Christian and a conservative one. However, I am not ignorant, intolerant, pushy, etc. * I have a BA in Christian Education and an MA in Biblical Studies, both from Wheaton College (IL). I don’t know what I want to do when I grow up, possibly teach philosophy. * For now I’m an editorial assistant and programmer at a Christian book packager. * Some thoughts on [http://www.thinkulum.net/blog/2005/06/26/the-current-shape-of-my-life/ the current shape of my life]. (added 7-17-05) ==== Essential ==== * I am a ponderer. I mostly live inside my head. I am very curious. I write a lot. * I am interested in people. I like to listen to them and understand them. I value close relationships, but I am fairly independent. * I am a pragmatic idealist. * I am a male. * I have a low-key, impish sense of humor. I love irony and absurdity. * I have a weird imagination. * I am a very [http://www.typelogic.com/intp.html INTP]-ish [http://www.typelogic.com/infj.html INFJ]. On the Enneagram I am a [http://www.eclecticenergies.com/enneagram/type5.php 5w4]-ish [http://www.eclecticenergies.com/enneagram/type9.php 9w1]. * [[A Picture of Me|A picture of me]]. ==== Favorites ==== * <span class="fav">Musical instruments</span>: Piano and French horn. I have played the piano most of my life. I played the French horn for seven years and soon will again because I now have money to buy one, thanks to my amazingly generous parents. * <span class="fav">Colors</span>: Green and blue. * <span class="fav">Fruits</span>: Grapes, oranges, and peaches. Drink Welch’s white grape peach juice. “It’s like a magic potion,” says my friend Jason. * <span class="fav">Animals</span>: Cats, dolphins, hamsters, hermit crabs, sloths. I’m sure I like others, too. My family has a big, fat cat named [http://www.xanga.com/home.aspx?user=KittieKrunchies Ariel] who really loves meowing. I call her Ariel the Blimp. * <span class="fav">Style of architecture</span>: Gothic is kind of neat. Minimalist, too. * <span class="fav">Types of clothing</span>: T-shirts and jeans, sweatsuits. * <span class="fav">Genre of literature</span>: Fantasy. * <span class="fav">Genres of visual art</span>: Landscapes, surrealism. * <span class="fav">Type of pen</span>: Gel or liquid ink. I really like Pilot G2s. * <span class="fav">Types of store</span>: Bookstores, office supply stores, computer stores. * <span class="fav">Types of weather</span>: Sunny and 75-80, dark and windy if it’s not cold, thunderstorms with lots of lightning if I’m inside. * <span class="fav">Time of day</span>: The middle of the night. * <span class="fav">Website</span>: [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Page Wikipedia]. I have three overarching goals in life: to understand the world, to help people, and to keep myself entertained. The result is what you find on this site. === Site History === This is the reincarnation of my old website. The site was born in 1996 at Geocities when I was a freshman in college, and it was called ''Andy’s Alcove''. It didn’t have very much on it. Then it went through five other versions, gaining and losing content, most of which was was school papers because it was easier than coming up with original material. In the meantime my ideas, interests, goals, and self-understanding became more and more defined, and this led to my wanting to take my site a lot more seriously. So I pulled things together (over about three years of distraction and procrastination), got paid web hosting, and changed the name to ''The Thinkulum'', and on March 20, 2005, a new site was born. The title of this layout is “Pages from My Notebook.” Anybody who knows me in person will probably understand it as a reference to my writing habits. I’m always walking around with a blue notebook that contains whatever notes I’m working on at the time. I call these my “thoughts pages.” I write my all my notes on letter-size, white scratch paper (reduce, reuse, and recycle!), which I fold into fourths because I like small writing surfaces, and I use the notebook as my desk. My writing is small and fairly orderly, which is the first thing everybody comments on, and I always use a blue gel ink pen because I like dark, smooth lines. Particular, ain’t I? Well, journaling is my hobby. These thoughts pages are the source of much of this site’s material, at least in spirit if not in content. === Tools === * The whole site is powered by [http://wordpress.org/ WordPress]. * For the parts that aren’t automatically generated, I attempt to code these pages in XHTML and CSS using the text editor [http://www.liquidninja.com/metapad/ Metapad]. * I check my links with [http://home.snafu.de/tilman/xenulink.html Xenu’s Link Sleuth]. * My webhost is [http://www.p4host.com/ P4HOST]. * The color scheme was determined using [http://www.colorschemer.com/online/ Color Schemer]. * I created the background by scanning part of my notebook and then cropping and sharpening it with [http://www.irfanview.com IrfanView]. The section headings are my handwriting. === Contact === I think of personal websites as conversation pieces, so talk to me if you have the inclination. * E-mail: [mailto:%74%61%72%61%6E%40%74%68%69%6E%6B%75%6C%75%6D%2E%6E%65%74 taran@thinkulum.net] * AIM: Andyroonee * Yahoo: [http://edit.yahoo.com/config/send_webmesg?.target=andyrooni&amp;.amp;src=pg andyrooni] * MSN: thinkulum@hotmail.com * [http://www.thinkulum.net/blog/2005/03/21/guestbook/#comments Guestbook] And that’s all for the intro. Enjoy! [[Category:Site]] bfa9945df73626a47625c7c358b052f635e3ef64 104 103 2014-05-07T04:32:42Z Andy Culbertson 1 Fixed some spacing and formatting. wikitext text/x-wiki Version 1.4, 7-29-06 Hello. Welcome to my website. It’s here as a repository for the things that I like, things I think, things I’ve written, collected, created, or experienced. === Content === What you will find here: essays of various sorts, random musings, reviews and commentaries, a weblog, collections of links and other things, reference materials, creative projects. I am interested in a lot of stuff. This means that I am almost never bored. Distraction is the more typical problem. It also means that there’s a lot to keep track of, so I’ve tried to keep things organized here. The difficulty is that most of my interests are interrelated and could fit into more than one category. So if the organization seems odd, that’s why. I also tend to use my terms broadly for the sake of cramming as much into the category as possible. My interests come and go in phases, so at various times some parts of the site will be updated a lot more than others. To give you a context for understanding what I post here, I’ve written introductions to most of the sections of the site. These explain basically how I got into the subject, my general take on it, and what my specific interests are. === Updates === My site will be updated very sporadically. To save yourself the trouble of checking my updates page all the time and being constantly disappointed, you can either reading my RSS feed or subscribing to my e-mail updates. If you’re into RSS (and why in the world wouldn’t you be?), you can get my blog’s RSS feed [http://www.thinkulum.net/blog/wp-rss2.php here]. I recommend [http://www.rssbandit.org/ RSS Bandit]. Alternatively, you can have my blog updates e-mailed to you by signing up here: E-mail: You’ll get a confirmation e-mail with a link to click, and then you’ll be subscribed. Don’t worry. I hate spam. Your e-mail address won’t be shared with anyone. If you want to contact me, you’ll have to wait till the bottom of the page to find out how. ;) === Title === What is a “thinkulum” anyway? Um, well, it’s a silly pun. According to Merriam-Webster, a vinculum is a “a straight horizontal mark placed over two or more members of a compound mathematical expression and equivalent to parentheses or brackets about them” or more generally, “a unifying bond.” In Star Trek, it’s the part of a Borg ship that connects the minds of all the drones on the ship and organizes their collective thoughts. The Thinkulum is a web space in which semi-organized and interconnected thoughts are collected in concrete forms. === Me === A little about myself, in bullet point fashion. ==== Circumstantial ==== * My name is Andy Culbertson. * I was born on March 7, 1978. * I have two parents, a brother, and a sister, who are both younger. * I am from Texas, but that is incidental. There is nothing Southern about me. * I am a Christian and a conservative one. However, I am not ignorant, intolerant, pushy, etc. * I have a BA in Christian Education and an MA in Biblical Studies, both from Wheaton College (IL). I don’t know what I want to do when I grow up, possibly teach philosophy. * For now I’m an editorial assistant and programmer at a Christian book packager. * Some thoughts on [http://www.thinkulum.net/blog/2005/06/26/the-current-shape-of-my-life/ the current shape of my life]. (added 7-17-05) ==== Essential ==== * I am a ponderer. I mostly live inside my head. I am very curious. I write a lot. * I am interested in people. I like to listen to them and understand them. I value close relationships, but I am fairly independent. * I am a pragmatic idealist. * I am a male. * I have a low-key, impish sense of humor. I love irony and absurdity. * I have a weird imagination. * I am a very [http://www.typelogic.com/intp.html INTP]-ish [http://www.typelogic.com/infj.html INFJ]. On the Enneagram I am a [http://www.eclecticenergies.com/enneagram/type5.php 5w4]-ish [http://www.eclecticenergies.com/enneagram/type9.php 9w1]. * [[A Picture of Me|A picture of me]]. ==== Favorites ==== * ''Musical instruments'': Piano and French horn. I have played the piano most of my life. I played the French horn for seven years and soon will again because I now have money to buy one, thanks to my amazingly generous parents. * ''Colors'': Green and blue. * ''Fruits'': Grapes, oranges, and peaches. Drink Welch’s white grape peach juice. “It’s like a magic potion,” says my friend Jason. * ''Animals'': Cats, dolphins, hamsters, hermit crabs, sloths. I’m sure I like others, too. My family has a big, fat cat named [http://www.xanga.com/home.aspx?user=KittieKrunchies Ariel] who really loves meowing. I call her Ariel the Blimp. * ''Style of architecture'': Gothic is kind of neat. Minimalist, too. * ''Types of clothing'': T-shirts and jeans, sweatsuits. * ''Genre of literature'': Fantasy. * ''Genres of visual art'': Landscapes, surrealism. * ''Type of pen'': Gel or liquid ink. I really like Pilot G2s. * ''Types of store'': Bookstores, office supply stores, computer stores. * ''Types of weather'': Sunny and 75-80, dark and windy if it’s not cold, thunderstorms with lots of lightning if I’m inside. * ''Time of day'': The middle of the night. * ''Website'': [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Page Wikipedia]. I have three overarching goals in life: to understand the world, to help people, and to keep myself entertained. The result is what you find on this site. === Site History === This is the reincarnation of my old website. The site was born in 1996 at Geocities when I was a freshman in college, and it was called ''Andy’s Alcove''. It didn’t have very much on it. Then it went through five other versions, gaining and losing content, most of which was was school papers because it was easier than coming up with original material. In the meantime my ideas, interests, goals, and self-understanding became more and more defined, and this led to my wanting to take my site a lot more seriously. So I pulled things together (over about three years of distraction and procrastination), got paid web hosting, and changed the name to ''The Thinkulum'', and on March 20, 2005, a new site was born. The title of this layout is “Pages from My Notebook.” Anybody who knows me in person will probably understand it as a reference to my writing habits. I’m always walking around with a blue notebook that contains whatever notes I’m working on at the time. I call these my “thoughts pages.” I write my all my notes on letter-size, white scratch paper (reduce, reuse, and recycle!), which I fold into fourths because I like small writing surfaces, and I use the notebook as my desk. My writing is small and fairly orderly, which is the first thing everybody comments on, and I always use a blue gel ink pen because I like dark, smooth lines. Particular, ain’t I? Well, journaling is my hobby. These thoughts pages are the source of much of this site’s material, at least in spirit if not in content. === Tools === * The whole site is powered by [http://wordpress.org/ WordPress]. * For the parts that aren’t automatically generated, I attempt to code these pages in XHTML and CSS using the text editor [http://www.liquidninja.com/metapad/ Metapad]. * I check my links with [http://home.snafu.de/tilman/xenulink.html Xenu’s Link Sleuth]. * My webhost is [http://www.p4host.com/ P4HOST]. * The color scheme was determined using [http://www.colorschemer.com/online/ Color Schemer]. * I created the background by scanning part of my notebook and then cropping and sharpening it with [http://www.irfanview.com IrfanView]. The section headings are my handwriting. === Contact === I think of personal websites as conversation pieces, so talk to me if you have the inclination. * E-mail: [mailto:%74%61%72%61%6E%40%74%68%69%6E%6B%75%6C%75%6D%2E%6E%65%74 taran@thinkulum.net] * AIM: Andyroonee * Yahoo: [http://edit.yahoo.com/config/send_webmesg?.target=andyrooni&amp;.amp;src=pg andyrooni] * MSN: thinkulum@hotmail.com * [http://www.thinkulum.net/blog/2005/03/21/guestbook/#comments Guestbook] And that’s all for the intro. Enjoy! [[Category:Site]] 18cc4953b43f93376fe50aeed99e1f8bb950966b 0 46 105 93 2014-05-07T04:38:52Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the Religion category. wikitext text/x-wiki === Links === # [http://maps.google.com/maps/ms?msa=0&amp;msid=111762791336614627847.0004387a4fbb10bd55916 The Map] # [[Recommended Preachers Online|Explanation]] === The List === {| class="wikitable sortable toptextcells" |- ! Church ! Pastor(s) ! City ! State ! Notes |- | [http://www.ebcathens.com/ Emmanuel Baptist Church] | David Carpenter | Athens | AL | |- | [http://www.shadesmountain.org/ Shades Mountain Bible Church] | Ron Gannett | Birmingham | AL | |- | [http://www.stpetersbhm.org/ St. Peter’s Anglican Church] | John D. Richardson | Birmingham | AL | I really placemarked this because Lyle Dorsett sometimes preaches. |- | [http://www.twickenham.org/ Twickenham Church of Christ] | Brad Cox | Huntsville | AL | |- | [http://www.freepres.org/church.asp?trinity Trinity Free Presbyterian Church] | Myron Mooney | Trinity | AL | |- | [http://www.trinitychurchonline.org/ Trinity Church] | Ian Cron | Greenwich | CT | |- | [http://www.saint-peters.net/ St. Peter’s Anglican Church] | Eric Dudley | Tallahassee | FL | |- | [http://www.ctkfoxvalley.org/ Christ the King Church] | Ken Carr | Batavia | IL | |- | [http://www.allsaintsorthodox.org/ All Saints Antiochian Orthodox Church] ([http://ancientfaithradio.com/specials/allsaints/ Audio]) | Patrick Henry Reardon | Chicago | IL | |- | [http://www.chicagochurch.org/ Chicago Church of Christ – Chicago Ministry Center] | Jeff Balsom, Todd Fink, Randy Harris, Jim Lefler | Chicago | IL | |- | [http://covenantchicago.org/ Covenant Presbyterian Church of Chicago] | Aaron Baker | Chicago | IL | |- | [http://www.edgebapt.com/ Edgewater Baptist Church] | Jim Shedd | Chicago | IL | |- | [http://www.firstbaptist-chicago.org/ First Baptist Church of Chicago] ([http://www.fbcpreacher.com/ Audio]) | Jesse M. Brown | Chicago | IL | |- | [http://www.moodychurch.org/ The Moody Church] | Erwin Lutzer | Chicago | IL | |- | [http://www.churchrez.org/ Church of the Resurrection] | Stewart E. Ruch, III | Glen Ellyn | IL | |- | [http://www.gcvalley.org/ Grace Church of the Valley] | Clark Richardson, Mike Hill, Jerry Kennell | North Aurora | IL | |- | [http://www.kishwaukeebiblechurch.org/ Kishwaukee Bible Church] | Frank Yonke, Steve Leston, Ron Spiotta | Sycamore | IL | |- | [http://www.friendsofthesavior.org/ Church of the Savior] | Bill Richardson | West Chicago | IL | |- | [http://www.blanchardalliance.org/ Blanchard Alliance Church – Wheaton] | John Casey | Wheaton | IL | |- | [http://www.hopeingod.org/ Bethlehem Baptist Church] | John Piper | Minneapolis | MN | |- | [http://www.whchurch.org/ Woodland Hills Church] | Greg Boyd | St. Paul | MN | Okay, yes, he’s an [http://www.theopedia.com/Open_theism Open View] theologian. But other than that he’s really good! |- | [http://www.parksidechurch.com/ Parkside Church] | Alistair Begg | Chagrin Falls | OH | |- | [http://www.salemalliance.com/ Salem Alliance Church] | John Stumbo | Salem | OR | |- | [http://www.pcpc.org/ Park Cities Presbyterian Church] | Joseph “Skip” Ryan (formerly) | Dallas | TX | |- | [http://www.stonebriar.org/ Stonebriar Community Church] ([http://www.insight.org/ Audio]) | Chuck Swindoll | Frisco | TX | |- | [http://www.christchurchplano.org/ Christ Church Plano] | David H. Roseberry | Plano | TX | |- | [http://advancedministry.com/sites/index.cfm?i=1148 Bethany Community Church] | Richard Dahlstrom | Seattle | WA | |- | [http://www.jesusfellowshipofbelievers.com/ Jesus Fellowship of Believers] | Tim Dodson | Menomonie | WI | |- | [http://www.immanuelwestbend.org/ Immanuel Church] | Rich Vincent | West Bend | WI | |} [[Category:Religion]] 26adea448b72da3ec9e8e3e7ba3139c5884e07b4 0 42 106 85 2014-05-07T04:39:41Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the Religion category. wikitext text/x-wiki Version 1.0, 6-6-06 === [[On Being an Agnostic Christian#Introduction|Introduction]] === The [[On Being an Agnostic Christian|original version]] of this essay is very long, which I know is a barrier to reading it. So here’s a shorter version. The structure of this essay mostly follows the structure of the longer one, so if you want more explanation on a point I raise here, see the same section in the original. The section headings link to the same sections in the longer version. Also note that there are a few extra sections in the original that I had to cut out. I describe myself as an agnostic Christian because I’m uncertain about many aspects of my faith, yet I still consider myself a Christian. My doubts throw the future of my beliefs into question, but my hope is to stay a Christian and to grow in my faith. I wrote this essay to give myself a clear starting point for future study and for interacting with other people on my spiritual state. === [[On Being an Agnostic Christian#My_epistemic_situation|My epistemic situation]] === Basically, I am struggling to understand Christianity deeply while wrestling with issues of intellectual responsibility in the religious realm. I am an evangelical Christian, and I like being one and want to grow in my faith. But I see that the reasons I have right now for being a Christian aren’t entirely solid, and when I ask myself how reasonable (or livable) Christianity seems to me, the answers are discouraging. So I feel the need to step back and examine, as fairly as I can, the epistemic strengths and weaknesses of both evangelical Christianity and the alternative theologies and worldviews, so that I can come as close as possible to the best explanation for the world and human experience. My feelings of loyalty to evangelical Christianity and my tendency to see all viewpoints as equally plausible could get in the way of this search, although if Christianity is true, my loyalty to reason could get in the way of my loyalty to Christianity. This is a conflict I call the loyalty-truth tension. Balancing those possibilities is a challenge. Theology, apologetics, and spirituality are three major areas of Christian thought, and uncertainties can exist in all three. === [[On Being an Agnostic Christian#Theology|Theology]] === ==== [[On Being an Agnostic Christian#The_problem.E2.80.94the_too-fertile_field_of_possibility|The problem—the too-fertile field of possibility]] ==== Theological questions have to do with the details of Christian belief. Christians disagree with each other about almost every theological question. So which views are the right ones? Overall, I’m willing to affirm the core beliefs of Christianity, but beyond those any choice seems arbitrary without more study than I’ve done so far. I do have theological [[My Current Theology|default positions]], derived from my upbringing and my own dabblings, and some of them I feel rather strongly about. But I’m very aware that with more study, I might change my mind about them. I might even side with the heretics on some issues, though I doubt it. Sometimes I think that if I studied the Bible more extensively, I would arrive at satisfying conclusions, that the answers are ''there'' if you just think carefully enough. But sometimes (more often these days, I’m afraid) I think the answers just can’t be known. ==== [[On Being an Agnostic Christian#Effects.E2.80.94avoidance_and_restraint|Effects—avoidance and restraint]] ==== My thoughts on these questions are undecided enough that I tend not to think or talk about theology much. I almost think discussing theology is a waste of time, at least for me at this point in my life. To make any real headway I’d need to work out my hermeneutic and other issues of theological method. The same hesitancy goes for living by these beliefs, which is where theology intersects with spirituality. I’m reluctant to pursue actions very enthusiastically when they are based on a belief with so much uncertainty behind it. So I generally don’t, and my spiritual life is correspondingly weak. === [[On Being an Agnostic Christian#Apologetics|Apologetics]] === ==== [[On Being an Agnostic Christian#Overarching_themes.E2.80.94abduction.2C_naturalism.2C_and_the_varieties_of_doubt|Overarching themes—abduction, naturalism, and the varieties of doubt]] ==== Apologetic questions have to do with the foundational tenets of Christianity and whether Christianity as a whole is true. For me, the main competitor to the Christian explanation of the world is the naturalistic one. I tend to look at life from both of these perspectives in an inner dialog, though for now I ultimately side with Christianity, if only because it’s a safer bet. Some of my doubts have more to do (for now) with the strength of the arguments we have for certain beliefs than with the beliefs themselves. The beliefs I have in mind are the basic formal doctrines of Christianity. You could say I’m a ''de facto'' fideist on these central points. But I do want to investigate them rationally, so I can only hope that a good case can be made for them. However, some of my doubts have become more entrenched. Where my faith primarily falters is at the inspiration of the Bible, which I’ll explain in more detail below. ==== [[On Being an Agnostic Christian#Revelation.E2.80.94the_central_conflict|Revelation—the central conflict]] ==== One of the central Christian tenets is that the Bible is God’s Word. If the Bible is divinely inspired in some sense, then it would obviously be wrong to treat it as merely human. But how can we tell the difference between a divinely inspired book and a merely human book? And how can we tell that the Bible is of the divinely inspired kind? If we acknowledge that the Bible was inspired, what does that mean? One more liberal option is that the Bible writers were only indirectly inspired. They were simply theologians trying their best to interpret the awesome events they had witnessed, and God’s revelation was in the events rather than in the writing. It’s a possibility I’m considering. Even though this doubt about inspiration is more persistent than many of my others, I’m not usually thinking all this when I actually read the Bible. I tend to read it as if it’s God’s Word. I assume that the writers at least knew what they were talking about, even if I don’t. ==== [[On Being an Agnostic Christian#The_persisting_converse.E2.80.94tenacity_and_apologetic_potential|The persisting converse—tenacity and apologetic potential]] ==== These questions don’t mean I’m about to plunge into atheism. At this early stage in my search, that would be premature. This tenacity is part of my approach to managing the loyalty-truth tension. If the thing you’re loyal to is true after all, then you can miss that fact if you abandon it at the first sign of trouble. And in any case, I don’t see Christian apologetics as completely devoid of promise. The fine-tuning argument for God’s existence still appeals to me. Jesus’ resurrection is supported by some interesting arguments. Conservative scholars’ arguments for the Bible’s historical reliability usually impress me, and so do the insights of contemporary Christian philosophers of religion. And believers have some striking stories about their experiences of God that I’d like to explore and examine. === [[On Being an Agnostic Christian#Spirituality|Spirituality]] === Spiritual questions have to do with the spiritual realities that relate to our own time and place—current events in the spiritual realm, you could say—as well as how theological truths should be lived out in general. In the realm of spirituality, my uncertainties seem to exist in layers. ==== [[On Being an Agnostic Christian#Spirituality_itself.E2.80.94the_mystery_of_meaning_and_the_perplexities_of_practice|Spirituality itself—the mystery of meaning and the perplexities of practice]] ==== My problems begin with the fact that, for various reasons, the evangelical system of spirituality has never worked very well for me. For one thing, I’ve rarely been able to engage in spiritual practices like prayer and Bible reading in a way that was meaningful to me, and as I see it, meaning is a prerequisite for their effectiveness. The world of the Bible seems remote, so I have trouble connecting with it; and many Christian practices and messages have never quite made sense to me. A second reason evangelical spirituality hasn’t worked well for me is that some of its directives seem unworkable. They’re at least outside my realm of experience. Here I’m thinking mainly of the idea of a conversational relationship with God. Then there’s the sheer difficulty of the highest Christian principles. Christianity entails a very different way of life from the one that comes naturally. It’s really ''hard'' to trust God completely. It takes a lot of courage to be willing to sacrifice everything for someone else’s good. A common theme in most of my difficulties is the fact that God is a very unusual person, so unusual that he’s hard to relate to. Unlike the human beings we normally interact with, he is invisible, inaudible, and intangible, and for the most part we must relate to him indirectly through the Bible and perhaps other people and the natural world. ==== [[On Being an Agnostic Christian#Spirituality_and_theology.E2.80.94an_unfinished_puzzle|Spirituality and theology—an unfinished puzzle]] ==== A second layer that makes resolving the first one more difficult is my state of theological uncertainty. I don’t seem to understand God well enough to know what he might be thinking, feeling, and doing in response to me and my circumstances, which is important for knowing how to respond to him. But even when I know that and I’m not encumbered by obviously sinful attitudes and motivations, it can be easy to get confused. There are a lot of pieces in the Christian life to keep track of. As I see it, the Christian life is like a complex skill that is foreign to us at first and has to be learned through practice. In many ways I’m still at a beginning, uncoordinated stage, and I don’t even have a clear picture of how all the pieces fit together. ==== [[On Being an Agnostic Christian#Spirituality_and_apologetics.E2.80.94the_inspiration_of_the_Bible_and_the_interpretation_of_experience|Spirituality and apologetics—the inspiration of the Bible and the interpretation of experience]] ==== Then while all that is going on, in float my apologetic doubts. The difficulty comes from two angles. The first is the inspiration of the Bible, which I covered in the apologetics section above. It’s hard for me to worship God on the basis of what goes on in the spiritual realm or God’s agenda in history when I find myself wondering how the Bible writers could know those things. The second angle is the nature of the spiritual. Since it’s invisible, inaudible, and intangible, I sometimes wonder if it’s even there. Christians often describe the inner and outer events of their lives in terms of divine action. But sometimes I wonder, couldn’t it be that coincidences sometimes just happen, and people then find meaning in them that isn’t there? And how do we know that the psychological changes Christians report can’t be explained as merely psychological rather than supernatural? ==== [[On Being an Agnostic Christian#Effects.E2.80.94inertia.2C_isolation.2C_and_laissez-faire_evangelism|Effects—inertia, isolation, and laissez-faire evangelism]] ==== The result of all this is that I haven’t seen much spiritual growth in my life. I’m a decently good person, but I don’t see much that’s specifically Christian about the ways that I’ve grown over the years. These uncertainties and deficiencies also make fellowship with the Christian community difficult. People make statements about how God works in our lives or some other spiritual topic, and sometimes I can simply accept what they’re saying, but often I think, ''Well, maybe''. In those cases I can’t really share in their feelings of inspiration or add to them with insights or experiences of my own. My uncertainties in spirituality, along with those in theology and apologetics, also make it difficult to recommend Christianity to others, simply because I’m not quite sure what I’m offering, why they should believe it, what it’s supposed to do for them, or what they should do once they have it! ==== [[On Being an Agnostic Christian#The_persisting_converse.E2.80.94vestigial_spirituality_and_Christianity.E2.80.99s_merit|The persisting converse—vestigial spirituality and Christianity’s merit]] ==== Despite my confusion and doubt, I do still have my own, limited sense of spirituality. I am sometimes able, in the moment, to forget about my doubts and engage Christianity with the thin film of understanding that I have of its significance for my life. I still talk to God as if he is listening. I try to stay grateful for what I have and the good things that happen. I still participate in worship. Overall I do want to follow Jesus. And I still think that as a philosophy of life, Christianity in some forms has a lot to recommend itself. Among other things, it amplifies and transforms human experience by relating that experience to a transcendent personal being. So a desire for safety becomes a trust in God’s providence. A need for personal purity and for harmony with others becomes a need for divine grace and reconciliation with God and his family. A fear of death becomes a hope in eternal life—and not a disembodied spiritual existence, but a full-fledged life lived out in immortal bodies and in direct, unhindered fellowship with God. And this hope isn’t based on mere speculation but on an event in history—the resurrection of Jesus himself. It sounds great. Now I just have to figure out what it means, if it’s true, and how it all works out in practice! === [[On Being an Agnostic Christian#The_way_forward|The way forward]] === Since I still consider these questions vitally important and there’s still so much I don’t know, there’s really nothing else to do but to pick up the search again. For now I plan to concentrate on the topics that are the most uniquely Christian and the most fundamental to investigating worldviews and Christianity in particular. That means I’ll be looking at the issues surrounding the authority of the Bible and probably the church, the life and teachings of Jesus, the resurrection, miracles, some of the theistic and atheistic arguments, religious pluralism, and the nature of religious knowledge. And I’ll explore Christian spiritual formation. Even though my faith has been eroded and dispirited, I still think Christianity holds some promise, and I consider it the richest and most noble thing around, so I want to give it the best chance I can. I might not stay an inerrantist. I might not even stay an evangelical, though that would be nice. But I hope my investigations will allow me to remain within Christianity for as long as possible, which of course, in the Christian scheme of things, is forever. [http://www.thinkulum.net/blog/category/obac/ Blog entries related to this essay] [[Category:Religion]] 4684705847bc9beac1e890aa68ba0d0b0768764d 0 40 107 81 2014-05-07T04:40:09Z Andy Culbertson 1 Fixed some spacing. Added the Religion category. wikitext text/x-wiki Version 1.0, 7-17-05 Here are some of my current theological positions. This outline comes from a book by Gregory Boyd and Paul Eddy called ''Across the Spectrum: Understanding Issues in Evangelical Theology'' and the online appendix to it ([http://www.gregboyd.org/ www.gregboyd.org]; see the “Books and Essays” section). I’ve rearranged the issues to follow the traditional categories of systematic theology. My purpose in writing this is to give theologically-minded people a quick overview of my distinctive beliefs. Thus I’m assuming you already know what most of these terms mean or where to find out, and I’m not covering the standard details that all Christians or all evangelicals believe. Even though I consider this my theology, most of these positions don’t have the status of a full belief. They’re more like unsettled opinions. I arrived at them either by upbringing or by a minimal to moderate amount of investigation or simply by subjective preference. They will all be up for review at some time in the future. Broadly speaking, I classify myself as an evangelical Protestant. More specifically, I’m a Reformed Baptist. That label ties together a number of views that are scattered throughout this list. === Prolegomena === ==== Theological method ==== # Deriving propositional truth from scripture (the traditional model) # Understanding the Bible’s story through the lens of modern-day culture (the postfoundationalist model) The traditional model. ==== Inspiration ==== # Without error of any kind (the inerrantist view) # Infallible in matters of faith and practice (the infallibilist view) Hmm, toughie. I’ve always believed in inerrancy, but now I believe the biblical writers held the same basic cosmology as their Ancient Near East neighbors, which might put me in the infallibilist camp, unless that’s considered accommodation. Whether there are actual errors in the Bible, wellll, I’ll say no, for now … === Theology proper === ==== Models of the Trinity ==== # The Trinity is analogous to the unity and diversity of the human self (the psychological model) # The Trinity is analogous to the unity of three people (the social model) The psychological model, but only because I find it intriguing. ==== Providence ==== # God is sovereign over all things (the Calvinist view) # God limits his control by granting freedom (the Arminian view) The Calvinist view. ==== Foreknowledge ==== # God foreknows all that shall come to pass (the classical view) # God knows all that shall be and all that may be (the open view) The classical view. ==== Genesis ==== # Created in the recent past (the young earth view) # A very old work of art (the day-age view) # Restoring a destroyed creation (the restoration view) # Literary theme over literal chronology (the literary framework view) The literary framework view, but if I had to pick something chronological, it would be the day-age view. ==== Noah’s flood ==== # Global (the traditional view) # Local This is really more of a biblical studies question, but since it’s in the book I’ll answer it anyway. I don’t know. I’ve always believed the global view, but the local view people have the kinds of arguments that convince me nowadays. Does it really matter? I would like to add one here that was not in Boyd and Eddy’s book, but it’s a fairly significant topic and goes along with my Reformed Baptist views: ==== Redemptive history ==== # Israel and the church are separate entities, and so are the Mosaic and new covenants (Dispensationalism). # Israel and the church are the same entity, but the Mosaic and new covenants are separate (New Covenant Theology). # Israel and the church are the same entity, and so are the Mosaic and new covenants (Covenant Theology). New Covenant Theology. It provides a good framework for the Baptist views on baptism and the Sabbath while not forcing us to be ridiculous about Israel and the church. (heh heh) ==== Christian demonization ==== # Christians cannot be possessed by demons # Christians can be possessed by demons I would say cannot, but really I have no idea. Kind of a random topic. === Anthropology === ==== The divine image ==== # The image of God is the soul (the substantival view) # The image of God is our God-given authority (the functional view) # The image of God is our relationality (the relational view) All of the above. Why in the world would you need to limit it to any of those? ==== The human constitution ==== # The twofold self: body and soul (the dichotomist view) # The threefold self: body, soul, and spirit (the trichotomist view) # The unitary self (the monistic view) Dichotomist. === Christology === ==== The Incarnation ==== # The unavoidable paradox of the God-man (the classical view) # Christ relinquished his divine prerogatives (the kenotic view) The classical view. === Soteriology === ==== The atonement ==== # Christ died in our place (the penal substitution view) # Christ destroyed Satan and his works (the Christus Victor view) # Christ displayed God’s wrath against sin (the moral government view) Penal substitution as a basis for Christus Victor, but moral government is an interesting possibility. ==== Salvation ==== # TULIP (the Calvinist view) # God wants all to be saved (the Arminian view) TULIP. ==== Santification ==== # Santification as a declaration by God (the Lutheran view) # Santification as holiness in christ and in personal conduct (the Reformed [Calvinist] view) # Santification as resting-faith in the sufficiency of christ (the Keswick “deeper life” view) # Entire sanctification as perfect love (the Wesleyan view) The differences among these seem very subtle to me, so it’s hard to choose. I suppose I’ll go with the Reformed view for now, since I’m Reformed in general and I don’t see why sanctification shouldn’t require hard work. ==== Baptism in the Holy Spirit ==== # People are baptized with the Spirit when they believe (the classical Protestant view) # The baptism of the Holy Spirit occurs subsequent to salvation (the subsequent Spirit baptism view) Classical Protestant. ==== Speaking in tongues ==== # Speaking in tongues is evidence that a person is filled with the Holy Spirit (the Pentecostal view [the initial evidence doctrine]) # Some people may be given the gift of speaking in tongues and others not (non-Pentecostal view) Non-Pentecostal. ==== Eternal security ==== # Secure in the power of God (the eternal security view) # The need to persist in faith (the conditional security view) Eternal security. ==== The destiny of the unevangelized ==== # No other name (the restrictivist view) # God does all he can do (the universal opportunity view) # Hope beyond the grave (the postmortem evangelism view) # He has not left himself without a witness (the inclusivist view) Restrictivist, but universal opportunity appeals to me. ==== Infant death ==== # Babies who die automatically go to heaven (the age of accountability view) # Baptized babies go to heaven; all others go to hell (the Augustinian view) # It depends on the faith or unbelief of their parents (a medieval and Reformed view) # Elect babies are predestined to salvation; nonelect babies are not (another Reformed [Westminster Confession] view) # Babies mature in the afterlife and then choose (the postmortem evangelism view) I have no idea, unfortunately. === Ecclesiology === ==== Baptism ==== # Baptism and Christian discipleship (the believer’s baptism view) # Covenanting with the community of God (the infant baptism view) Believer’s baptism. ==== The Lord’s Supper ==== # “This is my body” (the spiritual presence view) # “In remembrance of me” (the memorial view) Memorial. ==== The charismatic gifts ==== # The gifts are for today (the continuationist view) # “Tongues shall cease” (the cessationist view) Continuationist. (You were going to guess cessationist, admit it!) But I personally don’t exercise any charismatic gifts, and I don’t really fit in with the charismatic culture, although I find it interesting. ==== Women in ministry ==== # Created equal, with complementary roles (the complementarian view) # The irrelevance of gender for spiritual authority (the egalitarian view) Another toughie. My personality is very democratic, so I lean heavily toward the egalitarian view, but I’m uncomfortable with female head pastors. ==== Submission in marriage ==== # Wives must submit to their husbands (the complementarian view) # Gender-based authority was only cultural (the egalitarian view) As with the previous one, I want to say egalitarian, but I couldn’t prove it. ==== Christians and politics ==== # The church must transform and ultimately control politics (the transformational [Calvinist] model) # Christians should be wary of involving themselves in politics (the oppositional [anabaptist] model) # God works through the secular government and the church for different purposes (the two-kingdoms [Lutheran] model) I actually lean toward the Lutheran model, for no particular reason. === Eschatology === ==== Hell ==== # The unending torment of the wicked (the classical view) # The wicked shall be no more (the annihilationist view) The classical view, but annihilationism would be nice. ==== The book of Revelation ==== # The events spoken of in Revelation were all specifically fulfilled in the first century (the preterist view) # Revelation is a heavily symbolic dramatization of the ongoing battle between God and evil (the idealist view) # Almost all of Revelation records events that will take place at the end of time (the futurist view) # Revelation records the gradual unfolding of God’s plan for history up to the present (the historicist [Reformation] view) Preterist. ==== The millennium ==== # Raptured before the reign (the premillennial view) # Working toward and waiting for a coming reign of peace (the postmillennial view) # The symbolic thousand-year conquest of Satan (the amillennial view) Amillennial. ==== The rapture ==== # Christ will remove the church before the tribulation (the pre-tribulation view) # Christ will return once, after the tribulation (the post-tribulation view) Neither, since I’m amillennial, but if I had to pick one, it would be post-trib. [[Category:Religion]] f1634d906a3a7e7449912bd113a48a4f656fc8ef 0 26 108 53 2014-05-07T04:40:29Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the Religion category. wikitext text/x-wiki Version 1.0, 3-20-05 Evangelism is a controversial topic these days. Not everyone thinks we should do it. It tends to offend people who are of a pluralist persuasion or a private nature. When I was young, around junior high, I didn’t know any of that. I was just discovering how significant my Christian faith was to me, and I had a hefty sense of mission for someone my age. I wasn’t preaching on street corners, but I did make “projects” out of several of my non-Christian friends, and I tried to persuade other Christians to make evangelism a habit as well. I was even working on a book (which fell by the wayside once I got into apologetics). It was going to be a ''Complete Guide to Soul-Winning'', and I spent hours and hours compiling notes from other books on the subject. I was a devoted kid. It all seemed so simple in the beginning. Just show unbelievers the Roman Road or the Four Spiritual Laws, maybe make an appeal to their emotional turmoil, lead them in the prayer, and they’d rush right into the fold. And if they were skeptics or followers of other religions, well, it seemed simple enough to prove them wrong and guide them to the truth. Only it didn’t work out that way. I had three fairly quick converts, but I wasn’t very good at follow-up, so I don’t know how they turned out or even if their conversions were genuine. The others just wouldn’t be persuaded. I talked to some of them for years, and at least one of them got fed up with my attempts. Fortunately she didn’t give up on my friendship as well. Evangelism was just getting more and more complicated, and gradually it faded into the background because I had a growing sense that I didn’t know what I was doing. It was still important; it had just moved itself from the list of “ways I direct my activities” to the list of “life problems to solve.” The more I explored the issue, the more complications I found. I didn’t know how to introduce the Gospel into my conversations. I didn’t know how to connect the Gospel effectively to people’s lives. I wasn’t even sure what the Gospel included. Is the Gospel about justification only or also things like physical healing? And how do faith and works fit together anyway? People have answers to these questions, of course, but these people don’t all agree, and a lot of their solutions seem unsatisfactory to me anyway. To put it another way, I think of evangelism as a great World-Saving Machine, kind of like a tank, sitting in a clearing in the middle of a forest. Now, I ''would'' hop in the driver’s seat and barrel across the countryside, using the machine’s magic to scatter people’s delusions and pull their lives together … only the machine seems to be broken. In fact, it’s ''very'' broken. Some of the parts are missing, there’s very little fuel, vines are growing all over it. This thing isn’t going ''anywhere''. Now, to judge from the stories, other people’s World-Saving Machines are humming along just fine … or at least certain other people’s. I suspect I’m not the only one scratching his head. So I’m in a muddle. Now, I do have a few definite opinions. If the Bible is true (as I believe it is), then evangelism is important. The most obvious reason is that the majority of the human race is lost and on its way to hell, to put it bluntly. This is not a flattering view of humanity, and maybe that’s behind a lot of people’s objections to the practice. But if you’re a Christian and you can get yourself to view things so starkly, evangelism becomes a frantic rescue mission. The panic involved is tempered by other considerations, such as the gentleness and patience of God, but the urgency is still there in the background. But while impending doom is a persuasive factor for me, at a more fundamental level I am driven to do evangelism (or at this point, just to figure it out) simply because to me, conversion is a part of one’s personal growth. Human beings were created to be like God, to embody his character, and in our current state that is impossible. Being recreated by Christ is the crucial ingredient, and that involves conversion, and that involves evangelism. I am interested in the whole process of becoming like Christ, from the initial unbelief and first contact with the Gospel, to the point of belief, to the process of sanctification after. I want to know how that journey works and how I can be involved in it, both for myself and for other people. It’s a large part of what drives my life. So evangelism is a big deal to me. As I said before, evangelism is controversial. I’m interested in the controversies, too. How can evangelism be a justifiable activity in today’s enlightened, pluralistic culture? Are there “anonymous Christians,” or must people believe in Jesus ''by name'' to be saved? And if there are such people, is evangelism really that urgent? I think of evangelism as sort of a meta-issue or an organizing principle. It has its own issues to be worked through, but I think some of the major difficulties will be cleared up as I deal with other issues, especially apologetics and spiritual formation. It ties together many aspects of Christianity nicely, which makes evangelism itself a good spiritual discipline. Evangelism isn’t the ''end goal'' of being a Christian, but it is a significant piece. [[Category:Religion]] 490d52d10b7840b567207a601e572ccd891eb6cc 0 23 109 47 2014-05-07T04:40:44Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the Religion category. wikitext text/x-wiki Version 1.0, 3-20-05 Ever since I was about ten, religion has been overall the most important thing in my life. I had grown up with Christianity all around me, and I was baptized at seven, but ten was the year that religion somehow became magnetic north to me. Some people, when they say, “Religion is the most important thing in my life,” mean something like, “I am totally in love with Jesus, and I would do anything for him.” When I say it, I mean just that I can’t avoid taking it seriously. Sometimes that has meant I’m excited about Jesus, and sometimes it’s meant he utterly baffles me, but it always means that I see religious issues as the fundamental issues in life and that they are something I have to deal with in whatever way seems necessary at the time. Thus, the prominent position of this section on this site. Over the years, my interest in Christian things has settled into five main areas: evangelism, apologetics, spirituality, theology, and hermeneutics. Here’s the quick run-through. You can read the subsection intros for more. I think I was a miniature [[Evangelism Introduction|evangelist]] even in elementary school, in my low key way, but in junior high that phase really kicked in. And since I was trying to evangelize my skeptical friends, evangelism led into [[Apologetics Introduction|apologetics]]. Apologetics was very distracting, and in the process of studying God, I forgot about ''talking'' to him, which led me into a vexing spiritual dry spell. Not to fear, however, for I had a spiritual reawakening at the end of high school and became super-enthusiastic about spiritual growth and the idea of a personal, conversational relationship with God. This was also when I began my habit of journaling. Then I went off to Wheaton College and entered The Crisis, which you can read about in the [[Spirituality Introduction|spirituality intro]]. It basically involved hearing opposing accounts from two different Christian groups of how Christianity is supposed to be lived. The effect of this crisis was to teach me that the world is more complicated than I thought and that I really didn’t know how to be the kind of Christian I wanted to be. It also reaffirmed for me that if you want something done right, you have to do it yourself. I was confused, and no one I talked to had answers that satisfied me, so I concluded I had to find my own. During this time my journal developed into my more organized “thoughts pages” as part of this effort. Other things happened at Wheaton. For one thing, I began working through my [[Theology Introduction|theology]]. This came partly as a result of discovering Reformed theology my freshman year. I was also involved in an Internet evangelism ministry, which kept evangelistic issues churning in my mind. And working at the Billy Graham Center library gave me exposure to various evangelism and missions movements. My church was another influence, of course. Teaching Sunday school there made me aware of ministry issues, as did watching the church dissolve. The process of sorting through my questions was aided by grad school. I did my masters at Wheaton in biblical exegesis, and it fed my latent interest in [[Hermeneutics Introduction|hermeneutics]], which is the theory of interpretation. And as is usual in higher education, I learned a lot but came out with even more questions than I had going in. My last year of grad school, all of these puzzles and others convinced me that it was time to work on my critical thinking and research skills. (Most of that project will appear in the [[Philosophy|philosophy]] section.) One side effect of this decision was to bring apologetics back to my attention, this time as much for myself as for anyone else. In my quest to figure out the world, Christianity certainly gives me the most to think about. It even infiltrates my other subjects of interest. I like to integrate ideas anyway, but Christianity is a special case. I see it as a basic perspective from which to look at everything in life. So there are Christian views of art, money, politics, work, play, computers, and pretty much anything else you can think of. Similarly, there are Christian uses for all these things; and conversely, insights from other areas can inform our understanding of Christianity. I didn’t come up with this idea of integrating Christianity with the rest of life, but it’s one that to me just seems right. [[Category:Religion]] 9a2802952a6285363aa9374bf0d7be407b7e8c31 0 20 110 41 2014-05-07T04:40:59Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the Religion category. wikitext text/x-wiki Version 1.0, 3-20-05 Apologetics came to my attention very early as a part of my attempt to be comprehensive in evangelism. I wanted to know how to evangelize ''everyone''; and if I got right down to basics and found out how to convince atheists, I thought I could cover all my bases. There was a more practical reason for my study of apologetics, and that was that I really was trying to evangelize atheists. I was friends with at least a couple of them and also a Mormon. I spent most of my junior high and high school years trying to persuade them and got basically nowhere, but at least it helped me. Studying apologetics taught me a lot about critical thinking, Christianity, the Bible, philosophy, science, and scholarship in general. It also taught me that the world is very complicated. Not only do people not simply convert just because of a few arguments, but the truth is not always a simple matter to uncover. Things are not always as they appear. At first I read popular apologists because they were readily available and I wasn’t aware of anything else. But the libraries I visited did have a few books on the academic level; and once I discovered them, those were the authors I gravitated towards. Two notable examples were William Lane Craig and Michael Martin. The first Craig book I picked up was ''The Son Rises'', a popular-level treatment of his arguments for the resurrection. The resurrection had been the subject of one of Craig’s doctorates. I was immediately impressed. Michael Martin was not an apologist (not for Christianity anyway), but his book ''Atheism: A Philosophical Justification'' gave me my first major dose of analytic philosophy. As I wandered deeper into the world of academic apologetics, it bothered me that there was not more material like this available to the general Christian public. The average churchgoer was not going to walk into the local university library and make a beeline for the ''British Journal for the Philosophy of Science''. But this information was important, at least to people who wanted to talk meaningfully with the skeptics in their lives. Bridging that gap, I decided, was one of my life goals. Since then I have noticed a trend in that direction in Christian publishing, for which I am glad. In that first round of apologetic study, I concentrated on evolution, Mormonism, the cosmological argument, and the resurrection. Evolution was first, probably because it’s the most visible apologetic issue. I studied Mormonism because my best friend was Mormon, and we spent about two years straight debating religion over lunch. The cosmological argument came along because I wanted to study apologetics systematically, and the creation of the universe seemed like a natural place to start. The resurrection entered the scene with Craig’s book, and it stuck because it was just such a fascinating topic and, of course, so central to Christianity. I came out of that period thinking that a) the creation-evolution debate is hopelessly complex and not very important anyway; b) Mormonism is unfounded but not easy for its adherents to walk away from; c) the cosmological argument probably works but proves very little; and d) among Christian historical evidences, the arguments for the resurrection are uniquely compelling, both in their force and in their implications. Through an apologetics listserv I subscribed to, I was also introduced briefly to presuppositionalism. My study of apologetics was interrupted at the end of high school by my [[Spirituality Introduction|personal revival]], and during my college and grad school years I neglected apologetics almost completely. Too many other pressing issues were weighing on me. I did learn a lot more about presuppositionalism in my study of Reformed theology, and I considered myself a presuppositionalist for a while; but as with most things, my mounting pile of questions overcame my commitment to the position, and I ended up agnostic on the subject. I also took a short graduate course on apologetics which added some important elements to my thinking about the existential, human side of apologetics. But mostly I was occupied by other things. During this non-apologetic period, questions settled like dust on my mind. These came from both my studies and my independent reading and reflection. Despite being an evangelical school, Wheaton was still a good place to collect troubling questions about one’s faith. I found that my professors in the biblical studies program did a good job of exposing us to non-evangelical scholarship and of training us in evangelical methods of interpretation, but they did an uneven job of refuting their opponents’ viewpoints. I suppose you can’t do everything. But I did gain the tools to answer many of these questions myself. These questions nudged me back toward apologetics, and they had help. My professors and other influences inspired me to develop my research and critical thinking skills further. This resolve was strengthened when I became irrationally alarmed by some conspiracy theories just before the Iraq war. After I recovered from my brief paranoia, I concluded that I was too gullible and that the solution was to learn to use critical thought more consistently. Somewhat unexpectedly, I realized that if I was going to be a critically thinking person in general, I couldn’t leave religion out. I had to think critically about that as well. My reasoning was that each person is born into the world in circumstances that they didn’t choose, and these circumstances include one’s religious environment. People are accustomed to taking the religion they grew up in to be true. But if not all religions are basically the same, then letting your circumstances choose your religion amounts to rolling dice to decide on your spiritual condition, perhaps your eternal destiny. It would be wiser to make an informed choice. And I was not exempt. So the nudge back to apologetics became a shove. I knew the need for critical thought about religion from my earlier expeditions into apologetics, but during that period I took it for granted that Christianity had solid foundations. I probably gave lip service to evaluating one’s faith; but Christianity was my starting point, and as far as I was concerned it only needed rational defence, not evaluation. Non-Christians were the ones who really needed to evaluate their viewpoints. But once I acquired this more critical approach to life, I believed that Christianity had to be examined along with everything else. I didn’t want it ''fail'', but a serious test seemed necessary. So that’s where I find myself now. This section is not for the faint of heart. I ask difficult questions, and I don’t settle for easy answers. If you’re a believer and you easily careen into anxiety and doubt, maybe you would do better to go somewhere else. Check out my apologetics links. These guys will take care of you. I can promise you no such thing. [[Category:Religion]] 81af78cb1c60ad369710c084b39615ccb15279d1 0 36 111 73 2014-05-07T04:41:16Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the Religion category. wikitext text/x-wiki Version 1.0, 3-20-05 There are many kinds of spirituality floating around out there–New Age spirituality, Buddhist spirituality, Hindu, Wiccan. You can even mix and match. Since I am a Christian (and a conservative one), the Christian variety is the kind that I pursue, so that is what you will find here. But even ''Christian'' spirituality comes in a wide array, and this fact is what has launched me on my current voyage. When I was young, I didn’t think about spirituality as a thing in itself. I just went about my business of going to church and listening to Christian radio and evangelizing my friends, and my spiritual life went rather well, at least by my standards then. But over time things fell apart. In high school my evangelistic activities took me into apologetics, which was so absorbing that I forgot all about basic things like praying and reading the Bible and, to some degree, even evangelism. Spiritually I dried up. I suppose my spiritual life was dependent on all the evangelism I was doing. Once that dropped off, prayer got boring, and the Bible no longer seemed relevant. I still cared about God; my relationship with him had just lost its earlier vitality. The groundwork for my spiritual reawakening was laid at [[Psychology Introduction|youth camp]] the summer after my junior year in high school, but my renewal really began halfway through my senior year. By a sort of accident I began corresponding with one of my friends at school, and she and I were able to encourage each other in some areas of insecurity. After two or three weeks of this, she wrote in one of her letters that she thought this accidental correspondence was “meant to be.” The idea intrigued me, so I started looking for other things that might have been “meant to be.” And I found them. This started me on an amazing, spiritual roller coaster ride. God became the Great, Good Conspirator controlling my circumstances behind the scenes to build me up and give me opportunities to minister to those around me. My relationship with God became more conversational. My prayers were now a matter of listening as well as talking. That is, I paid attention to what God might be saying through my thoughts and circumstances. I even began to read the Bible much more regularly and with an enthusiasm that had always been lacking, though my interpretation of the Bible was very subjective. Then began the Crisis. In the fall I went off to Wheaton, where I continued the same pattern of interaction with God. This was also the time I was introduced to Reformed theology. I had read a little about Calvinism two years earlier on the Internet, but that semester I had ''Theology of Culture'' with R. Scott Clark. He showed us not only the doctrine of election but also bits and pieces of the rest of Reformed theology. I never knew you could fall in love with a theological system, but I did. That class sent my thinking in a whole new direction; and like many converts to Calvinism, I felt like my theology had suddenly matured. That summer I read a lot of Reformed theology on the Internet. While doing a web search for Scott Clark, I found a group called the [http://www.alliancenet.org/ Alliance of Confessing Evangelicals]. He had written an article in their journal, ''Modern Reformation''. They were Reformed, of course, so I listened to them. Their main focus was not on theological instruction, however, but on cultural commentary, specifically commentary on the state of the evangelical church. It turned out there was not much about the contemporary evangelical movement that they liked. Contemporary worship music, listening prayer, “felt needs” evangelism, in fact anything that smacked of subjectivity was suspect. Christian spirituality, they said, was about the objective, historical, physical, earthy reality of Christ’s atoning work on the Cross, communicated through words, water, bread, and wine. And since at that point I implicitly trusted Reformed theologians, I adopted their critique. I can’t say their denunciation of subjectivity came as a complete shock. I had been questioning it myself. In my conversational relationship with God, I tried to be very sensitive to the Holy Spirit and listened very carefully to every little thought I had that sounded like a promise or a command. And I tried to have conversations with God during my quiet times. But I was never sure if the thoughts I heard were God or my mind’s own random productions; and in my conversations with God, my side of the conversation was a lot louder and clearer than God’s. After about a year and a half of trying to listen to God, I gave up and decided that if God was speaking to me, I couldn’t hear him very well. So when I came back to Wheaton, I had much to complain about, and I didn’t mind sharing. But still I was frustrated and confused. I couldn’t support any of the restrictive claims and criticisms I was making. I could only cite my Reformed teachers, and their arguments were curiously lacking in Scriptural argumentation. Essentially my new beliefs were just as subjective as my old ones, based only on the authority of the modern Reformers and the new values I had picked up from them. This threw me into an agonized confusion. I didn’t know how to be a Christian anymore, and I was no longer sure anyone else around me knew either. My confusion itself astonished me. I never expected to find so much diversity of opinion within Christianity. I was used to having my beliefs unsettled by atheists. But here were two ''Christian'' groups with diametrically opposed ideas about how believers should be carrying out their spiritual lives and ministry. Who was I supposed to believe? I wasn’t just going to leave it at that. No one I talked to had answers that satisfied me, so I concluded I had to find them myself. During Christmas break, I decided to put all of these issues together and figure out this question of Christian growth and experience. So I set to work cataloging my questions and recording my reflections in a notebook. It was sort of an extension of my journal and a precursor to my thoughts pages. Over the next many months I worked very hard at defining the differences between the “objectivists” and the “subjectivists,” as I called them. I also tried to define my own reactions to the issues, to lay out the possible answers, and to reason out what the Bible had to say about these things. Now at last I was getting somewhere! By the end of that summer, my confusion had begun to settle. While I hadn’t answered my questions completely, I had developed opinions I could live with, at least for the time being. I concluded that my Reformed friends had in many ways been too hard on evangelicalism. In some cases I thought they were too restrictive. In others I thought they were out of touch with the movement, at least its best sides. And in the case of my central struggle, listening prayer, I began to have doubts about my doubts. My argument against listening prayer was that since the source of inner voices was so uncertain, God wouldn’t use thoughts to convey information. Upon reflection, this struck me as a fairly shabby argument. And besides, some people simply had convincing experiences of hearing God speak to them through their thoughts! I was open to the possibility, then, that these other people’s experiences were valid and I was just too immature to discern God’s voice clearly. Since then my thoughts have been percolating, and my spirit of independent inquiry has been growing. My questions have changed, too. Since I had some provisional answers to the dilemmas from my crisis, my thoughts shifted to the general question of how one grows spiritually. I spent quite a long time at first fretting over the fact that I was not a very spiritual person. But over time I came to several decisions. First, since I didn’t even know how to become a spiritual person, worrying about it all the time was a waste of energy. I wasn’t about to give up on the idea of being a devoted Christian, but I figured (and hoped) that God was at least as patient with me as I could be with myself. Second, I wasn’t going to obligate myself to anyone and everyone’s ideas about what was spiritual, though I did listen more carefully to certain people. Third, it would be better to be somewhat systematic and purposeful in my investigations than to make desperate, haphazard guesses. Some of my more productive thoughts have revolved around certain other concepts that Wheaton introduced me to during my prior years of confusion. The main thrust of these ideas is that the church has a wealth of wisdom about the spiritual life hidden in the works of its ancient devotional writers. These were people who carefully observed the behavior of the soul and who seriously trained themselves to be godly by means of spiritual disciplines in a way that is rarely seen today. These writers aren’t the Bible, of course. Strictly speaking, they are only interpreters. But as people who have been shaped by Scripture’s values, they speak with some authority, both about Scripture and about human spiritual experience in matters that Scripture doesn’t directly address. They deserve careful consideration. So do many modern teachers, of course. I don’t think that wisdom passed from the earth with the eighteenth or nineteenth century. My penultimate goal is to develop a system for spirituality, as far as I’m able, and my ultimate goal is to live it. I don’t mean I want to “put God in a box.” I’m aware of that danger, and I believe it can be avoided. I hope so anyway. I thrive on systems. I also don’t think I have to have the whole system worked out before I begin to put it into practice. That would be disastrous because in a sense the system is never finished. The best course is to develop both theory and practice at the same time. But the point is that the theory serves the practice and not the other way around. [[Category:Religion]] b39e3f833b9bc6e81dab95936b8a5d77191b1c66 0 45 112 91 2014-05-07T04:45:56Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the Religion category. wikitext text/x-wiki === Links === # [http://maps.google.com/maps/ms?msa=0&amp;msid=111762791336614627847.0004387a4fbb10bd55916 The Map] # [[Recommended Preachers Online: The List|The List]] === Motivations === As I reflected on my lack of spiritual vitality earlier this year (2007), I concluded that it would help to have more Christian input into my mind. Once a week at church and an occasional devotion wouldn’t cut it. To keep my mind on spiritual things, I needed to hear the Christian message more often. One easy way for me to do that is to listen to online Christian audio, so I set out to collect some. === Procedure === As things usually go with me, the project quickly expanded beyond all reasonable proportion, and instead of gathering two or three sources I could rely on for insight and inspiration, I decided to find as many as I could, searching in a comprehensive and semi-systematic fashion. And by comprehensive, I mean searching every city (above a certain size) in every state in the US. And then expanding to other English-speaking countries after that. That’s what I’m shooting for anyway. In reality I’ll search until I get tired of it. At some point I may expand the project to include speakers that aren’t attached to a church. My overall procedure is to take the states in the order of their importance to me and search for churches by city, starting with the largest. I didn’t start out this way—I tried alphabetically first, so the map began with some random churches in Alabama—but officially the first state in the list is Illinois, and the first city is Chicago. And then along the way I’ve thought of churches in other states I knew I wanted to include, and I’ve listened to sermons at my friends’ churches from around the country, so I’ve interrupted my orderly progression to add some of those. Normally I would keep a list like this in my bookmarks, but since the data was geographical, I thought it would be fun to make a Google map out of it, which I have linked to above. My bookmarks are holding the raw results of my search, and to make my decisions, I’m taking more detailed notes in a Zoho Creator database. === Benefits === In addition to collecting more listening material than I could ever possibly take in and stimulating my thoughts and feelings on spiritual matters, this project has come with some unexpected side benefits. One is that I feel more connected with different parts of the country. If Birmingham, Alabama, comes up in a conversation, I can think, Ah, I know something about Birmingham. I’ve listened to some good preachers there. If a natural disaster sweeps through, I can wonder how my churches there are doing. If on a Sunday I’m traveling in an area that has churches on my list, I can visit one of them and gain a more personal connection. If I have a friend who needs a church, I can refer them to my list, if I’ve covered their area; or I can take the project on a detour through their city to see what I can find. For my friends who go to churches on my list, it gives me a little more of a connection with them and more topics for conversation. And finally, this project lets me exercise one of my joys in life, which is to find hidden treasure and share it with people who might not have found it otherwise. Some of the preachers in the list are well known, but there are pastors out there who are unknown but still good, and they deserve a wider audience. So by posting my discoveries online, I can hopefully give them a bit more exposure and put a few more people in touch with their unique perspectives and good preaching, and the happiness and well-being in the world can be increased. :) === Criteria === This list is extremely subjective. While there are a few things I look for, I don’t apply a rigorous and objective rubric to each church. The question that determines whether a church makes the list is, Would I listen to this preacher regularly? If the answer is probably or yes, they go on the map. (If it’s maybe, I come back to it later and listen to a sermon or two more to decide.) So this is not a list of all the good churches in the world or even all the good preachers, just the ones I have personally found to be especially worth listening to so far. Obviously someone else would have a different list. Also, since most of these decisions are based on a single sermon, I will take a church off the list if I change my mind about it on later listenings. I do keep my ears open for a few basic characteristics. I prefer speakers who have a more natural speaking style, as opposed to a highly affected one. I gravitate toward thoughtful pastors who are speaking to audiences who already have the basics of Christianity under their belt and who are looking to live it more effectively. I like hearing preachers who express the Christian message in new ways, rather than delivering the same old content with the same old language. And I appreciate a balance between exegesis and application. If it’s unbalanced, I’d rather it be on the application side. I am also a conservative Protestant, so you will see a clear bias toward this category in my list, which also I think comes from the fact that they seem to care more about preaching and getting their message out into the public. Since there are potentially thousands of preachers who fit these criteria, I also keep a few limiting questions in mind: Is this speaker unique enough to stick in my mind? Is he or she easily ignorable (by being overly academic, rambling, or boring in some other way)? Does the speaker express a lot of opinions I disagree with without adding anything to my understanding? Is this speaker annoyingly liberal or conservative? I am more tolerant of conservatism, but I will turn them off if they’re too simple minded for me. And although I am fairly ecumenical, I skip over churches that don’t fit into what I would consider orthodox Christianity, so no Mormon, Christian Science, or Unitarian churches. Seventh-Day Adventists are a little too iffy; they’re out too. Most of these criteria can be overridden by others in particular cases. Sometimes I can overlook an affected speaking style if the preacher is especially reflective. Or I can forgive a simple message if I feel inspired by the speaker’s sincerity. And I also look for certain specific preaching styles that I wouldn’t normally listen to because occasionally I do feel like listening to them. Sometimes I’m in an “old time religion” mood, for example, which is normally when I turn on Family Radio, even though Harold Camping is kind of a heretic. And of course my friends’ churches get special consideration. ;) Though they are not automatically included. -.- Even if they’re the preacher. === The List === The list linked to below corresponds to the placemarks on the map. It should be updated often while I’m on this project, except when I take breaks to concentrate on other things, and the changes will be reflected on the Recent Changes page and in the corresponding “all updates” feed. The churches on this page are arranged by state, then by city, then by church name. The Google map list is arranged in the order in which I added them. [[Recommended Preachers Online: The List|The List]] [[Category:Religion]] 1bb255ead7aab27300b3e23bdce3db7b87a22d19 0 41 113 83 2014-05-07T04:46:30Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the Religion category. wikitext text/x-wiki Version 1.0, 5-13-06 [http://www.thinkulum.net/blog/category/obac/ Blog entries related to this essay] === Introduction === “On being a what??” Yes, an agnostic Christian. And yes, it is an oxymoron. But it will make sense once I explain it, though it might not mean what you think. Take the word ''agnostic''. Agnosticism is the view that we don’t know and perhaps can’t know whether or not God exists. But the word ''agnostic'' can also be used broadly to mean that one has no firm opinion on a topic, and that’s the way I’m using it here. By agnostic Christian, I don’t mean someone who isn’t sure about God but does like Christian morality—in that case I might use the term Christian agnostic. No, an agnostic Christian is a Christian who is simply uncertain about many things. And yes, that’s me. I am a Christian. But I am an ailing one. I am a Christian who doubts. It wasn’t always this way. I grew up in a Christian household and was baptized at seven. In early my teenage years I began to take my faith seriously, and as time went on, my spiritual vitality rose and fell in phases. In the earlier phases I had a sense of mission. I think of those as my golden years, when I was young and excited and, well, naïve. But as I learned more about Christianity and the world and myself, my clarity faded, and my enthusiasm followed. This trend has led to a period of uncertainty about my Christian faith, and this is where I find myself now. For a couple of reasons I tend to keep these things to myself. First, while some Christians are content to let doubters fight their own battles and come to resolution on their own, other Christians tend to become uneasy and to provide anxious and unhelpful responses. Then there are Christians (whom I haven’t spoken with much but have seen in action) who think the answers are simple, go into apologist mode, and offer arguments I’ve already dismissed. With these last two groups it’s easier just to avoid the subject. So I do. The second reason I usually keep things quiet is that my doubts are unclear even to me. They are complex, nebulous, and subtle, and until now, I hadn’t sat down to sort them all out. I didn’t arrive at these doubts through a systematic study of Christianity’s claims, or else they’d be nicely organized already. Instead they’ve arisen gradually and haphazardly over the past eight years or so as I lived my everyday life. But drawing random ideas out of my mind all in a tangle is not an effective way to present a complicated and controversial subject if I want to be understood, and I do want to be understood. Bringing up doubt opens up multiple cans of worms, and I’d rather not do that unprepared and bite off more (worms) than I can chew—which is not very many, believe me! So again, I avoid the subject. Sometimes the state of my faith does come up, however, and I’d like to be able to give a substantive answer without babbling incoherently. And if I want to make any progress in resolving my doubts, I’ll need a clear starting point. So for those two reasons, I’ve finally decided to turn on a flashlight, explore my foggy mind, and try to explain myself. This essay is addressed primarily to Christians, especially to Christians who know me, since they are likely to have an interest in my spiritual life and since I still generally approach these issues from a Christian perspective. I’ll start with a summary of my position, then lay out a three-part framework for understanding the discussion, walk through the details, and finally examine my options for the next phase of my journey. === A summary === As a Christian wrestling with doubt, I’m caught in a state of limbo. Doubt involves a certain tension. On the one hand I want to remain a Christian and to become a better one, for several reasons. First, I find much to value in Christianity. Second, I tend to take its basic tenets for granted. Third, I believe it does have some epistemic merit. Fourth, I worry about leaving it in error. Fifth, I don’t want to hurt the people I care about. And sixth, I’m sometimes very aware that I ''need'' God. On the other hand, various forces have been weakening my convictions and even pushing me in other directions. First, it seems extremely difficult or impossible to know what the correct version of Christianity ''is''. Second, I’ve always found it difficult to understand or engage with the experiential dimensions of Christianity and to progress as a Christian. That by itself isn’t a reason to give up, but it is a discouraging and demotivating factor. Third, even though I think Christianity has some epistemic strengths, some of its fundamental tenets seem hard or impossible to support. Fourth, naturalism often seems to me like a very plausible alternative to Christianity. And finally, since the source of my conservative evangelical Christianity is my upbringing, which is essentially arbitrary, I feel that I ought to investigate other theologies and worldviews out of a sense of intellectual duty. But none of these reasons takes away from my first statement, that I do want to remain a Christian. ''Both'' sides of this tension exist in my mind. Each surfaces at different times and in different ways. I aim to resolve this tension, though the tension is involved even in the attempt to resolve it. That is, I hope that the tension will be resolved on the Christian side, and I will give Christianity every chance I can, but I don’t feel it’s right to give it a free pass. Christianity will have to stand on its own merits. If it can, then hopefully I will have the awareness to perceive it. Even then, however, I’m left with the daunting task of sorting out my theology and spirituality. Although these questions are of vital importance to me, the difficulty of finding what I consider solid answers has reduced my passion for pursuing them to a few smoldering coals. I tried to sort everything out for several years, but after I’d had enough bewilderment I quietly shelved my search for answers and put my spiritual well-being on hold for a while. Right now I just sort of exist, and I pursue other interests, with these other issues rumbling just below the surface. But I hope that this essay will be a first step in resuming the search. === A three-part framework === The issues in this essay are rather complicated. So before I descend into the messy details, I’d like to lay out a conceptual framework so you can understand how all the pieces relate to each other and what their implications are. The framework has three parts: five characteristics of beliefs, three areas of Christian thought, and five epistemic problems that motivate and guide my search for truth, along with my methods for evaluating opposing views. In the rest of the essay I will be combining these factors and looking at how they show up in my life. ==== The nature of belief ==== Before I explain my model of belief, I’ll set out some rough definitions to get us going. A ''belief'', in very basic terms, is an idea that a person accepts as true. Various levels of belief are possible, and these could be described by other terms, but I’ll use belief as a catch-all in this essay. The concepts I want to differentiate more carefully, for the sake of my believing readers, are the varying degrees and types of non-belief, which I will call uncertainty, doubt, skepticism, and unbelief. ''Uncertainty'' is an indecision about whether to believe an idea. ''Doubt'' is a suspicion that an idea might not be true. ''Skepticism'' can be used in three senses: as a general strategy used in evaluating ideas, as a stance one takes toward particular ideas, or as a name for a specific view of the world. As a strategy, skepticism assumes that ideas are probably false until they have been proven true, rather than, among other approaches, assuming that ideas are true until they have been proven false. As a stance, skepticism is a stronger one than doubt. It is a confidence that a particular idea is either probably or definitely not true. And when speaking of it as a viewpoint, I use skepticism more or less as a synonym for naturalism. Here I’ll outline five main characteristics of beliefs according to my understanding. First, a belief is not only an idea a person has that something is true—it’s not merely a thought. It’s <span class="item">an idea that is integrated into the rest of a person’s life. The result is that the idea is connected to the person’s other beliefs and has effects in the person’s thoughts, feelings, and behavior. Let’s say a nefarious person has presented me with a large wicker basket that has a hole in the side. The hole reveals only darkness, so I can’t see what the basket contains, but the villain tells me that inside is a poisonous snake. He seems to be the kind of person who would keep such a dangerous creature on hand, so I believe him. Because of this belief, I interpret the hissing sound and occasional movement of the basket to be the work of the snake. I even imagine what the snake looks like as it slithers around and bobs its head menacingly inside the basket. These are thoughts. Suddenly the villain grabs my arm and tries to force my hand into the hole! In response, I am terrified—an emotion—and I resist—an action. I have an ''expectation'' that if my hand enters the basket, it will be bitten by the snake and I’ll die. And I have these interpretations, expectations, emotions, and physical reactions as a direct result of my belief that there is in fact a poisonous snake in the basket. This relationship between thoughts and the rest of one’s life is also how we can tell that someone is insincere. They say they believe one thing, but then they do things that conflict with that purported belief.</span> Second, <span class="item">beliefs can be simple, complex, or anything in between</span>. An example of a relatively simple one would be the belief that if a door is locked, merely turning the doorknob won’t let me open it. A prime example of a complex belief, and the one most relevant to this essay, would be a worldview—an interpretation of reality and human life as a whole—such as Christianity. The word ''Christianity'' is like a container for a lot of other ideas, each of which must be believed in for someone to say that they believe in Christianity. Third, <span class="item">beliefs are held for many different reasons</span>, some of which are better than others. A person can believe something based on varying degrees of evidence or for non-rational reasons, such as a sense of loyalty to other people who believe the idea. Sometimes an idea can be adopted for pragmatic reasons, such as when one is forced by dire circumstances to trust a stranger, and I suppose this could be called a type of belief. And often beliefs are based on assumptions. Here I’m defining ''assumption'' to mean an idea that is taken for granted without strong evidence to back it up. Sometimes an idea is assumed consciously and on purpose as a strategy for carrying on an investigation to see where the idea leads. But usually people’s assumptions are unconscious. People have many, many beliefs that either can’t be proven or that they simply haven’t taken the time or don’t have the time to prove. Fourth, <span class="item">beliefs can be arrived at in different ways</span>. For example, they can be taught as part of one’s upbringing. They can be formed as the result of an experience. Or they can be adopted after intentional study. Several paths can lead from a purposeful investigation to a conclusion and, if the conclusion is convincing to the investigator, a belief; and these paths correspond to the types of logical arguments. The kind that is most familiar to people is deductive reasoning (all men are mortal; Socrates is a man; therefore Socrates is mortal). But there are other kinds, and one that is especially relevant to this essay is known as abductive reasoning. Abduction is the process of finding the best explanation for a set of facts. In general my approach to searching for truth is abductive. Fifth, <span class="item">beliefs are held with different strengths</span>. At a certain degree of weakness, a belief might be considered an opinion. If a belief is held strongly, it’s usually not easy to change. For example, most people probably believe that the universe is very large. If you randomly stopped a person on the street and told them that the universe is actually quite small and asked them to just believe it, they would probably have a hard time fulfilling your request. They might imagine what the universe would be ''like'' if it were small, or they might ''say'' that they believed it, but deep down they would still believe that the universe is large. People can’t just hop from one belief to another and hold those beliefs strongly. What all this means for this essay is that I need to explain not only what I believe and what I doubt but also what ''kind'' of belief and doubt I have regarding those things. ==== Areas of Christian thought ==== Apologetics, theology, and spirituality are three major areas of Christian thought, and uncertainties can exist in all three. The fundamental issues of Christian belief are in the realm of <span class="item">apologetics</span>. Apologetic questions have to do with the foundational tenets of Christianity and whether Christianity as a whole is true. Does God exist? Is the Bible God’s Word? Is the Incarnation a coherent concept? <span class="item">Theological</span> questions have to do with the details of Christian belief, what the true nature or shape of Christianity is. What is the nature of the atonement? Does God know the future? What is the relationship between the Old and New Covenants? Should women be leaders in the church? <span class="item">Spiritual</span> questions have to do with the spiritual realities that relate to our own time and place—current events in the spiritual realm, you could say—as well as how theological truths should be lived out in general. What is God doing in the world? What is genuine prayer? How is my relationship with God? Do I even have one? I experience uncertainty in all three areas. I’m really using the term ''doubt'' as shorthand for a much broader set of difficulties. <span class="item">My problem isn’t just that I don’t know whether to remain a Christian. It’s that I don’t even know what kind of Christian to be if I stay one, let alone how to be a </span><span class="item_em">good</span> one. I’m in a general state of confusion. These three areas of Christian thought are interrelated and can’t be totally separated from each other. Thus as I explain my situation in each area, I’ll bring in aspects of the others that relate to it. In this essay my main concern is conceptual—what is the state of my faith right now? For some historical background on my relationship to these topics, see the introductions to the [[Christianity Introduction|Christianity]] section and the [[Theology Introduction|theology]], [[Hermeneutics Introduction|hermeneutics]], [[Apologetics Introduction|apologetics]], [[Spirituality Introduction|spirituality]], and [[Evangelism Introduction|evangelism]] subsections of my site (don’t worry, they’re shorter). ==== My epistemic situation ==== What is an epistemic situation? It sounds medical. Actually it’s philosophical. Epistemology is the study of knowledge, and something that is epistemic is something that has to do with knowledge or the process of knowing. In each of these areas—apologetics, theology, and spirituality—I’m asking three basic questions: Are my existing beliefs true? If not, what is? If so, what then? I have five epistemic problems that are motivating these questions and also making it difficult to answer them. The first problem is that <span class="item">my existing beliefs aren’t epistemically secure</span>. That is, they aren’t based on solid methods of establishing knowledge. Instead of secure epistemic foundations, such as a comprehensive network of sound arguments, my existing beliefs are based on my upbringing, my personal preferences, my simple intellectual dabblings, and my unwillingness to give them up just yet. Those might be okay to start with, but for me ultimately they aren’t good enough. My second problem is that <span class="item">I don’t know enough yet to make my beliefs more secure</span>. And there’s a lot to know. People have different ideas about how to establish knowledge, but for now, as I’ve said, I take a best-explanation approach; and to do a really good job of arriving at a best explanation, you have to survey all the possible explanations and determine at least three things about each one: how well it fits the facts it’s supposed to explain, how effectively it explains them (for example, does it extrapolate from the evidence to make predictions that can be tested?), and how internally consistent it is. A major part of determining those things is examining the arguments for each possibility, the rebuttals to those arguments, the arguments against each possibility, and the rebuttals to those. And you have to try to be fair and impartial when evaluating all these arguments. It’s a demanding task. I consider it also to be a part of what it means to be intellectually responsible, whereas making forceful assertions without examining all the available evidence would be intellectually irresponsible. My third problem is that <span class="item">when I encounter arguments from opposing sides, they tend to balance each other out</span>, and I’m no closer to the truth than I was before I heard them. This is where the agnostic part of being an agnostic Christian comes in. The world is complex enough that just about any view will be supported by some of the facts and contradicted by other facts. This is why, in a trial, both the prosecution and the defense are able to make a case. For any two opposing views, the evidence that appears to support the one will be facts that the other has to somehow explain away or incorporate into its system of ideas. When deciding between the two views, you have to look at how clearly the evidence supports the first view, how well the second view takes that evidence into account, how clearly the second view is supported by its evidence, and how well the first view takes that evidence into account. In some cases the truth is fairly obvious and there’s little debate. In areas of knowledge that are more remote or intangible, however, such as history or metaphysics, the evidence for both sides can be equally convincing (or unconvincing). This is the trouble I repeatedly have in the area of religion. The arguments within evangelical Christian theology, apologetics, and spirituality are ''sort of'' convincing, but other theologies and worldviews have good arguments too. So I’m still on a search (though a stalled one) for the best explanation, because the one I have doesn’t entirely stand out. My fourth problem is that <span class="item">I’m </span><span class="item_em">not</span> completely fair and impartial, which is one of the requirements for a search for the best explanation. I don’t want to leave Christianity. In fact, I want to become a ''better'' Christian. This is why I call myself an agnostic Christian and not a Christian agnostic—I’m fundamentally a Christian who has some agnostic tendencies and not an agnostic who just likes Christian morality. Now, from a Christian point of view, not wanting to leave Christianity is a ''good'' thing. Part of the essence of being a Christian is loyalty to God and to fellow believers, and that’s what I feel. It’s a large part of what keeps me a Christian, aside from a fear of judgment and of social pressure. But loyalty to a particular viewpoint isn’t all that good for intellectual inquiry, if your inquiry is about the truthfulness of that viewpoint. This is a conflict I call the <span class="item">loyalty-truth tension</span>. Sometimes the people and ideas you feel loyal to really are trustworthy and true, but sometimes they’re not, no matter how intensely you feel about them. And when they’re not, sometimes that feeling of loyalty can blind you to the truth. That’s why, when truth is your aim, loyalty can get in the way. When you’re loyal to something that really is true, of course, there’s no particular problem, although there could be if your goal is to be absolutely sure you have the truth, since to do that you’d have to examine other possibilities as if they could be true. In a certain sense this tension is a conflict between ''two'' loyalties, a loyalty to a particular conclusion and a loyalty to reason as a method for coming to conclusions. The conflict is that reason might lead you to some other conclusion than the one you want to be loyal to. It could be true that instead of loyalty to the conclusion, the other loyalty should be abandoned—the loyalty to reason—and some other method chosen for seeking truth. For now I trust reason, but this is a question I’ll need to explore. My fifth problem is that, even though I’m not completely impartial and I do want to remain and progress as a Christian, <span class="item">when I look at Christian theology, apologetics, and spirituality from an epistemological point of view, I’m not very satisfied with what I see</span>. This is one reason I’m asking these questions in the first place (are my existing beliefs true?, etc.). If our beliefs were all completely obvious, there would be no need to investigate them. Knowing the truth would be as easy as breathing. But that’s not the world we live in. The real world is something that has to be explained; the truth is something we have to find; and sometimes we turn out to be wrong and have to rethink our position. Various factors give us clues about whether we’re right or wrong about an idea. Here are three major steps for an idea that’s on the road from speculation to knowledge: First, the idea has to have meaning or definition. Otherwise we don’t know what we’re talking about when we try to express it. Second, the idea has to be coherent. That is, it can’t contradict itself. And third, the idea has to be attested by evidence. Now, I don’t necessarily mean the physical kind of evidence they pick up on ''CSI'', just that the idea needs to be supported by sound arguments, of which there are different kinds. I’ll have more on that in the essay’s conclusion. The problem is that when I look at Christianity, significant concepts within it seem to ''lack'' meaning, coherence, or evidence. The rest of this essay is devoted to explaining these observations, so I won’t go into them here. But they are the reason that my loyalty to Christianity and my loyalty to reason are in tension. If Christianity made complete sense to me, then there wouldn’t be a problem and I could get on with my life without worrying about such things. This lack of meaning, coherence, and evidence has a consequence beyond knowing if Christianity is true, which is that even if it is true, I don’t know what to do with it. How do I live as a Christian if I barely know what Christianity means or how it relates to the everyday world? I’ll explain this difficulty in the section on spirituality. To a certain degree I don’t know if these epistemic weaknesses are a problem with Christianity itself or a problem with my understanding of it. I’m like an airplane pilot who’s lost at sea and has encountered a foggy island, but all I can see are the tops of the mountains. Are those mountains connected by dry valleys? Or are they a series of unconnected peaks jutting out of the ocean? If I descend, will I be able to land? Similarly, are the terms of Christianity connected meaningfully to each other and to human life? Are the concepts that seem to be in conflict connected by bits of logic that I can’t see yet? Are the seemingly speculative teachings of Christianity connected to the real world by evidence? The situation is ambiguous until the facts make it clear, and as I’ve said, I don’t have enough of the evidence yet to know the answers to these questions. Anything can seem nonsensical if you know little enough about it. It’s fine to ask questions, but to find out if they can be answered you need data, sometimes lots and lots of it. Maybe I haven’t read the right books or had the right experiences. At the least, I can say there’s a disconnect between Christianity and my sense of reason. Maybe the fault is on Christianity’s end; maybe it’s on mine. To summarize my situation (because even I have trouble keeping this stuff straight), I am struggling to understand Christianity deeply while wrestling with issues of intellectual responsibility in the religious realm. I am an evangelical Christian, and I like being one and want to grow in my faith. But I see that the reasons I have right now for being a Christian aren’t entirely solid, and when I ask myself how reasonable (or livable) Christianity seems to me, the answers are discouraging. So I feel the need to step back and examine, as fairly as I can, the epistemic strengths and weaknesses of both evangelical Christianity and the alternative theologies and worldviews, so that I can come as close as possible to the best explanation for the world and human experience. My feelings of loyalty to evangelical Christianity and my tendency to see all viewpoints as equally plausible could get in the way of this search, although if Christianity is true, my loyalty to reason could get in the way of my loyalty to Christianity. Balancing those possibilities is a challenge. My questions can be boiled down to two: Is there a viewpoint that fits the facts of the world better than evangelical Christianity or than Christianity in general? And how do I go about investigating that question fairly while giving proper weight to the possibility that my current beliefs may be true after all? To summarize my methods, the goal of my search is to answer the following questions: (1) Are my existing beliefs true? (2) If not, what is? (3) If so, what then? The process of answering these questions involves surveying the ideas that are competing with those beliefs and answering at least three other questions about each one: (1) Does the idea have meaning? (2) Is it coherent? And (3) is it supported by the evidence? Examining the evidence relevant to an idea involves further questions: (1) How clearly does the evidence support this idea? (2) How effectively does the idea explain the evidence? (3) How well is the idea able to account for evidence that seems to contradict it? And throughout this process of investigation, four kinds of arguments need to be examined, whenever they’re available, about whatever point you’re investigating at the time: (1) arguments for the position in question, (2) rebuttals to those arguments, (3) arguments against the position, and (4) rebuttals to those arguments. Note that these are methods used in an intentional study and not necessarily in the haphazard reflection I’ve done so far. The rest of this essay is occupied with explaining how I’ve seen these questions show up in my thinking on theology, apologetics, and spirituality. One caveat before I go on. Some of my friends, knowing my preference for intellectual rigor, tend to assume that every opinion I express stems from some exhaustively researched, carefully reasoned study of the topic; and they might be tempted to think that’s what this essay represents. This is completely false. Intellectual rigor is unfortunately much more an ideal than a reality in my life. The purpose of this essay is to collect my hazy ''impressions'' of these issues and to draw out the principles that seem to govern them. The result will hopefully be a starting point for more rigorous study. I’ve worked hard to present these things in a logical and organized format so they will be easier for everyone, including me, to understand. But if you scratch the surface of all this clarity, you’ll find that it’s a thin layer on top of a sea of disordered vagueness. In other words, if you ask me questions about what I’ve written here, I might have to think for a while and get back to you (especially if it’s a request for examples—specific cases seem to flee my mind as soon as I’ve drawn conclusions from them). That’s how the whole process of writing this essay has been. I knew I had issues involving doubt, but to put together anything like a complete picture of the state of my faith, I had to spend a long time stirring the murky waters of my mind, collecting the thoughts that bobbed to the surface, and putting them together in a way that made sense. A lot of the details are still down in the depths. === Theology === ==== The problem—the too-fertile field of possibility ==== Since I’m already a Christian, I’ll start with issues internal to Christianity. These internal issues make up Christian theology—the Christian view of God, humanity, and the universe. There is a large set of important questions about the world that Christians have opinions on. Unfortunately, the set of specific beliefs that all Christians agree on is very small. They disagree on everything from the nature of the atonement and the authority of the church to speaking in tongues and styles of worship music. So which Christian answers are the right ones? What beliefs constitute the “one true theology”? The brief answer is I don’t know. Overall, I’m willing to affirm the core beliefs of Christianity—that God created the world; humanity is sinful; Jesus is the Son of God, died, rose from the dead, and will come again; and that we must have faith in him for salvation. But beyond those few central points of doctrine, I don’t know what to think. There are too many viewpoints within Christianity, and any choice seems arbitrary without more study than I’ve done so far. It’s not that I don’t have opinions. I do have theological [[My Current Theology|default positions]], derived from my upbringing and my own dabblings, and some of them I feel rather strongly about. But I’m very aware that with more study, I might change my mind about them. In the spirit of intellectual fairness, I am even willing to entertain the notion that orthodox Christian theology might misinterpret the Bible on some points and that the heretics might have been right after all, though I don’t think it’s likely. Sometimes I think that if I studied the Bible more extensively, I would arrive at satisfying conclusions, that the answers are ''there'' if you just think carefully enough. But sometimes (more often these days, I’m afraid) I think the answers just can’t be known. As I hear the arguments offered for various positions, the Bible seems ambiguous enough that it is very difficult or impossible to settle on one theological position while being fair to all the biblical evidence. But why would God give us such a long, drawn-out revelation of himself while leaving its meaning so unclear? ==== Theology and apologetics—the nature of the Bible ==== This question leads me to the intersection of theology and apologetics—that is, the relationship between determining what Christianity teaches and determining whether Christianity is true at all. The Bible is supposed to be a primary source of theological truth, but its ambiguity makes me wonder if the Bible is really a coherent document. Interpreters of the Bible disagree widely, but is it really just a problem of interpretation? Did the ''writers'' of the Bible agree? As a conservative Christian, my default answer is yes. Maybe the Bible’s meaning was clear when it was first written but it has been clouded by the distance of time and culture. Maybe God values the effort we put into understanding spiritual truth, and the struggle is more important than the outcome. And maybe the reason is simply a mystery kept hidden within God’s mind. But the persistence of these problems leads me to ponder the no answer too. And when I explore that answer, I see three basic possible explanations. Either the Bible was inspired by God but not in the carefully controlled way that conservative Christians think it was; God exists, but the Bible isn’t his Word; … or there isn’t a God to inspire it in the first place. In either of the last two cases, the Bible is merely a record of human speculation. I won’t leap to any of those conclusions, but I also can’t simply dismiss them. ==== Effects—avoidance and restraint ==== My thoughts on these questions are undecided enough that I tend not to think or talk about theology much. I almost think discussing theology is a waste of time, at least for me at this point in my life. It’s a field of study that is highly dependent on the conclusions from other fields; and until I’ve dealt with its prerequisites, I just can’t take theological discussions very seriously. First we have to establish that the ground of theology (Scripture) is reliable, and then we have to work out a reliable way (hermeneutics) to build a theology from that foundation. And I am very far from having accomplished either of these. I don’t even know if I ought to be a theological foundationalist. So I tend to avoid getting into theological discussions in the first place. When I do interact with people on these issues, my uncertainty causes me to restrain my emotions. I don’t want to press a point if I know I could easily be wrong about it. When people ask me questions about theology, I usually give noncommittal answers, as if I had little knowledge on the topic. In reality, I know enough to answer the question. I just don’t know enough to tell them which answer is the ''right'' one and defend it. And when I affirm my default positions with people who agree with them, I often feel like I’m only humoring them, since at the same time I’m thinking, ''I don’t really know if this is true, but I don’t want to sound like a heretic just yet''. But I’ve been trying to be more open about my uncertainties lately. The same hesitancy goes for living by these beliefs, which is where theology intersects with spirituality. I’m reluctant to pursue actions very enthusiastically when they are based on a belief with so much uncertainty behind it. Another idea might be true instead that requires a different response. In fact, I feel disingenuous when I try to enthusiastically embrace ideas I’m not sure I believe. So I generally don’t, and my spiritual life is correspondingly weak. I’ll have more on that in the spirituality section. If you’re a Christian, especially if you know me personally, you may feel disturbed by all this. That’s understandable. But don’t panic—I haven’t gone off the deep end yet. I’m only asking questions and raising possibilities, not stating conclusions. My concerns are real, but I’m in no hurry to abandon my roots. === Apologetics === Now, just to review, I am an evangelical Christian, and I like being one and want to grow in my faith. But various uncertainties have crept into my mind over the past several years, and in spite of my general contentment with being a Christian, I can’t just ignore them. My desire to remain and progress as a Christian and my wish to be true to my reason form a tension, a conflict in my mind, and I’d like to journey toward resolving it. So I’m trying to explain this tension and its various facets in this essay in order to give myself a starting point and to help me interact with people when the topic of my spiritual life comes up. As I’ve said, the state of my faith has not been very clear to me in recent years, but in the months I’ve spent writing this essay, I’ve been able to gather the following insights into my inner thoughts. ==== Overarching themes—abduction, naturalism, and the varieties of doubt ==== Good theology is important to me, but it isn’t enough. My concerns are more fundamental than merely wanting to define the details of Christianity. For the past few years I have been interested in developing my critical thinking skills and applying them to as much of life as I reasonably could. I’ve wanted to have rational reasons for holding my beliefs and to have ways of critically evaluating ideas to decide whether I should accept them. While it’s impossible to investigate ''everything'' rationally, I don’t want to intentionally exclude areas of life from that program. And that means that religion has to undergo scrutiny too. The upshot has been that, even without undertaking a concentrated study of these issues yet, my confidence in my Christian beliefs has gradually been eroding. In some ways this is nothing unusual. The more I learn, the more complicated the world seems, and the less sure I am of anything. Thus, I’ve been in a general trend of agnosticizing over the past several years. I don’t know the answers to society’s questions, and I’m not sure all of them ''can'' be known. I’m hoping this isn’t a permanent state, but it is the reality I’m facing right now. Since my doubts and questions come up randomly in the course of everyday life, I usually only think about them in disconnected bits and pieces, but there are several broad issues lying behind them—a best-explanation approach to reasoning, naturalism as a competitor to Christianity, and the variety of forms doubt can take. In general, I take an abductive approach to apologetic questions, as I do with most questions. Abduction is the process of finding the best explanation for a set of facts. In the case of a worldview, abductive reasoning would try to find the best explanation for all the facts in the universe, or at least the most important ones, whichever those are. Differing worldviews could thus be thought of as competing explanations for the facts of the universe and human experience. I believe this would correspond most closely to a cumulative case approach in apologetics. Given my analytical personality and science-oriented upbringing, when I consider the available options, I am much more tempted toward skepticism than toward another religion. So although in principle I think I should find out, I rarely wonder if, say, Hinduism is more warranted than Christianity. For me, the main competitor to the Christian explanation of the world is the naturalistic one. I tend to look at life from both of these perspectives in an inner dialog. For a while I wondered if this skeptical inner dialog meant I was maybe a budding atheist, but the thought of how that would hurt the people I cared about was painful to me. If someone falls away from the faith, they aren’t saved, and that can be terrible to contemplate. I couldn’t easily do that to my family and friends. But then I realized that part of the reason for my anguish was that I believed they could be right. ''I'' believed that apostasizing would mean judgment, and it seemed like a tragic choice to make. So why make it, if that’s still what I believed? And it wasn’t only judgment that bothered me. I felt like I would be hurting God if I concluded he didn’t exist. A contradiction, I know, but it brings out the fact that I hadn’t (and still haven’t) drawn that conclusion yet. In any case, I doubted I would be the kind of hardened atheist who sneers at all things Christian. I would more likely be a weak agnostic who was always hoping to find the missing piece of evidence for the Christian religion. From an intellectual standpoint, there isn’t a lot of difference between that and a weak ''Christian'' who’s looking for the missing piece of evidence. Blaise Pascal, the French mathematician and philosopher, argued that if you’re uncertain whether Christianity or atheism is true, it’s a safe bet to settle on Christianity, since if atheism is true, the Christians lose nothing, whereas if Christianity is true, the atheists lose everything. Pascal’s wager has some significant weaknesses, but for a case like mine it’s perfect. If it comes down to a choice between being a weak agnostic and being a weak Christian, I’ll side with Pascal and keep my Christianity for as long as it retains a glimmer of credibility. This is an example of how the loyalty-truth tension gets played out in my mind. Now, my doubts come in various forms. Often I’m essentially playing “what if” with myself. I think, ''What if the skeptics are right about such-and-such? How would they argue for it?'' And the skeptical arguments I come up with make sense to me. Then I wander out of that frame of mind and go back to taking Christian things for granted. Some of my doubts have more to do (for now) with the strength of the arguments we have for certain beliefs than with the beliefs themselves. After I had concluded that I didn’t ''really'' want to become an atheist, I took a brief inventory of what Christian beliefs I tend to take for granted and what things I actively doubt. What I still believe are the basic formal doctrines of Christianity. I take it for granted that the God of the Bible exists; that Jesus is the incarnate Second Person of the Trinity; that he was born of a virgin, died for our sins in some sense, and was raised from the dead; that he is sitting at God’s right hand and will return at some point in the future; that we must trust in him for salvation. That is, not only do I take these doctrines to reflect the true form of Christianity (see the theology section), but I also assume them to be true. I’m more uncertain about everything else. In practical terms the fact that I take these ideas for granted means that they form part of my mental picture of the world. When I think about the way things are, those features are there, however dimly I understand them and their implications. And they form the basis of my limited spirituality, which I’ll talk about in the spirituality section. You could say I’m a ''de facto'' fideist on these central points. I take them almost purely as assumptions, although I don’t believe that I should. Truthfully, that leaves me wide open to doubt in those areas (my theological default positions are even wider open). Once I do examine them critically, there’s every chance that my belief in them will fall apart. For the moment I tend to assume that somehow it all works out in Christianity’s favor, and from a Christian perspective I suppose this kind of weak fideism is okay for now. However, some of my doubts have become more entrenched. Compared to the things I take for granted, these more settled doubts seem limited in scope, but they come in at a fairly fundamental spot. Where my faith primarily falters is at the inspiration of the Bible. Since that’s my main area of doubt, I’ll take some time to explain it in depth. ==== Revelation—the central conflict ==== For me, the two competing explanations for the world are Christianity and naturalism. The Christian explanation of the world comes from God’s self-revelation and the human theology that is based on it. Hence, at least for me, the major battleground between Christianity and naturalism (or indeed any other worldview) is this revelation. Traditionally God’s revelation has been seen as coming in two forms, general revelation, which is God’s use of the natural world to display his existence and attributes, and special revelation, which is God’s communication in the form of written Scripture. Despite my belief in God, general revelation has for a long time seemed faint to me. It seems to me that few features of the universe are uniquely explained by Christian theism. When I’m thinking about the classical theistic arguments, then, I find most of them weak; and I wonder if, going only on the information in the realm of general revelation, deism or naturalism wouldn’t explain the world just as well. At the moment the only theistic argument that really appeals to me is the fine-tuning argument, which argues that conditions in the universe are just right for life to exist, and therefore the universe must have been designed. Special revelation is a much more complex issue than general revelation because the theological ideas it asserts are much more specific, there are many more of them, and they are wrapped up with all the complexities of human history and the process of recording that history in writing. One of the central Christian tenets is that the Bible is God’s Word. In keeping with my current attention to the justification of beliefs, my basic question here is why Christianity should be allowed such strong claims for its Scriptures. The Enlightenment began a concerted effort on the part of scholars to study the Bible as a merely human book like all other books. And the Bible certainly is a human book. If it were merely divine, it might have materialized out of nothing one day. But it was written by human beings. If the Bible is divinely inspired in some sense, then it would obviously be wrong to treat it as merely human. But here’s my question: ''How would we know?'' How can we tell the difference between a divinely inspired book and a merely human book? And how can we tell that the Bible is of the divinely inspired kind? It’s potentially a complicated question because the Bible wasn’t written in one day by one person. It was written by many people over thousands of years. How do we know that ''each book'' of the Bible is inspired? And ''each part'' of each book? At this point, I don’t know, and to take the whole Bible to be inspired ''just because'' a pastor or theologian says so seems like a rather tall order. Once skeptics have excluded God from the writing of the Bible and from history itself, they often feel the need to explain the supernatural elements in the Bible. Sometimes they seem to be grasping at straws, but other times their alternative explanations give me pause. I find myself wondering, for example, if skeptics are right when they claim that the story of the Exodus and of Israel’s special relationship with God was invented to justify the conquest of Canaan. Of course, there are less extreme positions one could take than the view that the Bible is only human or only divine. Christians believe it’s both, but they vary in the way they define the Bible as God’s Word. The strongest form of the claim is probably dictation theory, in which God simply “whispered in the ear” of the biblical writers and they wrote down whatever he told them. The Bible shows obvious signs of the normal human processes of writing a book, as even conservative evangelicals agree. The question is what the relationship is between the human writing and the divine message. If God didn’t hand every word to the writers, then how did they get their information about the invisible spiritual realities they wrote about? I believe some liberal Christians hold that the Bible writers were simply theologians trying their best to interpret the awesome events they had witnessed. The question of the writers’ sources for spiritual knowledge repeatedly enters my mind, and it leads me to wonder if maybe the liberals are right. Maybe the Bible was only indirectly inspired through the events that prompted its writing rather than directly in the process of the writing itself. And along with this more lenient view, I wonder if it isn’t more sensible just to admit errors here and there. I’m not saying definitely. Just maybe. Doesn’t throwing out inspiration have serious consequences for the rest of Christian belief? It does look that way. But does that mean we should hold on to it? I have trouble moving in that direction epistemically. It seems wrong to say, “We need Christianity to be true; therefore the Bible must be true.” We could say other things like, “There’s evidence that the Bible is true; therefore the Bible is probably true,” or even, “We have reason to believe that Christianity is true; therefore the Bible is probably true.” But simply rejecting one position because it’s dangerous to another position won’t work. This is another manifestation of the loyalty-truth tension. In this case we would be taking a logically questionable step in order to preserve the belief that has our devotion. Even though this doubt about inspiration is more persistent than many of my others, I’m not usually thinking all this when I actually read the Bible. I tend to read it as if it’s God’s Word. I assume that the writers at least knew what they were talking about, even if I don’t. So at times I think of the Bible as innocent until proven guilty (of being merely human) and at others guilty until proven innocent. It’s a strange case, I know. ==== Intellectual base covering ==== There are other things to doubt, of course. Skeptics sometimes argue that various Christian doctrines are logically incoherent or that if he exists, God cannot be truly good because of the suffering in the world or because some of his actions in the Bible appear morally objectionable. These issues are important, and since I think Christianity needs to be examined, I intend to deal with them, but they aren’t my primary concern right now. Similarly, it may be that neither Christianity nor naturalism is true but some other religion or secular worldview is. The intellectually responsible course would be to try to investigate all the options. But I can’t do everything, and to be honest it would be more out of a sense of duty than genuine interest. Being fair to the various possibilities while balancing my time is something I’ll have to figure out as I go along. ==== The persisting converse—tenacity and apologetic potential ==== But for now and the foreseeable future, I remain a Christian. These questions don’t mean I’m about to plunge into atheism. Abandoning Christianity still seems very wrong to me; I’m not about to do it glibly. In fact, it would take a long time and a lot of work for me to conclude that Christianity simply cannot be believed, and despite my history with apologetics, I feel like I’ve barely started. This tenacity is part of my approach to managing the loyalty-truth tension. I don’t think of sticking with Christianity as just a safe bet on eternity. To a certain degree loyalty can be a benefit in the search for truth. The thing you’re loyal to might turn out to be true after all, in which case if you drop it at the first sign of trouble, you might miss seeing the key pieces of evidence that would convince you. So since I still take Christianity seriously, dismissing it prematurely is one error I want to avoid. And in any case, I don’t see Christian apologetics as completely devoid of promise. There’s the fine-tuning argument for God’s existence that I mentioned earlier. Jesus’ resurrection is supported by some interesting arguments. Conservative scholars’ arguments for the Bible’s historical reliability usually impress me, and so do the insights of contemporary Christian philosophers of religion. And believers have some striking stories about their experiences of God that I’d like to explore and examine. === Spirituality === In case you’re memory’s getting foggy, I am an evangelical Christian, and I like being one and want to grow in my faith. But various uncertainties have crept into my mind over the past several years, and in spite of my general contentment with being a Christian, I can’t just ignore them. My desire to remain and progress as a Christian and my wish to be true to my reason form a tension, a conflict in my mind, and I’d like to journey toward resolving it. So I’m trying to explain this tension and its various facets in this essay in order to give myself a starting point and to help me interact with people when the topic of my spiritual life comes up. As I’ve said, the state of my faith has not been very clear to me in recent years, but in the months I’ve spent writing this essay, I’ve been able to gather the following insights into my inner thoughts. ==== Evangelical spirituality in a nutshell ==== Now I’ll bring the discussion into the most personal domain of the three, the spiritual. First, a technical description: In the evangelical spirituality I’ve spent the most time with, the goals of spirituality are spiritual growth and the enjoyment of a relationship with God. Spiritual growth has various causes and occurs in the context of this relationship. In general, it happens when the individual comes to a realization about some issue, often through an experience of interaction with God, that leads to a change in attitude or behavior. These realizations and interactions with God can be spontaneous, or they can be brought about when the Christian engages in certain practices that foster spiritual growth, such as prayer, Bible reading, worship, fellowship, and the sacraments. In some way, both God and the believer play a causal role in spiritual growth, though the ultimate cause is God. The results of spiritual growth are that the person increasingly embodies and displays certain positive character traits, such as patience, compassion, boldness, holiness, and closeness to God. Collectively these traits are known as godliness. I believe this pattern describes evangelical spirituality in general, and it might reflect Christian spirituality outside evangelicalism too. In the realm of spirituality, my uncertainties seem to exist in layers. ==== Spirituality itself—the mystery of meaning and the perplexities of practice ==== My problems begin with the fact that, for various reasons, this system of spirituality has never worked very well for me. For one thing, <span class="item">I’ve rarely been able to engage in spiritual practices like prayer and Bible reading in a way that was meaningful to me</span>, and as I see it, meaning is a prerequisite for their effectiveness. Here I’m using the term ''meaning'' somewhat differently than I used it in my framework. There it meant “definition.” Here, by ''meaningful'' I mean that an idea has implications for the other facts of the world or of an individual’s life in ways that are emotionally significant to that person. Without going into my theory on emotions (and making this essay even longer), I’ll say that the Bible is an emotional book; Jesus himself had emotions; and if we are to become like him, we have to learn to see in the world the same meaning that he saw in it. And as far as I can tell, getting to that point typically means having emotionally significant experiences with the ideas we’re meant to find meaningful. For various reasons, I haven’t made it very far down that road yet. The paths I’ve tried didn’t seem to lead anywhere, and now I’m back to the place I started. Part of the problem I have finding meaning is that the world of the Bible seems remote. The Bible was written to people whose circumstances and concerns were very different from mine. It’s difficult for me to feel inspired by their stories. I even have trouble responding emotionally to the Bible’s depictions of God, such as Isaiah’s vision in Isaiah 6. They’re dramatic, but I have trouble wrapping my mind around them. Maybe if I could expect to encounter God in those ways in my own life, I could relate to them better, but to my knowledge such experiences are very rare in the modern world (and, granted, were rare even back then). Meaning also eludes me because the practices I’ve always been told to pursue and the spiritual messages I’ve been told to draw strength from have never quite made sense to me. Sometimes this is because the language people use is barely comprehensible. Christians often speak poetically about God and the Christian life, and I usually find it hard to correlate their imagery with real life actions and experiences. It lacks meaning in the sense of definition. Other times it’s because I have trouble getting the concepts themselves to make sense. That is, they seem to lack coherence. I especially have this problem with prayer (e.g., if God already knows, why pray?) and the idea that we can trust God to take care of us (what about Christians starving in Africa?). A second reason evangelical spirituality hasn’t worked well for me is that <span class="item">some of its directives seem unworkable</span>. That is, they seem generally coherent, but they don’t seem practicable, although since they’re supposed to be put into practice, this could be considered another type of incoherence. If not truly unworkable, they’re at least outside my realm of experience. Here I’m thinking mainly of the idea of a conversational relationship with God, which is actually a fairly fundamental concept in the evangelical scheme of things. Then there’s <span class="item">the sheer difficulty of the highest Christian principles</span>. Christianity entails a very different way of life from the one that comes naturally. It’s really ''hard'' to trust God completely. It takes a lot of courage to be willing to sacrifice everything for someone else’s good. Sometimes I wonder if it’s even possible to be both a devoted Christian and a human being, but some people seem to manage it. A common theme in most of my difficulties is the fact that <span class="item">God is a very unusual person, so unusual that he’s hard to relate to</span>. All the other people I relate to have bodies, which means I can have direct, two-way communication with them. But God is a spirit. He is invisible, inaudible, and intangible, and for the most part we must relate to him indirectly through the Bible and perhaps other people and the natural world. So I find some of the personal relationship language we use misleading. I acknowledge that there may be aspects of spirituality I haven’t experienced, but relating to God is extremely different from interacting with humans. I would venture to say that this by itself makes having a close relationship with God something we have to work hard to learn, assuming that a personal relationship really is the goal. ==== Spirituality and theology—an unfinished puzzle ==== So that’s the first layer, my general spiritual deficiency. A second layer that makes resolving the first one more difficult is my state of theological uncertainty. Even though most theological debates tend to be abstract, they do have practical implications, if only for the ways we worship and pray. And some of these debates relate directly to spirituality, such as the question of miraculous gifts and the nature of sanctification. Then there are more subtle questions that don’t make it into the theological top 100 but still make a difference in the shape of one’s spirituality. A fairly basic question that seems to fit into this category is, what is God like? I don’t seem to understand God very well. Is he interested in the small details of our lives or only in his grand, missional purposes? Is he strict with his children or lenient? In the Bible, he reacts in different ways to different people and circumstances, and I haven’t sorted it all out yet. I don’t understand him well enough to know what he might be thinking, feeling, and doing in response to me and ''my'' circumstances. And it seems to me that if I’m going to respond to ''him'' appropriately, those are pretty important things to know. There’s more to living the Christian life than knowing God’s thoughts and actions, however. Not every reaction we have to God will be appropriate. Sometimes our instinctive reactions are influenced by sinful attitudes and motivations. And even when sinful attitudes and motivations aren’t obviously getting in the way, it can be easy to get confused. There are a lot of pieces in the Christian life to keep track of. You can’t apply the same spiritual principle naïvely across all situations. For example, if you sin against someone, you can confess it to God, receive forgiveness, and experience the relief and joy that brings, but after that you can’t simply walk up to the other person and act as if the past is happily behind you. You have to respect the fact that you’ve wronged them, humbly reconcile yourself to the other person, and restore the relationship. As I see it, the Christian life is like a complex skill that is foreign to us at first and has to be learned through practice. In many ways I’m still at a beginning, uncoordinated stage, and I don’t even have a clear picture of how all the pieces fit together. I’m assuming optimistically that they do fit together and that everyone basically agrees on how, or at least that the truth is discernable. Since I currently avoid trying to answer theological questions, my spirituality doesn’t have much of a theological shape. In the areas of spirituality that I do try to put into practice, I’m working from a few default positions. They work okay for the low level I’m at, but I suspect I’ll feel more internal pressure to answer the theological questions once I pursue my spiritual life more seriously, and then I’ll need to work through issues of theological method, as I mentioned earlier. “Theological method?” you say? “I thought you were being practical in this section.” Well yes, dealing with theory does seem like a step back when I’m trying to put my faith into action. But when the people I go to for guidance disagree with each other, I need some way to decide between their conflicting words of advice. I could flip a coin or rely on my feelings or just pick one, and in fact I might end up doing that on some occasions. But generally I’d like to make a more informed decision, and in theology I’m not sure how to do that yet, if it can be done at all. ==== Spirituality and apologetics—the inspiration of the Bible and the interpretation of experience ==== Then while all that is going on, in float my apologetic doubts—the question of whether Christianity is even true. Since I pretty much take basic Christianity for granted, this isn’t as big a problem as it could be, at the moment, but it is an obstacle. The difficulty comes from two angles. The first is <span class="item">the inspiration of the Bible</span>, which I covered in the apologetics section above. The question often comes to my mind, where did the writers get their information? It’s hard for me to worship God on the basis of what goes on in the spiritual realm or God’s agenda in history when I find myself wondering how the Bible writers could know those things. The second angle is <span class="item">the nature of the spiritual</span>. Since it’s invisible, inaudible, and intangible, I sometimes wonder if it’s even there. Or at least if it’s the way Christians describe it. Christians often describe the inner and outer events of their lives in terms of divine action. I call these events psychological and circumstantial miracles, respectively. The miracles that people usually think of are what I call physical miracles. Physical miracles are the most confirmable, at least in principle, but they are the least common. Most of the time when believers describe God at work, they’re telling the story of a psychological or circumstantial miracle. They tell of a change in their character when they converted, for example, and they attribute it to the work of the Holy Spirit. Or they relate the story of a bad situation in which a remarkable coincidence got them off the hook or gave them an insight into their lives, and they say God was working behind the scenes to make it happen. They even describe the situation in metaphorical terms, as if God were visibly, audibly, tangibly interacting with them. Now, it may be perfectly true that these ''are'' supernatural events and that psychological and circumstantial miracles ''do'' occur all the time. But when I have my skeptic hat on, when I’m in the mode of wanting to make sure what I believe is true, I often wonder if we aren’t just letting our imaginations run away with us. Human beings are interpreters. They compulsively look for patterns and reasons and meanings, and they sometimes find them where they don’t exist. Couldn’t it be that coincidences sometimes just happen, and people then find meaning in them that isn’t there? And how do we know that the psychological changes Christians describe can’t be explained as merely psychological rather than supernatural? This last question is important from two perspectives. From an apologetic perspective, if we can’t distinguish supernatural psychological events from natural ones, then we can’t use them as evidence for the supernatural. And from a spiritual perspective, if we can’t tell the miraculous psychological events from the ordinary ones, then it’s impossible to know if we’ve really had a special experience of God or if we only think we have. I especially wonder if it’s is all in our heads when I think about the fact that believers come up with positive explanations for both good and bad events. God is either blessing them or teaching them a lesson, but he never lets them down. How would we know if he had? It’s as if God’s faithfulness is nonfalsifiable. Predictably, it’s hard to have a spiritual life when you suspect that any spiritual meaning you find in your experiences might be illusory. ==== Effects—inertia, isolation, and laissez-faire evangelism ==== The result of all this is that I haven’t seen much spiritual growth in my life. I’m a decently good person, but you don’t have to be a Christian to be decently good. It seems to me that true spiritual growth should make one shockingly good, and I’m not that. It should at least bring you to a point that you wouldn’t have reached through the normal process of maturing. But when I look at my life, I don’t see much that’s specifically Christian about the ways that I’ve grown. And beyond general moral character, I also don’t see much progress in the ways I relate to God—worshiping, trusting, loving him, and so on. I admit, some of my behavior is motivated by a desire to obey Jesus. And it may be that some of the growth in my life has been supernatural and that God has worked in ways I’m not seeing right now. But in general, my progress in the spiritual life is lacking. These uncertainties and deficiencies also make fellowship with the Christian community difficult. I feel somewhat like an outsider in that way, but not a total outsider, more like someone on the periphery—a tangential Christian, you could say, or a minimalist Christian. People make statements about how God works in our lives or some other spiritual topic, and sometimes I can simply accept what they’re saying, but often I think, ''Well, maybe''. In those cases I can’t really share in their feelings of inspiration or add to them with insights or experiences of my own. In fact, sometimes I have to hold my tongue because I don’t want to ruin the moment with a discussion of my doubts. But it’s not only skepticism that hinders my fellowship. It seems that the standard levels of spiritual understanding or experience that evangelicals tend to expect from each other, I just don’t have, at least not in a way I can affirm with conviction. If I’m expected to give input in a spiritually oriented setting, I usually come up with something marginally acceptable and avoid talking about my real issues. These uncertainties and deficiencies, along with my uncertainties in theology and apologetics, also make it difficult to recommend Christianity to others, simply because I’m not quite sure what I’m offering, why they should believe it, what it’s supposed to do for them, or what they should do once they have it! I’m exaggerating somewhat, but since I don’t have a clear idea of what’s true right now, that’s my gut reaction when I think about evangelism. It’s one thing to believe Jesus is the Son of God for my own, idiosyncratic reasons. But to assert that belief as a fact to someone else is to imply that I can give reasons for believing it that should be adequate for anyone. I’m not to that point yet, so when I try to advocate Christianity to other people I feel at best clueless and tentative and at worst a little guilty. After all, implying that something is plainly true when I know I can barely defend it is tantamount to lying. ==== The persisting converse—vestigial spirituality and Christianity’s merit ==== Despite my confusion and doubt, I do still have my own, limited sense of spirituality. That’s why I described myself as a minimalist Christian. I am sometimes able, in the moment, to forget about my doubts and engage Christianity with the thin film of understanding that I have of its significance for my life. I still talk to God as if he is listening. My prayers are hardly profound; there is little emotion invested in them, and I don’t take extended time out specifically to pray. But I do speak (or rather think) to God briefly at random times because I think of him as being present and available to hear me. I still think of God as arranging my circumstances to foster my growth. I try to stay grateful for what I have and the good things that happen. I still take communion, and I take that time to reflect on Jesus’ death and my life and what might make the Lord’s supper as a ceremony mean something to me (''that'' been a lifelong struggle). I still participate in worship music. I do it rather mindlessly most of the time, and usually I see the lyrics more as nice ideas about God than as specific facts about him that I can wholeheartedly affirm, but sometimes the words mean something to me. Overall I do want to follow Jesus. And when I’m feeling especially in need of protection or comfort or forgiveness, it becomes very important to me for God to exist and to be with me and on my side. In those times, I experience my relationship with God as a need rather than as an obligation or an abstract ideal. Even with all my reservations, I still think that as a philosophy of life, Christianity in some forms has a lot to recommend itself. For instance, it has a very high view of human dignity and actually has a metaphysical reason for it (that humans were created by God in his image), whereas any naturalistic view of human dignity would have to be somwhat artificial and tenuous I think. Along with that, Christian teachings explicitly promote the formation of caring communities. Meanwhile, its Scriptures present a grand, intricate story with a richness of insight and symbolism that has allowed it to form a large part of the Western way of thinking (I can appreciate the depth and breadth of this story even if it doesn’t affect me as much as I’d like). And rather than calling suffering an illusion or telling people to rid themselves of desire, Christianity acknowledges and embraces the full range of human experience. The desires and behaviors it deems sinful, it views as corruptions of more basic aspects of human nature that it then tells us to put to higher uses (even if that’s really hard to do!). Not only does Christianity acknowledge and embrace human experience, but it amplifies and transforms it by relating that experience to a transcendent personal being. So a desire for safety becomes a trust in God’s providence. A need for personal purity and for harmony with others becomes a need for divine grace and reconciliation with God and his family. A desire for significance and purpose in life becomes a devotion to God and involvement in his activities in the world. Any positive event becomes an occasion for praise and thanksgiving to God. A time of suffering becomes an opportunity to identify with the sufferings of Jesus and to receive divine comfort that we can then pass on to others. A fear of death becomes a hope in eternal life—and not a disembodied spiritual existence, but a full-fledged life lived out in immortal bodies and in direct, unhindered fellowship with God. And this hope isn’t based on mere speculation but on an event in history—the resurrection of Jesus himself. It sounds great. Now I just have to figure out what it means, if it’s true, and how it all works out in practice! You could say I’m a seeker, though one who is beginning on the inside of Christianity rather than outside it. Maybe the best witness I can give right now is to the value of Christianity if true, and my best invitation is either to plunge right in or to embark on a journey of discovery. Join mine, if you like. === The way forward === What am I saying by all this, and what am I not saying? Well, if you haven’t caught on by now, I’m ''not'' saying that Christianity isn’t true and these are the reasons why. I’m only describing my current state of mind. I’m not saying these difficulties are insurmountable and I’m ready to deconvert. For all I know, the answers could be right in front of my nose. This essay is just an acknowledgment of work that needs to be done. It’s a midpoint, not an end point. Since I still consider these questions vitally important and there’s still so much I don’t know, there’s really nothing else to do but to pick up the search again. But where will I go from here, and how will I get there? In terms of that question, this essay is also something of a crossroads. I find several forces at work in my mind, pushing me in different directions. My desire to remain a Christian competes with my doubts and my sense of duty to investigate all the options and evaluate them impartially. And my desire to progress in some direction is impeded by a sense of futility and the distraction of other interests. ==== The problem of motivation ==== You would think that with all these vitally important issues unresolved, I would be desperately scouring the library for answers, having nervous breakdowns, and so on. But I’m not, and there are several reasons for this. First, I’m used to these questions. I’ve been looking into issues of apologetics, theology, and spirituality on and off for a long time, so this is all kind of old hat to me. Now, back when I was in college and first discovering that Christians disagree with each other about everything—even basic, important things like how to live as a Christian—I ''was'' in crisis. But eventually I decided that it wasn’t helpful to take everything so seriously and be confused and panicked all the time; that no matter how desperate I felt, I wasn’t going to find the answers I needed overnight; and that I could live some form of the Christian life even before I had all the answers. So I calmed down and settled into the search. And then a while after that, I got tired of repeatedly believing people’s opinions and then realizing I didn’t have proof for them; and with school in the way I didn’t have time to investigate everything seriously, so I put it all on hold until I could give more attention to it and then went on with my life. Second, I’m lacking one of the factors that causes people to go into a panic when they have doubts in the first place. That is the feeling that their Christian faith is their most cherished possession and they couldn’t bear to live without it. I used to have the same feeling, but as I’ve said, my grasp on the meaning of Christianity for my life has weakened considerably. I do think Christianity is deeply meaningful, but mostly in an abstract sense. My task is to discover or rediscover that meaning. I’m ''pursuing'' a sense of Christianity’s value rather than trying to preserve a sense I already have. But if it turned out that Christianity wasn’t true and naturalism was, well, it probably wouldn’t be that much different from my experience of life right now, aside from any social pressure I would then feel to continue espousing Christianity. As I keep saying, however, hopefully that won’t be the case and I will be awakened to more of the reality of God in my life. Finally, since I tend to be equally convinced by the arguments on all sides of an issue—or rather, since I tend to feel that the evidence for any position on a debatable issue is too weak to be conclusive—I have this feeling that the answers can’t be found, which makes me much less eager to try. I think that’s what drove me in my earlier forays into apologetics, theology, and spirituality—the idea that the answers were there to be found. I had been promised buried treasure, so I dug as fast as I could. And I did find a few gold coins and some nickels and dimes, but not the rich trove I was expecting. Some of the gold coins weren’t even real; they were just those chocolate coins with the gold-colored wrappers. Tasty, but not as valuable as they looked at first. So now if I keep digging, it will be because I’m forcing myself, because I know it’s important to see if anything is there, not because I have a good idea of the spectacular things I’ll find. Meanwhile, other things in my life that seem more achievable are attempting to attract my attention. So my mind isn’t roiling with all these doubts and questions. What I do feel is a subtle pressure in the back of my mind to get these issues resolved. I feel like my life can’t truly progress in any fundamental sense until I do, though I expect to be addressing them ''as'' the rest of my life progresses. ==== Paths to knowledge ==== Let’s assume that I can push through my lack of motivation and get somewhere with my questions. How should I proceed? Well, guess what. Not only do people have different ideas about ultimate truth, they even have different ideas about how to find it. It’s one of the basic epistemological questions: What are the sources of knowledge? For the answer to this, the primary options in the history of philosophy have been the senses and reason, as preferred by empiricism and rationalism, respectively. But there are other possible sources of knowledge. One is mystical experience—direct encounters with God or the infinite, whatever the mystic understands that to be. And another source is the pronouncements of an authority, such as the Bible or the church councils. The investigative approach that’s considered the proper one depends somewhat on the worldview you’re aiming for. Naturalism would call for something like empiricism, while certain Eastern philosophies would consider mysticism a more appropriate vehicle for truth. But I suspect that opinions differ within those worldviews. I know they differ within Christianity. Yes, Christians disagree on their basic epistemology along with everything else. Some emphasize the use of evidence because of the fact that Christianity is a historical religion. Others attempt to rely solely on an authoritative source for their spiritual information—the Bible and perhaps the church. And some believe that the spiritual nature of our relationship with God means that our faith should rely on mysticism. Which view is right? Who knows. I’ll figure it out later. For now I can only be what I am, and what I am is an American who grew up in a scientifically minded household and has had two decades of thoroughly Western education. For most kinds of knowledge I trust introspection, analytic philosophy, and the scientific method. I also like to explore new ideas and try to keep an open mind, though I like to come to conclusions eventually. That’s my basic methodological starting point. As I go along I’ll investigate others. But, obviously, one thing I won’t do is to simply take anyone’s word as the absolute truth without discussion. I’ve tried that already. I would like to mention one other path to knowledge that I’m borrowing from Dallas Willard, among others. He says, “[Jesus’] way is self-validating to anyone who will openly and persistently put it into practice.” The idea is that as we practice Jesus’ way of life, “we gain insight into how and why his path works and receive a power far beyond ourselves” (“Foreword,” ''The Spirit of the Disciplines''). C. S. Lewis expands this to a general principle in “Meditation in a Toolshed” (''God in the Dock''). Looking ''along'' a beam of light toward its source gives you a very different experience and body of knowledge than merely looking ''at'' it. Being open to experiences gained through action can lead to new understanding. Now, I can’t say that I’m open to every experience under the sun. But as long as I’m trying to gain a better grasp on Christianity and to find as much truth in it as I can, I might as well include Christian practice among my research methods, especially since Christian practice is one of the puzzles I’m trying to sort out. And even though I won’t just take people’s word for it when they give me their views, I might try out their ideas experimentally. What will I study? For now I plan to concentrate on the topics that are the most uniquely Christian and the most fundamental to investigating worldviews and Christianity in particular. That means I’ll be looking at the issues surrounding the authority of the Bible and probably the church, the life and teachings of Jesus, the resurrection, miracles, some of the theistic and atheistic arguments, religious pluralism, and the nature of religious knowledge. And I’ll explore Christian spiritual formation. Yes, this could all take several lifetimes. I’ll try to reach some conclusions before then! I’ll probably put off theological debates until later, such as the mode of baptism or even Calvinism and Arminianism. There are also some apologetic debates I’ll put off, such as creationism. I see theistic evolution as a legitimate option, though if I ever thought I’d become an atheist, I’d need to study this issue to make sure creationism could be safely buried. ==== Loyalty and truth revisited ==== And how will I reconcile my loyalty to Christianity with my desire to find the truth, whatever it might be? It may be that they are simply incompatible and that I’ll have to alternate between wanting to believe in Christianity and being coldly indifferent to it as I consider the merits of other options. But a search for truth isn’t the kind of task that requires swinging back and forth between absolute acceptance of a possibility and absolute rejection of it. There’s a wait-and-see element. In this respect a sporting event offers a helpful parallel. The fans are cheering for their own team, and throughout the game they are clearly biased toward their victory; but if by the end of the game their team has clearly lost, they’re not going to pretend that they’ve won. In my case I’m not the most energetic fan, but I still want Christianity to win. Even though my faith has been eroded and dispirited, I still think Christianity holds some promise, and I consider it the richest and most noble thing around, so I want to give it the best chance I can. I might not stay an inerrantist. I might not even stay an evangelical, though that would be nice. But I hope my investigations will allow me to remain within Christianity for as long as possible, which of course, in the Christian scheme of things, is forever. [[Category:Religion]] 194fa3e7cfafe3355d65d011b0bd22b4b9ecf812 0 22 114 45 2014-05-07T04:48:45Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the Religion, Site, and Obsolete categories. Fixed some spacing wikitext text/x-wiki This is an index page from an old version of this site. [[Christianity Introduction]] [http://del.icio.us/thinkulum/Christianity Christianity links] [[On Being an Agnostic Christian]] (added 5-13-06)<br/> A long essay on the current state of my faith, mostly dealing with the conflict between belief and doubt. It provides a context for much of what will happen in this section. [[On Being an Agnostic Christian: The Severely Abridged Version|OBAC: The Severely Abridged Version]] (added 6-6-06)<br/> If you don’t have time to read the original, try this one. === Spirituality === [[Spirituality Introduction]] === Apologetics === [[Apologetics Introduction]] === Evangelism === [[Evangelism Introduction]] === Hermeneutics === [[Hermeneutics Introduction]] === Theology === [[Theology Introduction]] [[My Current Theology]] (added 7-17-05) [[Category:Religion]] [[Category:Site]] [[Category:Obsolete]] 349346d922f8571631fe4a8e74347c42fdaef9e9 0 37 115 75 2014-05-07T04:49:06Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the Religion category. wikitext text/x-wiki Version 1.0, 3-20-05 Theology has gone on mostly in the background of my life. It’s not endlessly fascinating to me like other topics, but I still consider it important. I first noticed theology in high school when I read some discussions about Calvinism on an apologetics mailing list. I had grown up in a tacitly Arminian, Southern Baptist church, and Calvinism seemed rather repugnant to me. Still, when I read certain parts of the Bible, they did sound suspiciously Calvinist. So I got myself to the point of at least not ''minding'' Calvinist doctrines and then sat myself squarely on the fence. My first semester at college, in the midst of various discussions with my friends, I drifted off the fence and down onto the Reformed side of the lawn. By a happy coincidence, my professor for Theology of Culture happened to be ''very'' Reformed, and through his lectures I was introduced to the wonder of Reformed theology. Reformed theology inspired me. Its God was ''huge''. He was sovereign without limit, able to bring about all his purposes, utterly worthy of worship. Someone once observed that people who come into Reformed theology from other realms often describe their experience in terms of a second conversion. That’s certainly the way it was for me. The summer after that school year I didn’t find a job, so most of that free time was spent reading. There’s a cornucopia of Reformed theology on the web, and I just devoured it. One of my key sources was the [http://www.alliancenet.org/ Alliance of Confessing Evangelicals]. They were very helpful because they contrasted Reformed teachings with the kinds of ideas I had grown up with (and contrast is one helpful way to achieve clarity!). At my friend’s Presbyterian church there was a saying: “There’s no one more obnoxious than a newly converted Calvinist.” All through that next year I could have been a poster child for the Obnoxious Baby Calvinists’ Guild. I criticized Arminianism right and left. But I can never stay committed to any point of view for too long; I just think too much. So over time I mellowed out, partly because I came to believe that Calvinism wasn’t quite so earth-shatteringly important and partly because I was entering a more questioning period in general. Everything was up for review. Not all at once, however, so the opinions that had to wait in line, such as Calvinism, only got very quiet. That, in fact, is the situation I am in now. I still have my beliefs, but I also believe that true knowledge, especially theological knowledge, is pretty hard to come by. A lot of people are very confident that they have it, but confidence alone isn’t a very good argument. Yet despite the difficulty, I still hold on to the thought that the truth is findable and that it is important. So I will keep searching. [[Category:Religion]] a7b7b648e5d07605887f05f2e5856eb070595a13 0 27 116 55 2014-05-07T04:49:21Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the Religion category. wikitext text/x-wiki Version 1.0, 3-20-05 My senior year of college I started an accelerated masters program at Wheaton in New Testament, which I exchanged for their new Biblical Exegesis program a couple of years later because that program also covered the Old Testament. I thought I wanted to end up working in some branch of practical theology, but that’s not where I wanted to start. Being a thorough sort of person, I believed that the large-scale ideas of theology have to be built on the tiny details of the biblical text. This called for interpretation, or the more technical term, exegesis. Hermeneutics, as I use the word, is a more general term for the theory of interpretation, while exegesis is the process of interpretation itself or the end result of that process. I had already been thinking about interpretative methods for a few years. I didn’t do much Bible study growing up, but when I got to college and became interested in theology, I thought Bible study would be a good thing to get into. My wandering attempts to do this received a boost when I planted myself at Trinity Baptist Church. Our pastor was really into expositional preaching, and Bible study was the major activity of the church as a whole, so I was exposed to a lot of it. Gradually I got an idea of how it worked. And as with everything, it got me asking questions. Why did we ask ''this'' question of the text and not this other one? Why did we zero in on these particular features? Why do we assume the writer laid out the book ''this'' way? And so on. While my graduate program did teach me the tools of exegesis, there’s only so much you can learn in a class. In these courses we were hard at work learning the exegetical techniques of our professors. These techniques belonged to an interpretative approach called the historical-grammatical method. Historical-grammatical interpretation analyzes the language of the text and tries to understand the text based on its historical context. This method seemed like a perfectly natural way to interpret things, but I wanted to know more about … ''the others''. In our biblical criticism classes, we learned about other methods of biblical interpretation, both current and past. As it was explained to us, critical interpretation of the Scripture began around the Enlightenment (“critical” in the sense of “involving careful judgment,” usually judgment about things like the historical circumstances of the work and how it was composed). Thinkers of the time were throwing off the shackles of human institutions, all institutions, including the church. Their goal was to submit only to the authority of reason. Thus, they decided that the Bible was ''just another human book'', not a divinely inspired one. Instead of simply believing it, therefore, they began evaluating it to sort out the true from the false. The idea was that once they knew how the Bible had come to be written and which parts were true, they would know how to interpret it and make it useful for modern society. In the process they came up with a succession of critical approaches to biblical interpretation, each one gaining acceptance and then giving way to a new approach as the old one’s flaws became evident. These critical approaches were obviously unacceptable to many conservative Christians, who attacked them vigorously, especially in the early twentieth century. Evangelicals today do use these critical methods but typically in modified forms that are more friendly toward inerrancy. These days the big deal is reader-response criticism, which is actually an outgrowth of postmodernism rather than modernism. While the earlier methods were a problem, at least as they were originally conceived, reader-response seemed to be public enemy number one for my evangelical professors. The main question in this debate is whether we can know what the “authorial intent” of the text was–what the author meant by what he wrote–and whether it’s important in the first place. The historical-grammatical critics say we ''can'' know it and it’s ''very'' important, and the postmodern critics say we can’t and it isn’t. Well, I’m all for the historical-grammatical method, but it seems strange to me that when it came to interpreting any particular passage, not only was there no consensus in my classes, but there was no agreement among the professional commentators either. Don’t take that too far, by the way. I don’t mean each commentator had a totally different opinion on every little point, only that I was surprised at the number of places they disagreed and how widely their interpretations could differ. It made the text seem very unclear. So I’m curious about these “heretical” interpretative methods, both modern and postmodern. What can be said for and against them? Our discussions in the exegesis program were good, but the theoretical courses covered too much ground to deal with everything to my satisfaction, and the practical courses were less concerned with these questions. So I am left to my own devices, which is what I prefer anyway. [[Category:Religion]] 8c992b35ee2da94c5857b180d3146182977359b4 0 47 117 95 2014-05-07T04:49:35Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the Religion category. wikitext text/x-wiki Version 1.0, 1/1/2010 It’s the start of a new year, and you may be thinking about reading through the Bible. If you’d like a more vigorous reading plan than usual, try this one. It’ll take you through the whole Bible in 90 days. If you want to do a “quick” overview study of the Bible, this is one way to make your way through it. If you are creating a long Bible-related work, such as a commentary, this list may also be suitable for dividing your work into more manageable volumes. Each day’s reading is not of equal length. I tried to avoid ending a day’s reading in the middle of a narrative or discourse or starting it in the middle of one book and ending in the middle of another, which meant stretching some readings and shrinking others. I also used whole chapters throughout the plan so it could easily be used with audio Bibles, which are often divided by chapter. The days cover about 5,000 to 10,000 words each, with most in the 7,000- to 8,000-word range. For most people 5,000 to 10,000 words translates into about 30 minutes to an hour of reading. {| class="wikitable sortable toptextcells" |- ! '''Day''' ! '''Text''' |- | 1 | Genesis 1-16 |- | 2 | Genesis 17-28 |- | 3 | Genesis 29-39 |- | 4 | Genesis 40-50 |- | 5 | Exodus 1-13 |- | 6 | Exodus 14-27 |- | 7 | Exodus 28-40 |- | 8 | Leviticus 1-15 |- | 9 | Leviticus 16-27 |- | 10 | Numbers 1-10 |- | 11 | Numbers 11-24 |- | 12 | Numbers 25-36 |- | 13 | Deuteronomy 1-11 |- | 14 | Deuteronomy 12-26 |- | 15 | Deuteronomy 27-34 |- | 16 | Joshua 1-12 |- | 17 | Joshua 13-24 |- | 18 | Judges 1-12 |- | 19 | Judges 13-Ruth 4 |- | 20 | 1 Samuel 1-15 |- | 21 | 1 Samuel 16-31 |- | 22 | 2 Samuel 1-12 |- | 23 | 2 Samuel 13-24 |- | 24 | 1 Kings 1-7 |- | 25 | 1 Kings 8-14 |- | 26 | 1 Kings 15-22 |- | 27 | 2 Kings 1-13 |- | 28 | 2 Kings 14-25 |- | 29 | 1 Chronicles 1-9 |- | 30 | 1 Chronicles 10-20 |- | 31 | 1 Chronicles 21-29 |- | 32 | 2 Chronicles 1-16 |- | 33 | 2 Chronicles 17-32 |- | 34 | 2 Chronicles 33-Ezra 10 |- | 35 | Nehemiah |- | 36 | Esther |- | 37 | Job 1-21 |- | 38 | Job 22-42 |- | 39 | Psalms 1-22 |- | 40 | Psalms 23-41 |- | 41 | Psalms 42-72 |- | 42 | Psalms 73-89 |- | 43 | Psalms 90-106 |- | 44 | Psalms 107-125 |- | 45 | Psalms 126-150 |- | 46 | Proverbs 1-16 |- | 47 | Proverbs 17-31 |- | 48 | Ecclesiastes-Song of Songs |- | 49 | Isaiah 1-12 |- | 50 | Isaiah 13-27 |- | 51 | Isaiah 28-39 |- | 52 | Isaiah 40-53 |- | 53 | Isaiah 54-66 |- | 54 | Jeremiah 1-10 |- | 55 | Jeremiah 11-23 |- | 56 | Jeremiah 24-31 |- | 57 | Jeremiah 32-39 |- | 58 | Jeremiah 40-49 |- | 59 | Jeremiah 50-Lamentations 5 |- | 60 | Ezekiel 1-15 |- | 61 | Ezekiel 16-24 |- | 62 | Ezekiel 25-36 |- | 63 | Ezekiel 37-48 |- | 64 | Daniel 1-6 |- | 65 | Daniel 7-12 |- | 66 | Hosea |- | 67 | Joel-Obadiah |- | 68 | Jonah-Zephaniah |- | 69 | Haggai-Malachi |- | 70 | Matthew 1-16 |- | 71 | Matthew 17-28 |- | 72 | Mark 1-7 |- | 73 | Mark 8-16 |- | 74 | Luke 1-8 |- | 75 | Luke 9-18 |- | 76 | Luke 19-24 |- | 77 | John 1-10 |- | 78 | John 11-21 |- | 79 | Acts 1-14 |- | 80 | Acts 15-28 |- | 81 | Romans |- | 82 | 1 Corinthians |- | 83 | 2 Corinthians |- | 84 | Galatians-Ephesians |- | 85 | Philippians-2 Thessalonians |- | 86 | 1 Timothy-Philemon |- | 87 | Hebrews-James |- | 88 | 1 Peter-Jude |- | 89 | Revelation 1-11 |- | 90 | Revelation 12-22 |} [[Category:Religion]] f86bdef8add565b507feec1455856c0d9ea1e3c6 0 33 118 67 2014-05-07T04:51:23Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the Philosophy category. wikitext text/x-wiki Version 1.2, 7-29-06 Philosophy can be thought of either as a way of thinking or as a specific set of topics to be thought about. The academic discipline of philosophy is made up of the latter and hopefully uses the former. I am made up of the former and sometimes drift into the latter. (That’s right! I am in fact an abstract thought process and not an embodied human being. The truth is out!) I’ve been a philosopher as long as I’ve been alive, but it wasn’t until recently that I recognized it as a distinct part of myself and gave myself the label. I just approach life philosophically. That is, I analyze things and think about their broader implications. As far as the actual discipline of philosophy goes, my formal education has been meager. Most of the philosophy I’ve learned has come from my own sporadic reading, and I still consider myself pretty new to it. But my primary loyalties are definitely with analytic philosophy. I think of myself as being interested in continental subjects while taking an analytic approach. I am grateful to Michael Martin, even though we are diametrically opposed on some major issues, for his ''Atheism: A Philosophical Justification'', which was my first real exposure to analytic philosophy and helped to kindle my love for it. A common way to organize philosophy as a discipline is to divide it into three categories: epistemology (the theory of knowledge), metaphysics (the theory of reality), and axiology (the theory of value). Not everything in philosophy fits neatly into those categories, but they are an easy way to get a handle on the subject. === Epistemology === Epistemology has by far the most draw for me and I’m sure will accumulate the most material. I ask epistemic questions always and about everything. How do I know which politician is telling me the truth? How do I know which car is the best one to buy? What criteria should I use when evaluating a movie? How did the characters in this novel know the correct solution to their problem? How do I know who is right in an interpersonal conflict? These are the kinds of questions that invariably pop into my mind whenever I face a new situation. In fact, epistemology is my philosophical starting point. Even though I know that any epistemological view will carry assumptions about metaphysics and axiology, I feel a need to answer questions about knowledge first and then use those answers to help me gain knowledge about existence and value. I have a hard time doing it the other way around. I want to deal with the more abstract questions of epistemology (can we trust our senses, and all that), but my main concerns are practical. I would like to come up with a generalized set of guidelines and procedures for investigating an issue from start to finish. They would cover things like the kinds of questions to ask about a topic, effective research methods, criteria for evaluating evidence and arguments, cognitive pitfalls to avoid, and the epistemic idiosyncracies of various subjects. For lack of a better term I’m calling this my “investigative process project.” I want to go beyond the basics, which are readily available anyway. I’m always discovering nuances as I observe people’s ways of dealing with issues, and this project is partly an effort to gather these observations in one place and to make them useful. It’s sort of a meta-project, since the process of investigation is involved any time anyone studies anything. I love reference works. Give me an encyclopedia and I’m happy. The problem is I have no good place to put such things on my website, and I’m not going to create a whole category just for reference. I already have enough categories already. So since general reference works have to do with knowledge, I’m just stuffing them in the epistemology section! You’ll notice I do that kind of thing a lot. === Metaphysics === About metaphysics I have mixed feelings. I like practicality and certainty, and metaphysical issues seem to teeter on the edge of complete irrelevance and unanswerability (I could probably say the same about some epistemological questions–but I won’t!). However, to be fair, some of the questions of metaphysics are ''somewhat'' relevant to everyday life (are people basically good or evil?). Some of them are only really relevant to other philosophical or theological questions, but some of those other questions can be important (for example, the nature of time is relevant to certain arguments about the existence and nature of God). And some seem relevant to philosophical reasoning in general (such as the distinction between necessary and contingent truths). Certain issues, like the question of determinism, I’m not sure can even be resolved, apart from divine revelation, if even then. Still, they are all questions I will try to address seriously at some point. I acknowledge my massive ignorance on the subject. === Axiology === Axiology can be divided into ethics, aesthetics, and politics. Here my feelings are even more divided. I care intensely about the value dimension of life (as I do about epistemology), but I have a certain despair about its arguability (as with metaphysics). With aesthetics it doesn’t matter so much. Getting your aesthetics wrong doesn’t usually carry serious consequences unless you’re a professional artist. With ethics, on the other hand, the issues are vitally important, both to me personally and to society in general. They pop up everywhere every day. Two problems haunt me when I consider interacting with other people about ethical issues. One is that I feel that people are very bad at discerning the real issues in most moral debates. The other is that even if they do understand them, agreement is impossible if the participants don’t share certain fundamental moral assumptions. So I tend to avoid moral debates because they’re just so complicated and frustrating and generally painful to me. Maybe I’ll be more willing to engage in them after I’ve fully investigated the issues on my own. Why do I have a whole page on my site called “Aesthetics” and then a subsection of my philosophy page for aesthetics? Well, it’s just another example of the contents of my mind trying to burst through the boxes I shove them into. The philosophy section is really the most natural home for a section on aesthetics. I just needed a term for my entertainment section that reflected the philosophical way I approach entertainment. My discussions of aesthetics in the philosophy section will be more general and theoretical, while the material in the main aesthetics section will be more practical. For convenience, I’m going to consider the philosophy of life to be a branch of ethics. One of my overarching aims in life is to understand the world so that I can fit myself into it. This amounts to forming a philosophy of life. It involves questions like, what is the meaning of life? What are its appropriate goals? What activities are worth spending one’s time on? These questions rival epistemology for the amount of thought I pour into them, so the material will probably pile up in this section as well. This topic overlaps significantly with spirituality. Politics can be thought of as ethics applied on a societal level. It can also be thought of as a social science, and I will dip into that aspect of the subject, but I’d rather have a single place to put it all, and I’m more a philosopher than a social scientist. It may be a while before I write much in this section. I’m a complete novice when it comes to thinking about politics because it’s only been in the past couple of years that I’ve begun paying much attention to it, so for now I’m much more of an observer than a debater, and my interests within the subject are rather vague. Topics on the national and international levels appeal to me, whereas local politics tends to leave me yawning. I think it’s because national and international politics are more dramatic and seem to more directly reflect the fundamental issues in political philosophy. As for my basic position, I was raised a conservative, and I’m happy to remain one unless my studies convince me otherwise. However, my feelings about politics are a lot like my feelings about ethics, only less intense. The issues are important, but the answers are hard to nail down. Despite the tension and frustration it sometimes puts me through, I like philosophy. It is the best way I have for dealing with life. I used to think I might make it my career, but now I’m thinking about psychology. Whatever I end up doing, I will do it using philosophy’s tools. [[Category:Philosophy]] 00eec83c6cf539dad1e75f1c7a68d651b253786d 133 118 2014-05-13T03:29:56Z Andy Culbertson 1 Updated the contents. wikitext text/x-wiki Philosophy can be thought of either as a way of thinking or as a specific set of topics to be thought about. The academic discipline of philosophy is made up of the latter and hopefully uses the former. I am made up of the former and sometimes drift into the latter. (That’s right! I am in fact an abstract thought process and not an embodied human being. The truth is out!) I’ve been a philosopher as long as I’ve been alive, but it wasn’t until about ten years ago that I recognized it as a distinct part of myself and gave myself the label. I just approach life philosophically. That is, I analyze things and think about their broader implications. As far as the actual discipline of philosophy goes, my formal education has been meager. Most of the philosophy I’ve learned has come from my own sporadic reading, and I still consider myself pretty new to it. But my primary loyalties are definitely with analytic philosophy. I think of myself as being interested in continental subjects while taking an analytic approach. I am grateful to Michael Martin, even though we are diametrically opposed on some major issues, for his ''Atheism: A Philosophical Justification'', which was my first real exposure to analytic philosophy and helped to kindle my love for it. A common way to organize philosophy as a discipline is to divide it into three categories: epistemology (the theory of knowledge), metaphysics (the theory of reality), and axiology (the theory of value). Not everything in philosophy fits neatly into those categories, but they are an easy way to get a handle on the subject. === Epistemology === Epistemology has by far the most draw for me and I’m sure will accumulate the most material. I ask epistemic questions always and about everything. How do I know which politician is telling me the truth? How do I know which car is the best one to buy? What criteria should I use when evaluating a movie? How did the characters in this novel know the correct solution to their problem? How do I know who is right in an interpersonal conflict? These are the kinds of questions that invariably pop into my mind whenever I face a new situation. In fact, epistemology is my philosophical starting point. Even though I know that any epistemological view will carry assumptions about metaphysics and axiology, I feel a need to answer questions about knowledge first and then use those answers to help me gain knowledge about existence and value. I have a hard time doing it the other way around. I do want to deal with the more abstract questions of epistemology (can we trust our senses, and all that), but my main concerns are practical. I would like to come up with a generalized set of guidelines and procedures for investigating an issue from start to finish. They would cover things like the kinds of questions to ask about a topic, effective research methods, criteria for evaluating evidence and arguments, cognitive pitfalls to avoid, and the epistemic idiosyncracies of various subjects. For lack of a better term I’m calling this my “investigative process project.” I want to go beyond the basics of research, which plenty of others have written about already. I’m always discovering nuances as I observe people’s ways of dealing with issues, and this project is partly an effort to gather these observations in one place and to make them useful. It’s sort of a meta-project, since the process of investigation is involved any time anyone studies anything. === Metaphysics === About metaphysics I have mixed feelings. Some questions in this area fascinate me (What is the universe fundamentally made of? What is consciousness?). But I also like practicality and certainty, and metaphysical issues seem to teeter on the edge of complete irrelevance and unanswerability (I could probably say the same about some epistemological questions–but I won’t!). However, to be fair, some of the questions of metaphysics are ''somewhat'' relevant to everyday life (Are people basically good or evil?). Some of them are only really relevant to other philosophical or theological questions, but some of those other questions can be important (for example, the nature of time is relevant to certain arguments about the existence and nature of God). And some seem relevant to philosophical reasoning in general (such as the distinction between necessary and contingent truths). Certain issues, like the question of determinism, I’m not sure can even be resolved, apart from divine revelation, if even then. Still, they are all questions I will try to address seriously at some point. I acknowledge my massive ignorance on the subject. === Axiology === Axiology can be divided into ethics, aesthetics, and politics. Here my feelings are even more divided. I care intensely about the value dimension of life (as I do about epistemology), but I have a certain despair about its arguability (as with metaphysics). With aesthetics it doesn’t matter so much. Getting your aesthetics wrong doesn’t usually carry serious consequences unless you’re a professional artist. With ethics, on the other hand, the issues are vitally important, both to me personally and to society in general. They pop up everywhere every day. Two problems haunt me when I consider interacting with other people about ethical issues. One is that I feel that people are very bad at discerning the real issues in most moral debates. The other is that even if they do understand them, agreement is impossible if the participants don’t share certain fundamental moral assumptions. So I tend to avoid moral debates because they’re just so complicated and frustrating and generally painful to me. Maybe I’ll be more willing to engage in them after I’ve fully investigated the issues on my own. I have a whole section of this site devoted to the arts, and I used to call that section “Aesthetics,” even though I also had a subsection of my philosophy page with the same name. It was just another example of the contents of my mind trying to burst through the boxes I shove them into. My discussions of aesthetics in the philosophy section will be more general and theoretical, while the material in the arts section will be more practical. For convenience, I’m going to consider the philosophy of life to be a branch of ethics. One of my overarching aims in life is to understand the world so that I can fit myself into it. This amounts to forming a philosophy of life. It involves questions like, what is the meaning of life? What are its appropriate goals? What activities are worth spending one’s time on? These questions rival epistemology for the amount of thought I pour into them, so the material will probably pile up in this section as well. This topic overlaps significantly with spirituality. Politics can be thought of as ethics applied on a societal level. It can also be thought of as a social science, and I will dip into that aspect of the subject, but I’d rather have a single place to put it all, and I’m more a philosopher than a social scientist. It may be a while before I write much in this section. My interests within the subject are rather vague, and so is my knowledge of it. Topics on the national and international levels appeal to me, whereas local politics tends to leave me yawning. I think it’s because national and international politics are more dramatic and seem to more directly reflect the fundamental issues in political philosophy. As for my basic position, I was raised a conservative, and while I still am fairly conservative, I've been slowly drifting left over the past few years. However, my feelings about politics are a lot like my feelings about ethics, only less intense. The issues are important, but the answers are hard to nail down. Despite the tension and frustration it sometimes puts me through, I like philosophy. It is the best way I have for dealing with life. I used to think I might make it my career, but now I’m headed for computer science. Whatever I end up doing, I will do it using philosophy’s tools. [[Category:Philosophy]] b3ac6243036f1129834a95ce86c2921a1aa17a32 0 32 119 65 2014-05-07T04:51:52Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the Philosophy, Site, and Obsolete categories. wikitext text/x-wiki This is an index page from an old version of this site. [[Philosophy Introduction]] [http://del.icio.us/thinkulum/philosophy Philosophy links] === Epistemology === === Metaphysics === === Aesthetics === === Ethics === === Politics === [[Category:Philosophy]] [[Category:Site]] [[Category:Obsolete]] dfb912854de0008c6b5b1936a24f7b665f191519 0 44 120 89 2014-05-07T04:54:32Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the Social science category. wikitext text/x-wiki Version 1.0, 5-12-07 In addition to the inspiring stories, perspective-altering advice, Life Design Models, and career possibilities Barbara Sher serves her readers, ''Refuse to Choose'' also contains about forty tools that Scanners can put to work when they need a little organization or motivation. These tools are listed in an index in the back. Unfortunately, in spite of the creative names she has given them, I had a hard time remembering when I should use each tool. Hence, I have added descriptions of the circumstances in which each tool would be helpful, based on Barbara’s discussions. {| class="wikitable sortable toptextcells" |- ! If ! Then You Need The ! See Page(s) |- | You don’t finish what you start because you don’t have a clear sense of direction | 15-Month Goal Calendar (use it with the Rotating Priorities Board) | 152 |- | You have many interests that you’d like to explore deeply, but you don’t have time | 20 or 30 Three-Ring Binders | 84, 157–158, 174, 253 |- | You have ideas you want to put into action, but you’re anxious about it and/or you have trouble keeping in mind what you need to do | Appointment Planner (use it with the Success Team) | 95 |- | # You’re disorganized and spend too much time getting the materials together for your projects, or # You find that you’ve neglected your projects for a while and you miss them | Avocation Station (use it with the Setup) | 153–156 |- | You think about your ideas but don’t get around to doing anything about them | Backward Planning Flowchart (use it with the Real Deadline) | 91–95, 97, 98 |- | You are interested in practically everything and you want to study each of those things deeply, but that’s impossible, so you don’t do any of it | Big List | 77–79 |- | You feel you can’t pursue your interests because it would be irresponsible | “Busting Open Either/Or Thinking” Game | 127–128 |- | # You’re trying to decide on a (temporary) career, or # You want to explore a variety of new fields or jobs | Career Tryout | 56–57, 207 |- | Ideas enter and leave your mind too quickly without being written down, so you forget them, can’t show them to anybody, can’t do anything with them, and start to forget who you are | Catalog of Ideas with Potential | 244–245 |- | You have an idea for a project | Da Vinci Write-Up (use it with the Scanner Daybook or the 20 or 30 Three-Ring Binders) | 11–17, 110, 243–244 |- | You live two lives, and you want to keep your gear for your other life in one place while you’re waiting to get to it | Destination Steamer Trunks | 139–140 |- | You’re doing a project you intend to finish, and you need a little pressure to keep you going | Down-to-the-Wire Tear-Off Calendar | 251 |- | You want to find out what your interests have in common so you can find a job that matches that theme | “Everything I Don’t Want” List | 216–217 |- | You can’t fit all your interests into one job (and maybe you don’t want to be pressured to do those things anyway), yet you still need to pay the bills | Good Enough Job | 60, 136–137, 143, 159, 233–235, 264 |- | You can’t keep track of your ideas or follow up on your interests | Interest Index Binder | 83–84 |- | # You need to test your Setups, or # You have neglected your projects and you miss them | Kitchen Timer (use it with the Avocation Station) | 155 |- | You want to find a career that can use all your experiences, or you’d like to find a theme to your interests, but you tend to get lazy about writing | Letters from the Field (use it with the Web E-mail Account) | 189–190, 225 |- | You need to adjust your environment, schedule, and/or career to give you the ability to pursue all your interests | Life Design Model | 128–129 |- | You finish a project, either completely or via a Scanner’s Finish, and especially if you aren’t used to appreciating your own wonderful mind or you think you never accomplish anything | Life’s Work Bookshelf | 112–113, 210, 236–237, 252 |- | You’ve started a lot of projects you haven’t finished and your home is cluttered with them, and you’re embarrassed by it | Living Quarters Map | 17–19 |- | You’re afraid of committing to a job long term because you know you’ll get bored with it | LTTL (Learn, Try, Teach, Leave) System | 58–59, 169–171 |- | You have a lot of stress and anxiety because you’re so busy all the time | Micro Nervous Breakdown | 66–67 |- | You keep accumulating a variety of skills and experiences, but it would look bad to put them all on your résumé | Never-Ending Résumé | 188 |- | # You’re very busy and you want to capture your ideas while you’re out and about, and especially if # You need to take a break now and then to think about something else | Portable Dream Deck (use it with the Alternating Current Life Design Model or just by itself) | 69, 167 |- | You finish a project, either completely or via a Scanner’s Finish, and you want a creative way to display it | Private Museum | 237 |- | You have interests that are too 3-D to put in a binder | Project Box | 157 |- | You need some accountability to keep you moving toward your goal | Real Deadline | 91, 94, 95, 97, 99, 250–252 |- | You can’t decide if your idea is a good or bad one just by thinking about it | Reality Research | 97–99 |- | # You feel guilty about jumping from one thing to another, especially if you don’t finish your projects, # You want to design a life that will fit your particular interests, or # You want to know how far to pursue an interest, especially if you’re afraid you have too many | Rewards and Durations | 29–36, 38, 79–81, 103, 117 |- | You’re juggling several projects, and your interest level for each one is unpredictable, so you don’t know how to prioritize them from day to day | Rotating Priorities Board (use it with the 15-Month Goal Calendar) | 152–153 |- | # You feel ashamed of the way you dabble in many different subjects, and you avoid getting involved in new subjects because you have too many interests and projects already, especially if you haven’t finished the ones you’re working on, # You tend to get ideas and then lose them, # You’re doing a Scanner exercise from ''Refuse to Choose!'' or taking notes on something Scanner related, # You’ve been neglecting or undervaluing certain sides of you, # You want to understand what interests you, what causes you to lose interest, and the way your mind works, # You want to capture the excitement you feel when coming up with a project, # You want to preserve your ideas for posterity, # You’ve been too busy to come up with any projects or to let your mind wander, # You just want to have fun in Scanner fashion, # You want to find a theme to your interests, or # You’re returning to Scanner mode after doing your Best Work | Scanner Daybook (use it with the Da Vinci Write-Up) | 11–20, 24–25, 33, 36, 57, 68, 77–79, 105, 109, 110, 140, 155, 156, 165, 167, 198, 209, 213, 225, 244–245, 252 |- | You have several projects you want to work on, but you can’t organize your time well enough to juggle them | Scanner Planner (use it with the School Day Life Design Model) | 146–148 |- | You have a project that you feel bad about not finishing, but you’re not interested enough to keep working on it | Scanner’s Finish (use it with the Life’s Work Bookshelf) | 111–112, 210 |- | You’re really busy and have only two minutes here and there to work on your projects | Setup | 69–70, 153 |- | # You finish a project (typically something you’ve made) and you want to show off the results, or # You need some accountability to keep you moving toward your goal | Show-and-Tell Party | 237–238, 250–251 |- | You want to learn and do a lot of different things, and you think informal learning would work better than college classes | Soiree | 230–231 |- | You learn something that calms your Scanner Panic | Sticky Notes | 47 |- | You need accountability and moral support to keep you moving toward your goal | Success Team | 92, 94–95, 99 |- | You keep accumulating a variety of skills and experiences, but it would look bad to put them all on your résumé | Three Scanner Résumés | 266–267 |- | You’re afraid you’ll never get to do everything you want to do | Wall Calendar Poster | 45–47, 138–139, 140 |- | You need a convenient place from which to write your Letters from the Field | Web E-mail Account (use it with the Letters from the Field) | 189–190, 225 |- | You think you haven’t accomplished much in your life | “What Have I Done So Far?” List | 24–25 |} [[Category:Social science]] 917bb41966926483960fdaebc3bdfa540574aa8d 0 34 121 69 2014-05-07T04:55:13Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the Social science, Site, and Obsolete categories. Fixed some spacing. wikitext text/x-wiki This is an index page from an old version of this site. [[Psychology Introduction]] [http://del.icio.us/thinkulum/psychology Psychology links] === Psychotherapy === === Personality === ==== Scanners ==== [[Reflections on Barbara Sher's Refuse to Choose|Reflections on Barbara Sher’s Refuse to Choose]] (added 4-29-07)<br/> A rambling review of Barbara Sher’s book on Scanners, who are people who have many interests and an inner compulsion to follow them all. They tend to have trouble settling down into one career. Sher says they don’t have to! [[The Annotated Scanner's Toolbox|The Annotated Scanner’s Toolbox]] (added 5-12-07)<br/> A modified version of the tools index in ''Refuse to Choose''. I added descriptions of the reasons you might use each tool. === Education === === Cognitive === === Interpersonal === === Social science === [[Category:Social science]] [[Category:Site]] [[Category:Obsolete]] adaa0b9d659379a15ade4bb79bfeb50408446c8e 0 48 122 97 2014-05-07T04:55:54Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the Social science category. wikitext text/x-wiki Version 0.1.0, 2012-03-29 === Motivation === My mind is like a murky lake. Along the shore are ropes leading into the water, and at the submerged end of each rope is a net. The ends I can see are questions life asks me that I need to answer from the contents of my mind, and the nets contain the answers I can provide. The ropes are of different lengths, and the nets are of different sizes. The big nets contain detailed and extensive answers, and the small ones contain little but ignorance. The short ropes lead to answers I know that I know and can pull to shore readily. The long ropes are the scary ones. Until the nets have emerged, I never truly know how long the ropes are or what will be at the end. Maybe the nets will have the answers I need; maybe they’ll be disappointingly, frighteningly lacking. Maybe the nets will reach the shore by the time I need the answers; maybe the ropes will be too long for the time I have to pull them. I don’t know how much information is in my mind to meet the needs of the moment or how long it will take to retrieve it. All this would be fine, except that most of the things I like to do—synthesizing and discussing ideas, programming, being a resource of information for people—require a memory that is clear and reliable, if I want to do them well. And I do. Plus, I like the sense of clarity, awareness, and familiarity I get from knowing things about the world around me. I’ve had this gripe against my mind for over a decade, and I’ve finally decided to do something about it. I’m studying memory improvement techniques. It’s turning out to be a much more complex topic than I expected, but at this point I’ve gotten far enough to shape my basic ideas on the subject and to form some goals. So to give myself a milestone and something to show for my work so far, I’m writing for you this summary. Since this is an interim report, I’ll continue to develop these ideas as the project progresses. The concepts, terms, organization, and agenda are all subject to change. === Sources === Where am I getting my information? Two kinds of sources interest me: reports of scientific research on memory and popular memory improvement literature. I look at the research because I want my techniques to be grounded in reality rather than marketing hype. And I look at the popular literature because it offers creative examples for applying the techniques, which I can then analyze and generalize to create a more expansive and flexible system. For this project I started on the research end of the spectrum with Kenneth Higbee’s ''Your Memory: How It Works and How to Improve It'' and some of Alan Baddeley’s much more recent ''Your Memory: A User’s Guide''. At some point I would also like to read ''Mnemonology'' by James Worthen and R. Reed Hunt, which I found while writing this essay, to see how my ideas about the principles behind mnemonics stack up against actual research. But in this summary I’ll mainly be citing Higbee and my own experience, because the material I’ve read in Baddeley has been more specialized and not as applicable to the topics I’m covering here. On the popular end, so far I’ve only dabbled in a few books and articles. === Overview === My project has a relatively narrow focus. Memory is a pervasive part of everything we do in everyday life, and there are several types of memory. But while it’s all important, I want to focus on ways to memorize information for long-term recall. I’m partly aiming for a computer programming approach to human memory. Programming is an excellent grid through which to examine many areas of life, especially areas that involve problem solving or designing systems that will perform tasks intelligently. It’s helpful for these purposes because it involves breaking down a domain into parts, relating them logically, and performing operations on them to achieve specific goals. It’s concrete and practical. Programming is especially good for dealing with human memory because computers have their own form of memory, and the tasks we need to perform with both types are largely the same. We need to store information, modify it, and retrieve it in various arrangements, though human memory certainly works differently from computer memory in some major ways. I’ll draw out these ideas as I go along. My overall approach is to view memory as an interconnected set of components that can nevertheless be treated modularly so they can be assembled to solve a large variety of problems. I divide my analysis of memory into three parts: the basic components that are involved storing and retrieving information in memory, the basic skills of memorization that use these components, and the ways we can apply these skills to various memory tasks. === Components of Memory === By the components of memory, I mean the basic structures we create with information in the mind and the basic operations we perform to store and retrieve it. Memory is a set of subsystems rather than a single structure in the brain {Higbee 2}, and each system handles a different type of information, such as visual or verbal {37-38}. It would be great if I could use the brain’s organization to lay out the principles of memory here. But I don’t know nearly enough about how memory is organized in the brain, and I’m not sure neuroscientists do either {Baddeley 11}. So I’ve attempted to come up with more of a functional framework for arranging the common memory principles and techniques. Most of psychology is about identifying the mind’s API, the things we do from the surface of the mind to achieve the effects we want, regardless of how the brain is doing things on the back end. Still, knowing the implementation can be useful, so I like to hear about the progress neuroscience is making on memory. To memorize information for recall, you’ll need to transfer it from '''short-term''' to '''long-term''' memory. Short-term memory lasts only a few seconds and can contain only around seven items at a time. If the information in short-term memory goes through an encoding process, it’s stored in long-term memory and can potentially be accessed for a lifetime {Higbee 19, 20, 23}. To make this transfer, you’ll need to put to work several factors. So far I’ve grouped them into three categories: description, significance, and maintenance. You’ll need to notice important characteristics and associations of the information, you’ll need to signal to yourself that the information is worth remembering, and you’ll need to keep your memory equipment in working order. The first two, which I’ll call the memorization components, relate to working with specific items of information, and the last relates to the overall operation of your brain’s memory systems. For this summary I’ll only discuss the memorization components, because I’ve done almost no research on the maintenance component, factors such as diet and rest. ==== Description ==== My view is that the mind '''stores''' information by indexing it according to its '''properties''' {50}, which amount to a description of the item. It '''retrieves''' information when it receives a reminder, which gives it one or more properties to search by. Memory researchers call the reminders '''cues''' {26}. A word, for example, is often recalled based on its first letter, its sound, or its meaning {30}. This is why you can often recall a word by reciting the alphabet, looking for the word’s first letter {100}. You can also see this property indexing at work when you remember the wrong word and find that it resembles the word you’re looking for in one or more of these ways. ===== Items ===== For the purposes of this project, an '''information item''' is any set of information you’re treating as a unit. It’s actually a stretchy concept. Our minds can almost always subdivide information into smaller pieces or group it into larger ones. Whatever you’re treating as a unit at the time is an item in that context. This expandability of information is a very important feature that makes it possible to create all kinds of useful associations for memory, as we’ll see later. Some information is easier to think of as a single, simple unit, such as the translation of a single English word into another language, and some is easier to think of as a group of smaller items, such as a grocery list or a whole chapter of a book. I’ll call the simple items '''unitary''' items and the groups '''collective''' items. Since pretty much any information can be subdivided, it’s technically all collective. But these categories are meant to help you in memorizing. Hence, the way you categorize any particular item is somewhat subjective and relative to your purpose for it at the time. I’ll explore the ways these categories can help you later in the essay. What kinds of information items are there? An item can be something more like an object or something more like a sentence, and really you could look at any item as one or the other. So you might memorize the flag of each country and treat each flag as an object, but in the back of your mind, you’re also memorizing a statement that goes something like, “The flag of Algeria looks like this.” ===== Properties ===== A property of an item of information is anything you can say about it. Really it’s just another piece of information that’s somehow related to the item you’re dealing with. In fact, I think of an item of information as being completely made of its properties. An information item is a set of information that someone has bundled into a package and maybe given a label, which is just another one of its properties. For the purposes of memory, there are at least a couple of ways to look at properties. You can think of a property as a handle for an information item that the mind can grab when it’s looking for the item. And you can also think of properties as parts of the item that you can then focus on as items in themselves. I also like to think of properties as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Resource_Description_Framework RDF] triples. That is, a property can be stated in terms of three parts: a subject, a predicate, and an object. For example, one property of tree bark is that it’s rough. That is, it has a texture of roughness. “Tree bark” is the subject, “has a texture of” is the predicate, and “roughness” is the object. Splitting up a property in this way can help you think about enhancing and organizing the material you’re studying, which I’ll cover below. I divide properties into a few somewhat fuzzy categories to help me get a handle on them. One division is between internal and external properties. An '''internal''' property is any characteristic that the item has on its own. I’ll call internal properties '''features'''. An '''external''' property is any connection it has with other information. I’ll call the external properties '''connections'''. If I’m looking at a tree, one of its internal properties is that it has green leaves. An external property might be another tree it reminds me of. Another division I make is between natural and incidental properties. '''Natural''' properties are related to the item’s meaning, and '''incidental''' properties are any other kind. For example, a natural internal property of the word ''horse'' would be its definition in a dictionary or an image of a horse. An incidental internal property would be the way the word looks in a particular font. A natural external property would be the fact that a jockey rides a horse. An incidental external property would be the fact that horse and helicopter start with the same letter. The fact that an item’s storable properties can stray so far from its typical meaning becomes very useful when you’re memorizing information that has very little significance to you or that has no logical structure, such as a list of random words. Memory researchers call these incidental external properties '''elaborations''' {Higbee 94}. We will see this feature of memory come into play when we discuss mnemonics. ===== Storage ===== I also divide memory storage activity into two categories, '''active''' and '''passive'''. These categories apply to both description and the other memorization component, significance. Even without consciously trying, your mind engages in memorizing all the time. For example, people tend to remember where they were when a national tragedy took place. It might not always be the memorizing you expect or need, but you can take advantage of this passive activity and use it to supplement your conscious memorizing. ===== Retrieval ===== As I mentioned above, the mind retrieves information when it receives a reminder, called a cue. A cue is anything that either reminds you there’s something you need to remember or simply reminds you of something you do remember. It’s like a question for you to answer or a sentence with a blank to fill in. It provides you with some of the properties of the information and leaves you to find the rest of the item. As with everything else, I divide retrieval of information into several categories. First, like storage, retrieval can happen passively or actively. I’ve observed that cues tend to happen in chains—one thing reminds you of another, which reminds you of another, and so on—and the chains tend to start with cues from your surroundings. The cues that bring up information from your mind without any effort from you are triggering '''passive''' retrieval. When the cues remind you of your need or desire to remember something and then you search your mind for the information, you give yourself a series of cues that could trigger your recall, and this search is a process of '''active''' retrieval. These cues can be either '''parallel''' or '''chained'''. That is, the cues may be independent of each other, or each cue may remind you of the next. It can also happen at different levels of consciousness. '''Explicit learning''' is retrieval with a conscious awareness that you’ve recalled something. '''Implicit learning''' is retrieval that happens unconsciously; you simply act on the information you’ve retrieved without being aware that you’ve retrieved anything {Baddeley 21}. And retrieval can happen more or less completely. '''Recall''' is the fullest level of retrieval, in which the whole item or set of information is brought to mind with only a starting cue. '''Recognition''' is less complete and more or less amounts to identifying the information you’re viewing as information you’ve seen before. Rate of '''relearning''' measures a subtle level of retrieval, in which you’re able to relearn information you’ve learned before in less time than you took to learn it at first. Your mind retains traces of the material from the first learning effort, so it doesn’t have to do as much work to learn it to the level of recall again {Higbee 26-27}. In this project, as I’ve said, I’ll be focusing on conscious storage for recall. Memory researchers have terms for several patterns of recall. When recall happens because it has been intentionally cued, they call it '''aided recall'''. Recall that happens in any order and without a specific external cue is termed '''free-recall''' {26}. Recall seems to be easier when it’s aided {100}, so it’s best to concentrate on memorizing specific properties of an item so they can reliably serve as cues. Most of my project will concern this strategy. When you recall items in a specific order, memory researchers call it '''sequential learning'''. When one item cues your recall of a second, they call it '''paired-associate learning''' {26}. Most of the memory techniques I’ve seen amount to different forms of aided recall using paired-associate learning. Even sequential learning can be reduced to a series of paired-associate tasks, where each item is the cue for the next in the list {133}. ===== Interference ===== A persistent problem for memory is what memory researchers call interference, the problem of confusing parts of something you’ve learned with parts of something else you learned before or after it {34}. This is different from the problem of strong emotions blocking your ability to learn or recall things, which I talk about in the “External emotional significance” section below. That could be seen as another type of interference, but memory researchers don’t call it that. To combat interference, each item you memorize needs to be unique in a memorable way. That is, it needs to have a unique set of properties. You can think of the items of information as being assigned unique addresses in your memory. The address is made of the item’s unique combination of properties. If two items aren’t meant to live at the same address, assign them different enough sets of properties that they’ll stay separate in your mind. Part of this memory improvement project will be to come up with ways to do that. ==== Significance ==== The second major aspect of memorization I identify is significance. For the mind to memorize something, it has to believe that it’s worth remembering. Here are some of the ways that can happen. Again, I’ve grouped them so they’re easier to remember. My categories for significance are familiarity, emotion, expression, timing, and interaction. Some of the categories from the description discussion apply to various aspects of significance as well—passive and active, internal and external. I’ll expand on them in the sections that follow. An item can gain significance as you discover its properties, such as other items that connect to it. For example, a man’s name may mean nothing to you and be quite forgettable until you learn he’s a brother you never knew you had. This ability of one item to elevate the significance of other items will be very important for the memory techniques I discuss later. ===== Familiarity ===== One obvious type of familiarity is '''knowledge'''. Information you’ve learned before is generally more significant to you than new information. This is important for two reasons. First, if you’ve already learned an item but you don’t remember it well, it will still be easier to learn than information you’ve never seen before {27}. Second, as we’ll see in the observation section, you can use more significant information, such as items you’ve already learned, to increase the significance of other information you’re learning {47}. A different type of familiarity that carries significance is '''sense'''. That is, information you can understand is usually more memorable than nonsense. I think of sense as a type of familiarity in that you understand a piece of information when it conforms to your existing, familiar patterns of thought as well as connecting with your prior knowledge. ===== Emotion ===== Emotion can lend great significance to information, making it easy to remember, though in some cases emotion can be a hindrance to memory. The emotion involved doesn’t need to be intense for it to help memory. In fact, it can be very slight. It just needs to be enough to make the material stand out as important in some way. Emotion that’s too intense may distort your understanding of the information anyway. ====== Internal emotional significance ====== In terms of emotion, I define '''internal significance''' as significance that is derived from the item’s properties. Internal emotional significance means that the item has properties that catch your attention. The information could be funny, surprising, fascinating, outrageous, impressive, disgusting, frightening, exciting, sensible, or touching, for example. Any property of the information—internal or external, natural or incidental, passive or active—can have significance that aids in remembering that information. Uniqueness, or novelty, while most important for separating similar information, also adds an element of significance to the information, if the item is unique in some way that feels significant {107}. It carries a sense of specialness: This item is worth paying attention to because it is one of a kind. On a subtler level, simply having a purpose can make an item more significant, even if it gets its purpose simply from being placed in a list or given a name. These features convey the sense that the item is supposed to be there. Internal emotional significance can be active or passive. Passive significance is reflected in the simple experience of emotionally reacting to the information you’re studying. The information is the type that is already important to you. Hence, I call this kind of significance '''reaction'''. Again, it doesn’t have to be a strong reaction, just a distinct one. A reaction doesn’t necessarily cement the details in your mind, so you may need to supplement your reaction with specific memorizing techniques, but it makes a difference. Taking the right '''attitude''' toward the material you’re learning is one example of active internal emotional significance. That is, you purposely see the information as significant. To do this, you take an interest in what you’re learning. You look for ways the information could be interesting or important or cause some other reaction in you, whether through the information’s features or connections, even though those ways aren’t obvious to you at first. ====== External emotional significance ====== I define external emotional significance as significance that the learner imposes on the information, whether actively or passively, because of the way the learner is feeling apart from the information itself. I haven’t explored this topic very far, and the books I’ve read don’t really cover it, so I’ll just mention it briefly. On the passive side, strong emotions, such as during a traumatic experience, can cement even random facts into your mind. In addition, events that happen directly in relation to the material you’re learning will often lend them significance. For example, the embarrassment of getting an answer wrong in front of other people makes the right information feel very important, and afterward it tends to stick in the mind! Similarly, the shift from confusion to understanding can give an item significance. Once an incomprehensible item makes sense, the feelings of relief and inspiration you get from finally understanding it can make it more significant. Necessity is another factor that can catch your attention. If the information is simple enough, knowing you need to know it can make it more memorable. Unless the necessity comes with a lot of stress, that is. Stress works against memory, which I discuss below. On the active side, you may be able to set an emotional tone for your study time via music, narrative, or some other form of art, and as you interpret the information by that mood, you may see new properties of it pop out as significant. But emotion also can hinder learning. In particular, stress works against both memorizing and recalling things {64-66}. I believe this is partly because stress and other strong emotions draw your attention away from what you’re learning and recalling, but I suspect there are other processes at work as well. My experience is that the mind can lock up under stress {Gladwell}. ===== Expression ===== The mind has several ways of taking in and processing information: visual, verbal, musical, narrative, kinesthetic. I’ll call them modes of expression. Some of these types of information are more memorable than others. It differs from person to person, but there are some trends. Visual information, for example, especially spatial, tends to be very easy for most people to remember {Higbee 37-39}. ===== Timing ===== I’ve encountered a few observations related to the timing of memory storage and retrieval relative to other things. I’ll probably try to generalize these later. You remember items in a list more or less easily depending on their position in the list {53}. You remember better things you learn just before sleeping and less well things you learn right after sleeping {44}. Most forgetting happens soon after learning. The rate slows down and levels off after that {35}. ===== Interaction ===== Your interaction with the material over time, even without any notable emotion, can lend the material significance. ====== Attention ====== Paying attention to the material you’re learning is one of the most basic and important ways of creating significance for it. Of course, you have to pay attention in order to notice things about the information and build up its properties in your mind {59}, but attention also clues your mind in that the information is important. This goes for any active part of memorization. ====== Repetition ====== I define '''repetition''' as repeated storage of an item in memory. Memory researchers know that spaced repetition is a key factor of learning {78-80}. I don’t know how it works out neurologically, but my interpretation is that being exposed to the same information repeatedly over a long period of time clues the mind in that it’s important. Many people think this type of repetition is what memorizing is. Reading over the information a few times is their only technique. But by itself, it’s really a very flimsy one, and we have many more resources at our disposal for planting information firmly in our minds {62}, which of course are the subject of this project. ====== Recitation ====== I define '''recitation''' as repeated retrieval of an item from memory. It seems to me that forcing yourself to recall information using spaced repetition is even more effective than simply exposing yourself to the information {83}. This is why flashcards are an effective study tool. === Memory skills === We can make use of these memorization components by exercising various skills. I don’t think I’ll have a real grasp on this section until I’ve experimented much more with different learning techniques. But I’ve grouped the skills I’ve found so far into several interrelated categories that loosely form a sequence: focusing, observing, selecting, enhancing, organizing, associating, rehearsing, and searching. The first of these is a general skill, the next several are storage skills, and the last is a retrieval skill. To memorize for long-term recall, you need to corral your attention, ask yourself questions about the information, pick out the information you need to know and the other information that will help you remember it, get the information into an easily memorizable form, arrange it all so you can easily link the information together, mentally form the connections, cement the connections over time, and then search your mind for the information when it’s time to recall it. In reality when studying various types of material for different purposes, you’ll mix these skills together rather than following them in a set sequence. ==== Focusing ==== Attention is a fundamental requirement both for active memorizing and for retrieval. So the first set of skills you’ll want to employ are those that focus the attention. The goal with these practices is to remove external and internal distractions. For external distractions, you’ll need to find a place and time that will keep you away from them. Find a quiet spot in the house, turn off the TV, go to the library, whatever circumstances you find the least distracting. You may have to observe yourself for a while and experiment with different setups. I like to sit in my car in a parking lot when I’m doing work that requires concentration. For internal distractions, you’ll need to settle or temporarily put aside disruptive thoughts and emotions. As I mentioned above, strong emotion, especially stress, can be a distraction from learning. So it pays to learn to relax and to remove stressors from your life. Relaxation techniques such as deep breathing exercises can go a long way to calm intrusive emotions. For thoughts that pull you away from the task at hand, it helps to write them down or tell them to someone, at least in summary form. That gives the part of your mind that’s concerned about them the assurance that you’ve given those thoughts some of the attention they deserve and that you’ll deal with them later, even if you haven’t completely resolved them now. And if you’re feeling worried about your memory’s performance when it’s time for recall, then the answer is to build your confidence. Your general confidence in your memory will grow as you practice the skills over time, especially when memorizing ''isn’t'' crucial. Then when you need to memorize something and the stakes are higher, studying to the extent that you overlearn the material will build your confidence that you know it, which will reduce your stress when it comes time to recall it {64-66}. Even if potential distractions are nearby, you may also find certain physical conditions for your study session that put you in a frame of mind for concentrating, such as playing certain kinds of music or simply sitting at a desk or in a room that over time you’ve associated with focused work {69}. In addition to removing distractions, you can help yourself focus by your attitude—gaining an interest in the material you’re learning. This has the added benefit of making the material more significant, which will make it easier to remember {70-71}. You can do a number of things to create interest while studying, which I’ll talk about below. But it can help to start the study session by reminding yourself of the reasons focus and interest are important. And if you can find reasons that are actually important to you personally and not simply reasons other people have for learning, that will be more convincing to you. ==== Observing ==== The rest of the skills relate to working with the specific information you’re memorizing. '''Observation''' is the skill of directing the attention to the specifics of what you’re learning, now that you’ve focused that attention. It’s the skill of noticing an item’s properties, both internal and external (its features and connections). These are the handles you’ll use to retrieve the information, and the main purpose of observation is to prepare the material you’re learning for planting in your mind via association and rehearsal. For this skill, keep in mind that I’m using the word ''item'' flexibly. An item can be anything from a single word to a whole book, to use a verbal example. An item can be subdivided into other items so you can concentrate on memorizing them separately, or it can be combined with other items to form a new whole, a process I’ll cover in the association section below. Before an item is subdivided, you can think of its sub-items as some of its properties. One good way to direct your attention is to ask yourself questions. A question is a type of cue. It gives you a set of properties and prompts you to find the item that matches them and to answer with a label that represents the item. The difference between an observation question and a recall cue is that when you’re observing, you’re looking for items in the material you’re studying as well as in your mind. Since observation plays a part in several of the other memorization skills, questions are a tool that will appear in several of the following sections. ==== Selecting ==== The most straightforward task related to observation is what I’ll call '''selection'''. This is the skill of identifying which information is worth noticing. Two other questions will help you discover which information that is. First, what do you need to know from this set of information? Or coming at it from the other side, what cues do you expect to receive for recalling the information? And second, what information will help you remember it? The answer to this one encompasses at least two types of information. One type is information that’s significant to you, since we can use that to raise the significance of less memorable information. The other type is information that may be in your mind at the time you need to remember the item, such as another item you’ve just recalled. This information can act as a cue if you’ve associated it with the item in question. These two types of information worth noticing are another example of an internal-external division. The cues (which tell you what you need to know) indicate what information is important to your circumstances (which are external to you), and significance indicates what information is important to your mind (which is internal to you). Of course, the same information may be important to both. I’ll call the cue-based information '''important''' information and the significance-based information '''memorable''' information. ===== Important information ===== Two main reasons for observing properties that are related to your expected cues are, first, to make sure you cover everything you need to learn and, second, to decrease your mental load by ruling out the things you don’t. A first natural question is what your expected cues ''are''. That is, what do you expect to encounter that will prompt you to recall this information? If the cues aren’t immediately obvious, try approaching the answer by asking yourself what context you’ll be in when you need to recall the information, such as an exam, a meeting, a party, or traveling. In an exam, the cues will be the test questions. In a meeting, they might be questions posed by the other attendees or simply the invitation to begin giving a presentation. At a party, they could be the greetings of the other guests, which would prompt you to recall their names and other information about them. While traveling, the cues might be landmarks, which would prompt you to recall the need to turn, stop, or look for the next landmark. Once you know the recall context and the types of cues you’ll encounter, you can imagine yourself in that context and begin to list the specific cues you expect to find. For example, who specifically will be at the party? What questions will likely be on the exam? What will the people in the meeting want to know? And once you have the specific cues, you can observe the responses to them that are available in the information you’re studying. ===== Memorable information ===== You will naturally react to much of the information you encounter. This information is already memorable to you, and you probably won’t have trouble remembering at least the gist. The skill is to notice these reactions when they happen so you can take advantage of them to add significance to the rest of the information. You can observe your reactions as you view each item for the first time, asking yourself how you’re reacting to this item, or you can review your reactions after you’ve seen all the material, asking yourself which items you recall reacting to. Observing your reactions is useful because if you can draw your attention to information that’s significant to you, you’re more likely to recall it when you’re looking for ways to make the other information more memorable. ==== Enhancing ==== For the material that doesn’t seem very memorable, you’ll need to associate it with other information that is memorable or with information that draws out its significant aspects. The actual association will come later. First you need to pick out the specific memorable information to associate the forgettable item with. Since this skill involves expanding on each item in various ways and since ''elaboration'' is already taken, I’m calling it '''enhancement'''. I call the items that will make the item in question more memorable '''helper''' items. When you’re looking for helper items, first tell yourself that there is something interesting about the information, even if you can’t see it yet. Then with that attitude in mind, do some more observing. Sharpen your observation of the information’s features and expand your awareness of its connections. You can do this by asking more questions: How does this information make sense? Understanding is typically an important first step in committing an item to memory. What interests other people about this information {72}? Assume they have a good reason! Why was this information included? Assume it has a real point! How does it relate to other items in the material? It may help to think in terms of relations like causation, implication, similarity, and contrast. What does the information remind you of that’s already familiar to you {53}? This question will be important again when you’re using the skill of translation, which I’ll describe in a later section. The answers to most of these questions don’t have to make sense. Certainly you should try to understand the material’s actual meaning. But the mind can invent connections that are significant without being logical {94}. Bizarre juxtapositions tend to be memorable, for example {107}. To use our terminology from earlier, an item’s properties can be natural or incidental, so feel free to take advantage of both. ===== Translating ===== One important type of enhancement is '''translation''', creating an item that you intentionally view as equivalent to the original item. You can think of translation in terms of the RDF triples I mentioned earlier. An item can be linked to its properties via different relationships. These are the predicates of the triples. The causation, implication, similarity, and contrast from the enhancement questions above are some possible relationships. Equivalence is another one. In this relationship, the property specifies another item, a '''substitute''' item, that stands for the one you’re studying {109}, which I’ll call the '''target''' item. In identifying this property, you’re translating the item you’re learning into the substitute item. If the substitute item is very memorable and it cues you to remember the original item, then it makes the original item easier to access in your memory. This is the idea behind many mnemonic techniques and systems. What kinds of items would you need a substitute for? Generally, any item that you expect not to be memorable, anything that seems boring or meaningless to you. More specifically, researchers have found that most people have a harder time remembering words than images, and abstract words such as ''timeless'' tend to be harder to remember than concrete words such as ''apple'' {38, 57}. People also find proper names hard to remember {192}, even though names are concrete in a way, since they usually represent people and physical objects. What kinds of substitutes are helpful? A substitute should have at least two characteristics. First, it should have some kind of connection to the target item that makes sense to you. That is, it should share some properties with the target item that are significant to you. For example, you could choose a substitute that sounds similar to the words of the target item, such as substituting ''celery'' for ''salary''. Or you could choose a substitute that symbolizes the target, such as imagining a set of balancing scales for the term ''justice'' {109}. It’s important for the connection to be meaningful. If you choose a completely arbitrary substitute with no meaningful connection, it will be hard to remember the connection, and the substitute won’t be able to act as a handle very well. Or if you memorize that meaningless connection well and then you run across a target item that the substitute would work much better for, you might confuse the new target with the old one when you’re using the substitute for recall. It’s not important for the connection to be meaningful to everyone, only to you, unless you want the substitute to make it easy for everyone to memorize the item. The second characteristic of a substitute is that it should represent the target item uniquely. If you choose a substitute that could be tied to a lot of different items, it might be hard to remember which item you need at the time. For example, if you’re memorizing the word ''frozen yogurt'' and you picture a bowl of it, you might accidentally recall the word ''ice cream'' if you don’t encode more carefully while you’re learning it {119}. The substitute isn’t meant to be a definition of the target item, only a cue. Its relationship to the target item can be purely incidental. It’s only a handle for pulling the information into your conscious mind. Once it’s there, you can put the substitute out of your mind for the moment and think about the target information normally. This approach lets the substitute do its job of adding significance to meaningless information while keeping the substitute from getting in the way of using the target information itself. The substitute item will often be in another mode of expression from the original item. It can be helpful to augment your learning by translating the information into the most memorable modes for you and even into multiple modes. Most mnemonic systems are based on translating verbal information into mental images {103}. And in addition to visualizing the information, you might also want to vocalize it, speaking the items out loud. I often struggle to find a substitute word as quickly as I need in order to memorize things on the fly. I would like to get better at this. It would help to memorize a lot of substitute words beforehand so I don’t have to be creative in the moment when I’m frantically trying to memorize the material in front of me. I want to write a program to create a dictionary of substitute words and phrases for names and common words. I also want to identify commonly used elements, such as days of the week and family relationships, that I can make a special effort to memorize. You can also take a poetic or musical approach, giving the material a rhythm, making it rhyme {111}, setting it to music, or all three. And if you can, perform this poetry or music for yourself out loud so that your mind can more fully encode the experience. Since most mnemonic systems take a visual approach and not everyone is visual {118}, I would like to find or develop a system along these auditory lines. The things I’d have to collect would be common rhyming words to translate harder words into, rhymes for commonly needed words, common poetic meters, and familiar melodies. The musical system could also use different aspects of music to encode things, like intervals, chords, keys, time signatures, and key signatures, if those things would be memorable. It would be good to see research about that. I would also like to explore a kinesthetic approach to memorization, though I’m not sure what it would look like, maybe creating actions that you associate with the information and arranging the actions into sequences to represent the relationships between the items. Sign language might be helpful here. ==== Organizing ==== The purpose of organizing is to bring together items that will help you remember more of the material. As I said in the selecting section, if you’re memorizing a set of information, you’ll often want each piece of information to remind you of other information in the set. You’ll also want more significant items to prop up the less significant ones. Thus, it helps to see them close together so you can easily associate them later. One type of organization is to group the items. If the items are related logically and you’re free to rearrange them, then you can group the information by category {51}. This gives you a chance to associate the category with all the items within it. Restating pairs of items as RDF triples could reveal categories you can group the information into, if the RDF idea helps you. Another type of organization is to arrange the items in a logical sequence, which lets you associate each item with the next in the sequence {133}. As you’re organizing, there are at least two other general questions to keep in mind. One is which item you should remember first when recalling a set of items {135}. And the other is how you’ll know when you’ve recalled everything you need from the set. To answer the second question, you can observe the total number of items in the group, or if they form a list, the last item in the list. Once you’ve recalled that number of items or that last item, you’ll know you’re done {133}. ==== Associating ==== '''Association''' is the skill of mentally assigning properties to an item. Or to say it another way, it’s cementing multiple items together in your mind. You can associate as many items as you want, but for simplicity we’ll assume it’s two. You can associate the information actively or take advantage of the passive associating your mind is already doing. ===== Active association ===== As I understand it, the way to associate two pieces of information is to create a new whole that incorporates both of them. The new whole, of course, is another item with its own set of properties. You’d think this would just give you more to study and take up more time. The goal, though, is to create associations that are memorable enough that you won’t need to spend much time studying them {166, 180}. There are several types of wholes you can form through association. If you’re visualizing the items, the new whole could be a scene in your imagination that features the two items interacting {104-105}. If the information is purely verbal, it could be a sentence or rhyme that incorporates them {111}. Another type of whole is a sequence of events that the mind groups together. I place classical and operant conditioning in this category. Pavlov rang a bell and then fed his canine subjects, so later when he rang the bell again, the dogs expected food. Simply grouping the items can tie them together, at least in short-term memory. If you’re memorizing a series of digits, such as a telephone number, then grouping them into chunks of two or three can keep them in your short-term memory longer. Memory researchers call this practice '''chunking''' {20}. Chunking can also let you create more complicated associations. You can chunk items together that you have associated with other items. For example, an '''acronym''' is a chunk of letters—a word—whose letters represent other words. Once you remember the word, you can break it down into its letters and remember the other words the acronym is associated with {98}. One effective visual way to establish associations in your mind is to group the information spatially. Group the items you’re associating into different regions of a page or some other surface. Along these lines, you could create a map that relates the items to each other in some way, using geography as a metaphor if the information isn’t geographical. Grouping the items physically is effective because the mind remembers at least basic spatial relationships very easily {150-152}. Another mode of expression that serves in association is storytelling. Humans are narrative beings. We naturally think in terms of coherent sequences of events, and we care about them, especially when they have to do with us. So one type of association that can add significance to the material you’re learning is telling a story that incorporates it {135}, especially a story that relates to your life. It doesn’t have to be realistic, just memorable. ===== Passive association ===== Even without consciously trying, your mind associates things all the time. You can take advantage of passive association by controlling the context in which you learn things. In particular, your mind associates things in your environment with things you’re doing. So if you’re studying for a test, it can help to study in the room you’ll take the test in. The features of the room may remind you of the information you studied there. The same goes for when you’re rehearsing for a performance {67-68}. And as usual, your mind isn’t picky about whether the associations make sense. Most of these associations will probably be for incidental rather than natural properties. Since interference is always a problem, it helps to memorize different pieces of information in different settings, whether different locations entirely different parts of the place in which you’ll be recalling the information {76-77}. That way, if you remember where you were when you learned that thing you’re trying to recall, there’s a chance something about that setting will cue your recall of the information. Making use of passive association is easiest to do with your external context—where you are—but it also includes your internal context—what state of mind you’re in. It also helps to try to learn the material in the same mental condition in which you’ll recall it (the same mood, for example). So if you’re going to be sober when you take a test, don’t be drunk while you’re studying for it {69}. ==== Rehearsing ==== Even the most memorable information will fade over time and become hard to recall if left alone. So in addition to enhancing and associating the information, you need to '''rehearse''' it. Rehearsal can take the form of both repetition and recitation, but recitation will cement the information in your mind more quickly. You can rehearse through recitation in a number of ways, such as using flashcards or having another person quiz you. But the basic procedure is to present yourself with a cue and then take a few seconds to try to recall the corresponding items. Then receive feedback on your result. If you were able to recall something, check the answer to see if you were right. If your recall was wrong or you couldn’t recall the item at all, use the feedback as a way to repeat your mental storage of the information, maybe looking for a new way to enhance it. Then cue yourself for the information again later. Feedback both lets you assess your knowledge and sustains your interest in the material {72-73}. Forgetting takes a certain shape over time. You forget most of what you learn right after you’ve seen it for the first time. After that the rate at which you forget the material slows down and levels off {35}. So your first study session should be a review of the material right after you first encounter it {89}. Learning also takes a certain shape over time. Your study sessions for the material should be frequent at first, but you can space them out more and more as your recall of the material becomes easier {89-90}. There are several algorithms for this kind of spaced repetition that can help you schedule your learning, such as the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leitner_system Leitner system]. ==== Searching ==== The mind stores information by indexing it by its properties. These properties are handles you can grab to retrieve the information as you search your mind for it based on those properties. So when you want to recall something and it’s not coming to mind right away, you can try to find it by suggesting properties to yourself that the information might have and seeing if the suggestion brings the information to the surface. Try to think of as many related types of information as you can, and one or more may trigger the memory. For example, if you enter a room and don’t remember why, look around the room in case your purpose was related to any of the objects in it, retrace your steps in case your previous locations gave you a reason to enter the room, and remember what you were talking or thinking about {Higbee 211}. Kenneth Higbee calls this the “think around it” technique {55-56}. === Applications === The components of memory I’ve discussed can be put together and applied to various problems that require memorization. Programmers sometimes write cookbooks that contain example code. The examples solve common problems in a particular language that don’t have immediately obvious solutions. Using the elements of memory in the above analysis as a rudimentary mental programming language, I’d like to do the same for common memory tasks. These applications can be built up in layers, with simpler applications becoming components in more complex ones. I’m organizing this section around tasks rather than the techniques that accomplish them, because each task can encompass a number of techniques. Since this essay is a summary and I haven’t thought very far about most of these applications, I’ll only cover them briefly here. ==== Holistic information ==== This category includes memorizing text, images, concepts, and music. With this type of information, it doesn’t work well to break it into a list of small components and then string them together with a series of associations, as in the mnemonic systems below. You have to recall it rapidly and fluidly, sometimes even nonlinearly, so it needs to be stored efficiently as a whole unit. You can think of it as assigning a single value, such as a string, to a variable. One good tool for rehearsing text is the [http://bencrowder.net/blog/2011/03/erasure/ erasure method], where several words are erased at random from the text before each repetition. This allows the surrounding words to serve as cues for a word that’s been erased. ==== Dates and times ==== One useful element to encode mnemonically is dates and times. This gives you a way to timestamp your memories, plans, and any other time-specific information. It would be an essential component of any mental task management system. The technique I have in mind would be to encode each component you needed (day, month, year, hour, minute, etc.), and then associate them all together. Then associate the whole clump with whatever information you want to timestamp. ==== Names and faces ==== Remembering names and faces is a very popular use for memory techniques {Higbee 194}. People are very important, but names by themselves are fairly meaningless, and faces can often look alike to the untrained eye. The techniques for remembering them are apparently the same from book to book. The idea is to find a visualizable substitute word for the name and associate it with a distinguishing feature of the face {194-198}. But I have my own spin on the details, and maybe some of the books take this approach too. It can be hard to recognize a distinguishing feature unless you know what the nondescript version would look like {Redman 1-2}, and it’s also harder to identify features when you don’t have a vocabulary for them {Higbee 191}. So I’d like to try using the techniques of caricature artists and, if I’m feeling really enthusiastic, the vocabulary of forensic artists {George chapter 1} to locate and name what’s unique about a person’s face. One benefit of having a technical vocabulary is that you can use substitute words for those terms and associate them with the substitute word for the person’s name. If you’re not very visual, this could be a helpful technique. ==== Experiences ==== There are a number of reasons you might want to remember your experiences in detail. For example, you might want to relive your good memories, which can happen more vividly if you remember more about them. It also gives you a better story to tell. If you’re giving eyewitness testimony, you can provide a better account. And if you’re learning a skill, remembering your mistakes and successes with the skill is important. Probably some of the important factors in remembering experiences are knowing in advance what kinds of things to observe in your experiences, having a reliable way to represent sequence relations to yourself (i.e., this event followed that event), and developing the habit of reviewing the experience right after it happens. ==== Complex sets of information ==== This is often a facet of studying for a school or certification exam, but complex information shows up other places too. Many people’s jobs involve knowing complex webs of facts and concepts. What are the best ways to organize and memorize these webs? ===== Mnemonic systems ===== A mnemonic (pronounced without the first m) is any method for aiding the memory, though most researchers define it more narrowly in terms of elaborations, aids that rely on what I’ve called incidental external properties. Kenneth Higbee helpfully distinguishes between single-purpose mnemonics, which he calls '''mnemonic techniques''' and general-purpose ones, which he calls '''mnemonic systems''' {Higbee 94-95}. An example of a single-purpose mnemonic is using the acronym HOMES to remember the Great Lakes: Huron, Ontario, Michigan, Erie, and Superior {98}. Much of this essay has dealt with the principles that seem to lie behind both types of mnemonics. In this section I’ll talk about mnemonic systems. Memory specialists describe a number of mnemonic systems you can use to memorize certain kinds of lists. Higbee includes five mnemonic systems in ''Your Memory'': Link, Story, Loci, Peg, and Phonetic. The Link system involves visualizing each item of a list and associating that item with the next item in the list {133}. The Story system involves creating a story that incorporates each item in sequence {135}. The Loci system involves memorizing a series of familiar locations, such as the rooms of your home, and then visually associating each item of a list with one of those locations {145}. The Peg system involves memorizing substitutes for a set of numbers or letters and then visually associating each list item with the corresponding number or letter substitute in sequence {157-161}. The Phonetic system involves memorizing a set of consonant sounds for each digit (0-9), translating any numbers you’re memorizing into the consonant sounds of their digits, adding vowel sounds to create words, and, if the numbers are meant to give order to a list, visually associating each list item with the word representing its number in the sequence {173-178}. One aspect of memorizing complex information is to mnemonically create data structures in your mind, the kinds of data structures that are fundamental to programming. Higbee’s five systems fall under the categories of linked lists (Link, Story) and arrays (Loci, Peg, Phonetic). But there are other data structures: stacks, queues, multidimensional arrays, hash tables, heaps, graphs, weighted graphs, and various trees (binary, red-black, 2-3-4) {Lafore}. We can find ways to organize and associate information to mentally build these and any others we need. The key to creating these mental data structures and inventing others is to break them down into sets of key-value pairs. To memorize the pairs, you associate the key with the value using the techniques from the association section above. Even a simple scalar variable is a variable name paired with the value assigned to it. The set of variables in a running program can be thought of as a hash table with the variable names as the keys. And you can think of an array as a hash table with the index numbers as the keys. If you’re using the data structure in a larger context and you might confuse its items with data from another structure, you could encode the keys using a different method or category (such as using animals for one variable’s keys and plants for another’s), or you could include the variable name with each key. So if you’re using a visual mnemonic technique, you’d create one image that incorporates your substitute images for the variable name, the key, and the value. This last technique treats the key as an address for the value. The value lives at key X within variable Y. You can extend this technique to account for data structures with several levels, such as trees or multidimensional arrays. This approach also treats the data structure like a database table with a primary key made up of several fields. In addition to creating the data structures themselves, it’s important to know basic algorithms for inserting, deleting, sorting, and searching for items in them, so I’d like to develop mental versions of those tasks too. ===== Rehearsal ===== Another aspect of memorizing complex information is to drill yourself, such as with with flashcards, which are an easy way to take advantage of spaced repetition. People normally use flashcards to study binary facts, such as sets of foreign vocabulary words. But as we’ve seen, key-value pairs can represent most types of information. This includes the points in an outline, the relationships in a concept map, or the cells in a table. So you could conceivably use flashcards to memorize these types of charts as well. I’d like to program a tool that will convert things like outlines and tables into flashcards. ==== Studying for an exam ==== My first motivation for learning about memory was to study more effectively for tests and not worry that I didn’t know the material. Studying effectively turns out to be a complex process of planning your study time and place, taking on the right attitude, organizing the material, and using effective memory techniques. Some type of chart would be helpful in making decisions about these steps. ==== Task management ==== My latest motivation for learning about memory has been to supplement the productivity system David Allen describes in his book ''Getting Things Done'' (often abbreviated GTD). Allen emphasizes recording your tasks in an external system, such as a planner, that is organized by context, because you can’t rely on your mind to remember everything you need to do when you’re in the right time and place for doing it {Allen 16, 21-23}. I think that the way GTD brings together the concepts of context, next actions, and horizons of focus is brilliant and very effective for helping to stay on top of one’s internal and external commitments. I also agree that an external system is easier to rely on than the mind. But is it really true that the mind is useless as a task manager? I think that using memory techniques creatively, it’s possible to do GTD mentally. For example, you could create a substitute item for each context and associate it with your list of next actions for that context, which you could memorize using the Link system. But at the very least, you can use memory techniques to remember tasks long enough to write them down later if you come up with them in the shower. === Next steps === My next step is to begin experimenting with memory techniques by memorizing things that are important to me. I’ll especially concentrate on finding substitute words and developing techniques for selecting, enhancing, and organizing. === References === “Leitner system.” Wikipedia. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leitner_system http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leitner_system]. “Resource Description Framework.” Wikipedia. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Resource_Description_Framework http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Resource_Description_Framework]. Allen, David. ''Getting Things Done''. New York: Penguin, 2001. Preview at [http://books.google.com/books?id=iykLVJAK49kC http://books.google.com/books?id=iykLVJAK49kC]. Baddeley, Alan. ''Your Memory: A User’s Guide''. New illustrated ed. Buffalo, NY: Firefly, 2004. Crowder, Ben. “Erasure.” BenCrowder.net. [http://bencrowder.net/blog/2011/03/erasure/ http://bencrowder.net/blog/2011/03/erasure/]. George, Robert M. ''Facial Geometry: Graphic Facial Analysis for Forensic Artists''. Springfield, IL: Charles C Thomas, 2007. Gladwell, Malcolm. “The Art of Failure.” New Yorker, August 21, 2000. [http://www.gladwell.com/2000/2000_08_21_a_choking.htm http://www.gladwell.com/2000/2000_08_21_a_choking.htm]. Higbee, Kenneth. ''Your Memory: How It Works and How to Improve It''. 2nd ed. New York: Prentice Hall, 1988. Preview at [http://books.google.com/books?id=N6FPQzBpheEC http://books.google.com/books?id=N6FPQzBpheEC]. Lafore, Robert. ''Data Structures and Algorithms in Java''. 2nd ed. Indianapolis, IN: Sams, 2003. Redman, Lenn. ''How to Draw Caricatures''. Chicago: Contemporary, 1984. Worthen, James B. and R. Reed Hunt. ''Mnemonology: Mnemonics for the 21st Century''. Essays in Cognitive Psychology. New York: Taylor &amp; Francis Group, Psychology Press, 2011. [[Category:Social science]] 7c9f64ba954a2a8f46937855ce5605e26b96e469 0 43 123 87 2014-05-07T04:56:12Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the Social science category. wikitext text/x-wiki Version 1.0, 4-29-07 Sher, Barbara. [http://www.amazon.com/Refuse-Choose-Revolutionary-Program-Everything/dp/1594863032/ Refuse to Choose! A Revolutionary Program for Doing Everything That You Love]. Emmaus, PA: Rodale, 2006. (also available in [http://www.amazon.com/Refuse-Choose-Interests-Passions-Hobbies/dp/1594866260/ paperback] with a different subtitle) === Summary === Scanners. You probably know some. Scanners are people who have many interests and a strong desire to pursue them all, and in many cases they try, flitting from one job or project to the next. In a society in which people are defined by their careers, this characteristic puts them in tension with the people around them, who want to know why they can’t just pick an occupation, stick with it, and make something of themselves! Barbara Sher, a Scanner herself, identified this group of people in her work as a life coach. She recognized that they shared gifts that were more valued in earlier periods of history than they are now, and so their tremendous potential is left untapped because modern culture provides them no guide for making the most of their talents. Thus, her task in this book was to define what a Scanner is, explain why it’s okay to be one, and give Scanners a manual for achieving the goal that sets these people apart—to do everything in life that they love. Along the way she identifies roadblocks and offers creative tools for sidestepping them. The book is divided into two parts. The first part deals with the question of what a Scanner is and the basic problems that any Scanner might face: Scanners tend to feel that they’re deficient because they seem so scattered. They’re often afraid that they’ll waste their lives. Many fear that committing to a job will keep them from following their interests. Some are just too busy for extra pursuits. Some feel so overwhelmed by their interests that they can’t begin to follow any of them. Some are too intimidated by their projects to start anything. And some begin lots of things and never finish them. The second part divides Scanners into nine types organized into two broad categories—Cyclical Scanners and Sequential Scanners. Cyclical Scanners have a limited number of interests that they return to repeatedly, while Sequential Scanners move from one interest to another and leave the old ones behind. Within each category Sher sorts the types by how often they switch interests. Each type gets a chapter, which discusses the distinguishing traits of that type; its unique motivations; and the life design models, careers, and tools that will allow Scanners of this type to do everything that they love. Life design models are comprehensive ways of organizing your time, tasks, and environment that naturally fit your goals and styles of working. In a word, this book is terrific. Barbara Sher’s writing is engaging, her descriptions true to life, her advice comprehensive and practical, and her outlook inspiring. The book could serve as a model for other self-help works. I have no real criticisms, only a few clarifications and issues for further discussion. Sher has a website with a forum for just such discussions at [http://www.barbarasher.com/ www.barbarasher.com]. This isn’t really a review, since I was too impatient to tidy it up much. The following is more a collection of notes I took on my reactions and reflections while reading the book. === Good things === Sher’s writing style is personal and engaging. Like many self-help authors, she addresses the reader directly and reveals her principles through stories. In her case they are largely accounts of her experiences as a life coach or other conversations she’s had with Scanners. But what makes Sher’s book so compelling is her blend of profound optimism and intense practicality. She believes unwaveringly in the goodness and potential in being a Scanner, in spite of all appearances and obstacles, and this is because she’s seen what Scanners can do and has a comprehensive plan for making it work. One Scanner, Ella, told Barbara about a story she heard when she was young called ''Rusty in Orchestraville'', “about a little boy who couldn’t make up his mind which instrument he wanted to learn, and so he ended up not playing anything and couldn’t be part of the orchestra.” Barbara replied, “In my experience, Rusty becomes a famous conductor. He needed to study all the instruments, because his instrument is the whole orchestra” (35). I’m not sure Ella’s recounting accurately captures the message of the story (see the description [http://www.317x.com/albums/l/alanlivingston/card.html here]), but Barbara’s version is an apt image for the role of Scanners in the world. Another is, “You have the eyes to see what many people miss” (43). She responds to the conventional wisdom about “buckling down” and devoting your life to one thing by demonstrating that it just isn’t true, noting trends in modern society as well as examples of successful Scanners throughout history (xiii–xiv, 115–116, and chapter 4). She has ''tons'' of ideas for getting things done, and they seem like they could really work, because they’re based on her years of experience talking and working with dozens of Scanner clients, friends, and acquaintances. An example of a good idea that struck me: “Sometimes you simply take an armful of books home from the library and read the introductions, the final chapters, and the index at the back. I get insights into very complex books I’d never be able to read all the way through” (236). I did this kind of thing once sort of by accident, and it was an effective way to get an idea of the subject. It would be worth being more intentional about the technique. This book will open your mind to possibilities (and jobs) you never knew existed (see pp. 254ff). For example, you could get a job as an expediter. They do all the tedious, bureaucratic things that their bosses don’t have time for, and sometimes they have to wait in line for hours to do it, which gives them plenty of time for Scannery things like reading (265). She asks a lot of good, probing questions. For example, to help Wanderers tie their random interests together, she has them ask during any activity that attracts them, “What element, if it were missing, would have made my exploration uninteresting?” (213). She is very thorough in her advice. She anticipates a large variety of problems that Scanners will encounter when trying to become more productive and offers many practical techniques for overcoming them, and she even recognizes when a particular tool won’t do the whole job. For example, in chapter 7 she introduces the Backward Planning Flowchart tool for identifying the steps toward reaching a goal, but then she notes that identifying these achievable steps won’t necessarily make the goal seem easier to reach. It might actually make the goal more intimidating! There can be a huge psychological leap between planning and acting. So you need to identify what mental obstacles are still holding you back and look for other tools that will help you through them, many of which she provides in other parts of the book. “Almost no one stays at one career ‘forever’ anymore” (50). One person I talked to about this point said that some fields suffer because people leave their jobs so quickly, and she was thinking specifically of public education. With a high turnover rate, there’s no consistency, and it’s hard to get things done within the field. I think this problem can be avoided in many cases with things like the LTTL system—Learn, Try, Teach, Leave (58–59). I love this idea, by the way, such a tidy way to be temporary. As long as the important policies and plans of an organization stay constant, the people can change, as long as each new person is competent. At certain points Sher brings up practical caveats to her “do what you want” philosophy, such as the fact that you sometimes do have to finish things even when you’ve gotten bored with them. Then she gives tools for dealing with that too (113–115), though “when it comes to your own projects, who cares?” (36). And even though she’s spent the whole book saying things like, “Start everything. And don’t bother to finish ''any'' of it” (110), she closes with an epilogue on the idea that “As enthusiastic as you may be about every passion, an active mind doesn’t get refreshment from producing nothing. Scanners actually grow tired when they’re underused. So you’ll have to give hard work another look, because inside you there are highly original works waiting to be brought into the world. Nothing will do that but starting and finishing at least one of them—or all of them, one at a time” (249). The point of this book isn’t that Scanners are just fine exactly as they are. They do need to be reshaped a bit, but the general thrust and contour of their life is all right. They have a valuable and truly different core. It just needs to be disciplined a little—''but'' in ways that are most natural for a Scanner while still being effective. (243) Throughout the whole book the key productive finishing skill for Scanners is the ability to pass on what their minds have collected in some way, through either writing, speaking, or creating. It’s not ''really'' okay ''just'' to learn or experience. (243) === Issues to discuss === ==== The Definition of a Scanner ==== She quotes a Scanner: “If I have to slow down or use only one part of me at a time, I become bored, worse than bored—I feel like a part of me is dying on the vine” (28). I think this is what makes the difference between Scanners and other people. When describing the essence of a Scanner and contrasting them with Divers, it’s not enough to say that Scanners can’t have fewer interests or restrict themselves to one. For all we know, they may just be intractably undisciplined. But this part of my experience as a Scanner suggests that there’s something more going on. It’s the profound sense of withering when I’m deprived of my projects that makes me think all these interests are ''vital'' to me and that they’re not just whims I can’t resist. ==== The Goodness of Scannerhood ==== Barbara talks about the relief that Scanners felt once she began identifying them as such. “The realization that their behavior was different—because they were actually genetically different—explained so much that it was accepted right away” (xv). This genetic difference hasn’t been proven, but it certainly seems genetic anyway. That by itself doesn’t mean the genetic difference is a ''good'' one. Being a Scanner could be a congenital disability or character flaw, like having anger management problems. We have to evaluate Scannerhood based on its ''effects''. This, of course, she does throughout the book. Scanners are multitalented people who have a lot to offer the world ''because they are Scanners''. They do have some disadvantages, but these can be overcome by the use of all these great tools. Scanners do need some discipline; they need to be shaped, but not fundamentally changed. Their contribution to the world is not hindered by the fact that they pursue many interests. “To be honest, the elated reaction of people who realized they were Scanners came to me as a surprise at first. I had no idea that simply knowing there was a name for them would cause such a complete turnaround in their outlook and feeling of self-worth” (24). Again, not enough to prove it’s good. Part of their relief was probably from the name itself. It sounds like a personality type. If instead she said, “You have Scanneritis,” they might not be so happy, because that sounds like a disease to be cured. Of course, she does say in the next sentence, “Now I’ve seen over and over what amazing things a Scanner can do with nothing more than simple permission to be herself.” ==== Rewards and Durations ==== “When you lose interest in something, you must always consider the possibility that you’ve gotten what you came for; you have completed your mission. … That’s why you lose interest: not because you’re flawed or lazy or unable to focus, but because you’re finished” (31). “The reason you stop when you do: You got what you came for” (103). I think there’s a difference between what my emotions came for and what my mind came for. Sometimes I get bored with what I’m doing because I’m tired of working, and sometimes I’m just tired of looking at the same project after so long, though I think those are a more temporary and superficial type of boredom. But these projects are important to me on a larger level, so I want to finish them. Usually this is either because later projects are intended to be built on them or because they fulfill some deep purpose I have for my life. It’s if I ''gave up'' on them that I’d feel a loss of meaning. So what if what you came for isn’t enough? What if your feelings of excitement enjoy discovery but your sense of civic duty likes giving back what you’ve learned, but you lose steam simply because it’s hard work and takes a long time? What’s the tool for ''that''? But while feelings can’t indiscriminately be a good clue to Rewards, I think there’s merit to Barbara’s approach. There’s a certain kind of deeper boredom that can be a good clue. The clue comes when continuing the project isn’t just tiresome but actually ''feels pointless'', as Barbara mentions a few paragraphs before: “It was the riveting experience of confronting something he’d never imagined before. That was the only part he really cared about. What followed felt pointless.” Another caveat is that often I leave a project simply because I get distracted by other projects. I might still be perfectly interested in picking it back up if I thought about it, but often I don’t think about it. I wonder if this fits into Durations and Rewards or if it’s a separate issue, probably the latter. “When you’re getting your Reward from any activity, you always feel happy, absorbed, energetic. And when you are satisfied, or the Reward diminishes, you get bored. It’s as natural as sitting down to eat when you’re hungry and leaving when you’re full” (32). Hmm, when I’m done eating I feel satisfied, not bored. If I kept eating after that I might feel unpleasant, though perhaps not bored, unless I was just tired of tasting the same food. Hard work doesn’t always make me feel happy, absorbed, and energetic, but surely it’s important for many projects. I guess if you’re just trying to discover what makes you tick, those happy feelings are good ones. Satisfaction could also be a good clue, but that implies having reached a goal or at least a saturation point. Sometimes it happens on its own, and then using it as a clue would only require paying attention. Sometimes it requires having a goal to reach. But if you don’t have a good sense of your Rewards, maybe you’re not yet in a position to set the right goals. Maybe part of this exercise should be to evaluate the project goals you do set and your motivations for them. Are you, for example, just trying to fulfill someone else’s expectations? Just trying to be complete? Once you reach your goal, what then? would be another good question. In one example, Barbara relates a conversation with Meg, who wished she had stuck with Spanish, even though it bored her after a year, because then she’d be somewhere by now, such as being a teacher. But when Barbara pressed her, Meg admitted that would bore her too (214). Paying attention to your happy feelings is also good for identifying the kinds of projects that would let you just play, which is something Sher thinks Scanners should be allowed to do. Many of the common Rewards (33–34) are true for me in degrees. Maybe a five-point Likert scale would be good here. ==== Scanners and School ==== What does a Scanner major in? Barbara talks about what she did (“I gave up and took an easy major, anthropology … and with some disappointment, I went for the grades-and-graduation thing like everyone else.” [xii]), but what would she have done had she known all about being a Scanner back then? ==== Cathy Goodwin’s Review ==== I am not a career counselor, but Cathy Goodwin is, and she has [http://www.amazon.com/gp/discussionboard/discussion.html/ref=cm_rdp_st_rd/002-7195016-9929633?ie=UTF8&amp;ASIN=1594866260&amp;store=yourstore&amp;cdThread=TxJ98AUVMQFE8H&amp;reviewID=R3KTCC78R4ZL5Y&amp;displayType=ReviewDetail reviewed] Sher’s book on Amazon. Her review is not as glowing as mine, but it is probably more realistic. [[Category:Social science]] 26f593909f3d01980e2b8d3c555e78709b596962 0 35 124 71 2014-05-07T04:56:22Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the Social science category. wikitext text/x-wiki Version 1.0, 3-20-05 The summer after my junior year in high school, our church youth group went to a week-long camp in North Carolina with about five other youth groups. Youth camp happened every summer, but this was the first time the camp had included other churches. Maybe they felt the need to regroup, or maybe it was their practice to begin with, but whatever the reason, early in the week a few of our guys started meeting together at night to talk about what was going on in their lives and how they were doing spiritually. A day or two into it, I was invited. I had never seen anything like it. Certainly I had never been involved in such a thing. I had always been withdrawn, and I’m surprised I even had the kind of friendships that would get me there in the first place. But instead of feeling threatened by all the openness, I was enlivened by it. It wasn’t, as one friend suggested, that I was glad to see that other people’s problems were worse than mine. It was that people were gathering to share something that was somehow of vital importance to me–their inner lives. Eventually the gathering became co-ed and grew to about forty people (we had a large youth group). My fascination only grew as the group did. The more the merrier, to me! Thus was my interest in psychology sparked. I am never content just to experience things like the communal self-disclosure of those meetings. Anything that so engages me I have to study. So the human mind became something to explore. By coincidence I was already signed up for a high school psychology class the next year, which was also fascinating, and I decided to major in it in college. That changed to Christian education the next year, however, though I kept psychology as a minor. There were a couple of reasons for the switch. One was that I could see myself in a church setting more readily than in a counselor’s office. The other was that I didn’t entirely trust psychology. I had been reading Christians who believed that our guide to human nature was supposed to be the Bible and that psychology was intruding on Scripture’s territory. There was something compelling to me about their arguments, and it is an issue I’m still wrestling with. Nevertheless, psychology still has a huge draw for me, and I do see a lot of benefit in it. Several topics in psychology capture my attention. One is psychotherapy, which is basically what drew me to psychology in the first place. Sitting in those youth camp meetings, I felt impelled to help the people who revealed their personal struggles, even though I had no idea how. Helping people is what I had in mind as a psychology major and even when I switched to Christian Education, although it would be a somewhat different format for my helping role. Psychotherapy was also my main point of tension with psychology. Christianity and psychology seemed to have competing ideas about what was wrong with people and how they could be helped. As I said, I’m still exploring this question. Many of the topics that fit under psychotherapy could fit just as well under spirituality or philosophy, so my categorization of some of these essays will be somewhat arbitrary. The psychology of personality has been one of my central tools in understanding human nature and in relating to the people around me. One of my friends got me into the Myers-Briggs personality theory our senior year in high school, and it was a major obsession of mine for the next year. Fortunately, the obsession was temporary. Myers-Briggs is helpful, but it isn’t everything. In any case, I am also intrigued by the Enneagram and am generally willing to try out any personality theory that comes along. The thing I like about these personality theories is that they represent systems of values and strategies for dealing with life. As you will no doubt discover if you keep reading this site, I am enthralled by systems, values, and strategies. Other facets of individual differences also interest me, like birth order and gender. The psychology of education grabbed me in the middle of my sophomore year in college when I got fed up with the anxiety of exams and decided to analyze what made school so stressful. That began a process of discovering how I learned and worked and what practices made a teacher helpful or unhelpful. But my interest in education is broader than a concern for my own stress levels. Personal growth is what engages me, both my own and other people’s. It’s an occupation that penetrates to the bedrock of my life and sends out tendrils to every part of it. One means of growth is education–growth by knowledge and interaction, two of my other pervasive concerns. I suppose this means I’m destined to become a teacher. Then there are a few other topics that wander through my mind. One is cognitive psychology, which has a natural tie-in to epistemology. Another is interpersonal psychology, which includes things like friendship and conversation (and personality, but I separate that one out). And then there’s linguistics, which isn’t psychology but is a social science, and I don’t have a better place to put it. I have a passing interest in other areas of social science as well, like anthropology. But even though psychology is one of my major interests, as with philosophy, I don’t know that much about it yet. [[Category:Social science]] f61ca0499d9608858b8f382d12f0169ebf059049 134 124 2014-05-14T04:45:06Z Andy Culbertson 1 Updated the contents. wikitext text/x-wiki The summer after my junior year in high school, our church youth group went to a week-long camp in North Carolina with about five other youth groups. Youth camp happened every summer, but this was the first time the camp had included other churches. Maybe they felt the need to regroup, or maybe it was their practice to begin with, but whatever the reason, early in the week a few of our guys started meeting together at night to talk about what was going on in their lives and how they were doing spiritually. A day or two into it, I was invited. I had never seen anything like it. Certainly I had never been involved in such a thing. I had always been withdrawn, and I’m surprised I even had the kind of friendships that would get me there in the first place. But instead of feeling threatened by all the openness, I was enlivened by it. It wasn’t, as one friend suggested, that I was glad to see that other people’s problems were worse than mine. It was that people were gathering to share something that was somehow of vital importance to me–their inner lives. Eventually the gathering became co-ed and grew to about forty people (we had a large youth group). My fascination only grew as the group did. The more the merrier, to me! Thus was my interest in psychology sparked. I am never content just to experience things like the communal self-disclosure of those meetings. Anything that so engages me I have to study. So the human mind became something to explore. By coincidence I was already signed up for a high school psychology class the next year, which was also fascinating, and I decided to major in it in college. That changed to Christian education the next year, however, though I kept psychology as a minor. Several topics in psychology capture my attention. One is psychotherapy, which is basically what drew me to psychology in the first place. Sitting in those youth camp meetings, I felt impelled to help the people who revealed their personal struggles, even though I had no idea how. Helping people is what I had in mind as a psychology major and even when I switched to Christian Education, although it would be a somewhat different format for my helping role. Many of the topics that fit under psychotherapy could fit just as well under spirituality or philosophy, so my categorization of some of these essays will be somewhat arbitrary. The psychology of personality has been one of my central tools in understanding human nature and in relating to the people around me. One of my friends got me into the Myers-Briggs personality theory our senior year in high school, and it was a major obsession of mine for the next year. Fortunately, the obsession was temporary. Myers-Briggs is helpful, but it isn’t everything. In any case, I am also intrigued by the Enneagram and am generally willing to try out any personality theory that comes along. The thing I like about these personality theories is that they represent systems of values and strategies for dealing with life. As you will no doubt discover if you keep reading this site, I am enthralled by systems, values, and strategies. Other facets of individual differences also interest me, like birth order and gender. The psychology of education grabbed me in the middle of my sophomore year in college when I got fed up with the anxiety of exams and decided to analyze what made school so stressful. That began a process of discovering how I learned and worked and what practices made a teacher helpful or unhelpful. But my interest in education is broader than a concern for my own stress levels. Personal growth is what engages me, both my own and other people’s. It’s an occupation that penetrates to the bedrock of my life and sends out tendrils to every part of it. One means of growth is education–growth by knowledge and interaction, two of my other pervasive concerns. Then there are a few other topics that wander through my mind. One is cognitive psychology, which has a natural tie-in to epistemology. Another is interpersonal psychology, which includes things like friendship and conversation (and personality, but I separate that one out). I have a growing interest in other areas of social science as well, such as linguistics, semiotics, and cultural anthropology. But even though social science is one of my major interests, as with philosophy, I don’t know that much about it yet. [[Category:Social science]] 839df11081df62f61955658945c7c6bc8bd88490 0 18 125 37 2014-05-07T05:00:50Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the Arts, Site, and Obsolete categories. wikitext text/x-wiki This is an index page from an old version of this site. [[Aesthetics Introduction]] [http://del.icio.us/thinkulum/aesthetics Aesthetics links] === Music === === Writing === === Art === === Comics === === Games === === Mass media === === Humor === [[Category:Arts]] [[Category:Site]] [[Category:Obsolete]] 8d88bc0296279e74dec8ed04dc2f04306c391bfa 0 19 126 39 2014-05-07T05:00:54Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the Arts category. wikitext text/x-wiki Version 1.1, 5-1-05 “Aesthetics” is a strange title. Why don’t I just call it “Entertainment” or “Art”? Well, I would, but “entertainment” is too superficial for what I have in mind, and “art” sounds too highbrow; some of what’s here ''is'' just entertainment. But I am at heart a philosopher rather than an artist or entertainer or even a consumer, so I’ve called it something philosophical, “Aesthetics.” I do like immersing myself in the experience of fun, beautiful, or profound things, but I am equally (or more) interested in the ideas they represent and in what ''makes'' them fun, beautiful, or profound. You’ll notice I also have an aesthetics section on the philosophy page. I’ll try to put my more theoretical discussions of aesthetics there. I guess you could call the subject of this page “applied aesthetics.” My general aesthetic theory is that people have different emotional or intellectual desires in life, and they use art to help fulfill them. This leads them into different realms of artistic taste. For instance, I like to use music to create an environment for me to live in, so I don’t listen to music that takes a lot of concentration to appreciate. I tend to listen to new age or ambient music, sometimes classical. I like art that I can “get” at a glance but which also has deeper layers of structure and meaning that I can uncover over time. Additionally, my favorite genres of just about everything are science fiction and fantasy. This is due to the fact that the real world is boring. Before I get started on the subsections, a note on my links: I link to websites I like, but I don’t necessarily approve of everything on those sites. This is true whenever anybody links to anything on the web, but I just want to say to my more conservative readers that while I try to associate myself with wholesome things, sometimes the things I like about a work are accompanied by other things I could do without (usually it’s language and violence). I try to overlook those and just enjoy the parts I do like. I hope my aesthetic and other values will become evident to you as you read through my site. === Music === I’ve been a musician since I was three. I took violin lessons from three till first grade, piano first through twelfth, French horn in band sixth grade through high school, and church choir the whole time. By the end of high school, my musical activities had proliferated so much that I was tired of music altogether. Except for band. Band, I can honestly say, was the best thing I did in school, and I loved it the whole way through. I still kind of miss the French horn. I’ll probably pick it up again someday. When I went to college, I dropped music entirely for a couple of years, after which I helped out with the music at church until our little church closed. Performing is fun (when I’m not doing too much of it), but what I really want to do is compose. This is what I unconsciously wished I was doing whenever I’d sit down at the piano to practice. And I did compose some, though it wasn’t much and not that good. But what I really wanted my teachers couldn’t give me, which was formal training in composition. I did take a music theory class in high school, but that was about it. Wheaton offers a major in composition, but I had other priorities. You can’t major in everything. So now I plan to teach myself. I want to start with tonal harmony and counterpoint and then get into digital music. And of course, I listen to music, too. I don’t connect with most styles of popular music. As I mentioned earlier, mostly I listen to new age, ambient, and other electronic music, some classical, and a few movie and game soundtracks. I used to listen to a lot of Christian music, but these days I don’t connect well with Contemporary Christian Music. I do like hymns. But in general I’m an instrumental person. Vocal music just doesn’t do much for me, with a few exceptions. This section is called “Music,” but other auditory things will likely appear here as well, like sound effects and instrument samples. === Writing === Writing. Yes, I read as well as write. But “literature,” again, sounds too highbrow. I occasionally read high art literature but not that much. I would use “narrative,” but I’m interested in other kinds of writing as well. So I’ll just call the whole thing writing because really, when I’m analyzing other people’s writing, my goal is to know how to write better myself. I read almost no fiction while I was a teenager, except for the stuff we were forced to read in school. I read a lot of fiction when I was younger, but once I hit my teenage years my analytical mind took over, and I read mainly apologetics. What brought me back was a video game. I never played them growing up, but my senior year of college I was introduced to ''Chrono Trigger'', and I was hooked. ''Chrono Trigger'' was an RPG for the Super Nintendo that came out in 1995. I played it for hours at a time, and instead of feeling brain-dead like I did after playing other video games, I always came out of it feeling exhilarated. As I looked for other games like it, I realized that what I liked most about it was the plot, and of course, I could get that from literature. So I broke my narrative fast and picked up ''The Hobbit'', a book I had tried to read twice before and had dropped in the middle of Mirkwood each time. This time I finished it and moved on to ''The Lord of the Rings''. And my fiction consumption has just snowballed from there. Usually I read science fiction and fantasy. And I mostly listen to audiobooks because it lets me do other things at the same time. Despite all this fiction I’m reading, I haven’t been writing any stories like I did when I was little. I have these huge mental blocks that keep me from getting very far with … well, anything, but especially creative writing. My writing is all of a more expositional nature. This is something I hope to overcome. Narrative really fascinates me, and I have this impulse to create that so rarely gets channeled into anything productive. Poetry rarely does anything for me, usually because I find it hard to understand, but I strongly prefer metrical, rhyming poetry over freeverse. I especially appreciate meter-and-rhyme when it occurs in music, though I am also impressed when someone can set prose to a melody and not sound like they’re rambling musically. === Art === I’m including in this category anything visual, such as architecture. I know even less about visual art than the other areas of aesthetics, and my tastes here are even more limited. I’m pretty much at the level of pop culture. Art museums bore me about as much as the average person. I don’t typically care about any art produced before the twentieth century, and the avant garde types of modern art are nonsensical to me or at least uninteresting. My favorite kinds of art are nature photography, fantasy art, and surrealism. Then I have other miscellaneous visual interests, mostly having to do with computers and publishing, like fonts and tiling images. Sometime I want to explore the ins and outs of computer graphics. === Comics === Comics, along with video games, were one of those things I wished I could get into when I was young but didn’t because they cost too much. I did grow up on comic-related TV shows and movies, however. I watched ''Superfriends'', ''The Incredible Hulk'', ''Spider-Man'', ''Wonder Woman'', ''Batman''. Superman and Wonder Woman were at the top of my list of superheros, though they’ve now been supplanted by Spider-Man. There’s something about comics that’s just ''cool'' (not a word I use often, but here it fits). To some degree it depends on the comic, but partly it’s the medium itself that intrigues me. The first comic book I actually read was volume one of Neil Gaiman’s ''The Sandman''. Kind of a dark one to start out on, but that’s what I picked up. Anyway, that launched me into comic books. But one comic medium I had already discovered was ''webcomics''! What a great way to pass the time. I occasionally have the urge to try drawing my own, but who knows if that will happen. I can’t do ''everything''. I have to keep reminding myself of that (if you don’t know what I mean, take a look around this site!). I also dabble in anime and manga, which I like because they are weird and because they are character-driven. And for the record, ''Calvin and Hobbes'' is the best comic strip in the universe. The best webcomic in the universe is [http://www.gpf-comics.com/ General Protection Fault]. === Games === In a sense, games are the centerpiece of my aesthetic interests, specifically what I call “narrative games.” These are any games that revolve around stories. My primary focus is on computer games, like text adventures and computer RPGs. Narrative games bring together two topics that are deeply fascinating to me: narrative and interaction. Why they are so intriguing to me is a mystery I haven’t yet explored. Of course, most people wouldn’t explore it at all. Those people are normal. As I mentioned in the writing section, the game that got me started was ''Chrono Trigger'', which I played about six years after it came out. I love that game. To a certain degree it has become the model by which I evaluate many of the other games I play, at least the RPGs. Since then I’ve been playing a fairly steady stream of RPGs and adventure games, both commercial and freeware. One of my goals in life is to write at least one or two of these games. I want to write at least one text adventure and one graphical adventure. There are other kinds of games I want to create, too–games that are mindless but rewarding. I mean, really. I play games to relax, not to challenge myself. Most games take too much thought or skill. === Mass media === I don’t watch much TV or many movies, but I listen to the radio a lot. I used to alternate between talk and music in phases, but now my musical tastes have drifted away from the kinds of things that get played on the radio, so I listen to talk radio almost exclusively. And even though I pay very little attention to mass culture, in this category goes one of the few things I can genuinely say I’m a fan of, and that’s ''Star Trek''. ''The X-Files'' comes in second. ''Star Wars'' is growing on me, along with one or two others. === Humor === Humor is necessary for my survival. I am addicted to it. And to go along with my philosopher tendencies, I also analyze it. Everything else in this section will be a surprise. [[Category:Arts]] 879c47bc3b3bc27777883b4aaee0958d7d4a6d79 135 126 2014-05-15T06:26:15Z Andy Culbertson 1 Updated the contents. wikitext text/x-wiki I am at heart a philosopher rather than an artist or entertainer or even a consumer. I do like immersing myself in the experience of fun, beautiful, or profound things, but I am equally (or more) interested in the ideas they represent and in what ''makes'' them fun, beautiful, or profound. My general aesthetic theory is that people have different emotional or intellectual desires in life, and they use art to help fulfill them. This leads them into different realms of artistic taste. For instance, I like to use music to create an environment for me to live in, so I don’t listen to music that takes a lot of concentration to appreciate. I tend to listen to new age, ambient, or trance, sometimes classical. I like art that I can “get” at a glance but which also has deeper layers of structure and meaning that I can uncover over time. Additionally, my favorite genres of just about everything are science fiction and fantasy. This used to be because I thought the real world was boring, but reality is growing on me, so now I think the reasons are more complex than that. Before I get started on the subsections, a note on my links: I link to websites I like, but I don’t necessarily approve of everything on those sites. This is true whenever anybody links to anything on the web, but I just want to say to my more conservative readers that while I try to associate myself with wholesome things, sometimes the things I like about a work are accompanied by other things I could do without (usually it’s language and violence). I try to overlook those and just enjoy the parts I do like. I hope my aesthetic and other values will become evident to you as you read through my site. === Music === I’ve been a musician since I was three. I took violin lessons from three till first grade, piano first through twelfth, French horn in band sixth grade through high school, and church choir the whole time. By the end of high school, my musical activities had proliferated so much that I was tired of music altogether. Except for band. Band, I can honestly say, was the best thing I did in school, and I loved it the whole way through. When I went to college, I dropped music entirely for a couple of years, after which I helped out with the music at church until our little church closed. A couple of years ago I joined a worship team on the piano at my current church, and it's been a growing experience, since we normally use lead sheets and spend the whole time improvising. Not what I was used to. I also bought a French horn a few years ago, though so far I've rarely played it. Performing is fun (when I’m not doing too much of it), but what I really want to do is compose. This is what I unconsciously wished I was doing whenever I’d sit down at the piano to practice. And I did compose some, though it wasn’t much and not that good. But what I really wanted my teachers couldn’t give me, which was formal training in composition. I did take a music theory class in high school, but that was about it. Wheaton offers a major in composition, but I had other priorities. You can’t major in everything. So now I plan to teach myself. I want to start with tonal harmony and counterpoint and then get into digital music. And of course, I listen to music, too. I don’t connect with most styles of popular music. As I mentioned earlier, mostly I listen to new age, ambient, and other electronic music, some classical, and a few movie and game soundtracks. I used to listen to a lot of Christian music, but these days I don’t connect well with Contemporary Christian Music. I do like hymns. But in general I’m an instrumental person. Vocal music just doesn’t do much for me, with a few exceptions. This section is called “Music,” but other auditory things will likely appear here as well, like sound effects and instrument samples. === Writing === As usual, I don't know what to call this section. Yes, I read as well as write. But “literature” sounds too highbrow. I occasionally read fine art literature but not that much. I would use “narrative,” but I’m interested in other kinds of writing as well. So I just call the whole thing writing because really, when I’m analyzing other people’s writing, my goal is to know how to write better myself. I read almost no fiction while I was a teenager, except for the stuff we were forced to read in school. I read a lot of fiction when I was younger, but once I hit my teenage years my analytical mind took over, and I read mainly [[Apologetics Introduction|apologetics]]. What brought me back was a video game. I rarely played them growing up, but my senior year of college I was introduced to ''Chrono Trigger'', and I was hooked. ''Chrono Trigger'' was an RPG for the Super Nintendo that came out in 1995. I played it for hours at a time, and instead of feeling brain-dead like I did after playing other video games, I always came out of it feeling exhilarated. As I looked for other games like it, I realized that what I liked most about it was the plot, and of course, I could get that from literature. So I broke my narrative fast and picked up ''The Hobbit'', a book I had tried to read twice before and had dropped in the middle of Mirkwood each time. This time I finished it and moved on to ''The Lord of the Rings''. And my fiction consumption has just snowballed from there. Usually I read science fiction and fantasy. And I mostly listen to audiobooks because it lets me do other things at the same time. Despite all this fiction I’m reading, I haven’t been writing any stories like I did when I was little. I have these huge mental blocks that keep me from getting very far with ... well, anything, but especially creative writing. My writing is all of a more expositional nature. This is something I hope to overcome. Narrative really fascinates me, and I have this impulse to create that so rarely gets channeled into anything productive. Poetry rarely does anything for me, usually because I find it hard to understand, but I strongly prefer metrical, rhyming poetry over freeverse. I especially appreciate meter-and-rhyme when it occurs in music, though I am also impressed when someone can set prose to a melody and not sound like their music is rambling. === Art === I’m including in this category anything visual and static, such as architecture. I know even less about visual art than the other areas of aesthetics, and my tastes here are even more limited. I’m pretty much at the level of pop culture. Art museums bore me about as much as the average person. I don’t typically care about any art produced before the twentieth century, and the avant garde types of modern art are nonsensical to me or at least uninteresting. My favorite kinds of art are nature photography, fantasy art, and surrealism. Then I have other miscellaneous visual interests, mostly having to do with computers and publishing, such as fonts. Sometime I want to explore the ins and outs of computer graphics. === Comics === Comics, along with video games, were one of those things I wished I could get into when I was young but didn’t because they cost too much. I did grow up on comic-related TV shows and movies, however. I watched ''Superfriends'', ''The Incredible Hulk'', ''Spider-Man'', ''Wonder Woman'', ''Batman''. Superman and Wonder Woman were at the top of my list of superheros, though they’ve now been supplanted by Spider-Man. There’s something about comics that’s just ''cool'' (not a word I use often, but here it fits). To some degree it depends on the comic, but partly it’s the medium itself that intrigues me. The first comic book I actually read was volume one of Neil Gaiman’s ''The Sandman''. Kind of a dark one to start out on, but that’s what I picked up. Anyway, that launched me into comic books. But one comic medium I had already discovered was webcomics, a great way to pass the time. I also dabble in anime and manga, which I like because they are weird and because they are character-driven. And for the record, ''Calvin and Hobbes'' is the best comic strip in the universe. === Games === In a sense, games are the centerpiece of my aesthetic interests, specifically what I call “narrative games.” These are any games that revolve around stories. My primary focus is on computer games, and the narrative games in that category are things like text adventures, computer RPGs, and adventure games. Narrative games bring together two topics that are deeply fascinating to me: narrative and interaction. Why they are so intriguing to me is a mystery I haven’t yet explored. Of course, most people wouldn’t explore it at all. Those people are normal. As I mentioned in the writing section, the game that got me started was ''Chrono Trigger'', which I played about six years after it came out. For a while it was the model by which I evaluated many of the other games I played, at least the RPGs. For a few years after that I played a fairly steady stream of RPGs and adventure games, both commercial and freeware. Then I took a break from games for a few years, but last year when I got a better computer, I plunged back in and this time began expanding the types of games I played. One of my goals in life is to make at least one or two games. === Video === I have a love/meh relationship with video entertainment. I also don't have many profound things to say about it at this point. But there are a few TV shows, movies, and online video channels I like, so I might talk about those some. As usual, I'm especially into SFF and comedy. These days I watch a lot of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Let%27s_Play_%28video_gaming%29 Let's Plays]. === Humor === Humor is necessary for my survival. I am addicted to it. And to go along with my philosopher tendencies, I also analyze it. Everything else in this section will be a surprise. [[Category:Arts]] f380d5652128169c463aa54d32e33660dc5eaae6 0 24 127 49 2014-05-07T05:02:22Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the STEM, Site, and Obsolete categories. wikitext text/x-wiki This is an index page from an old version of this site. [[Computers Introduction]] [http://del.icio.us/thinkulum/computers Computers links] === Internet === === Programming === === Software === === Troubleshooting === === Tech culture === === Math, science, and technology === [[Category:STEM]] [[Category:Site]] [[Category:Obsolete]] ad408bda138b40d06d8ade0a3c22475179716343 0 25 128 51 2014-05-07T05:02:30Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the STEM category. wikitext text/x-wiki Version 1.1, 5-1-05 I grew up on computers. My dad is an electrical engineer, so we’ve had at least one computer in the house since I was little. The first family computer we had was an Osborne 1. Yes, I know, you’ve never heard of it. To me it was the best thing since sliced bread, which I had only discovered a few years earlier. My dad taught me how to program in BASIC, and for a while that was my major pastime. My brother Michael is the one who really picked it up, however. He is one of my chief sources of computer information, so his name will probably make frequent appearances in this section. I dropped programming in junior high for other things, and I regret it in some ways. The tech world is very interesting to me, and I have some friends in that sphere, but the learning curve for being conversant in computer science is pretty steep and I haven’t kept up with it, so I’m sort of at a disadvantage. But oh well, you can’t do everything. I keep up with programming and computer technology in my own small way, and it’s usually enough for me. After not having programmed for about ten years, I started learning Perl at my brother’s recommendation. It is not an easy language to learn because it can be very cryptic. But I rediscovered what I love about programming. It boils down to two things: puzzles and power. Power because when you know how to program, you can get the computer to do what ''you'' want it to do. You’re not limited to what other people’s programs will allow you to do. And puzzles because programming is a process of problem solving, and it can be surprisingly engrossing. I can sit there for hours, totally absorbed in working out the right code to achieve my goal. But I do have limits. I don’t naturally think like a computer, and contorting my mind into those patterns is taxing. So as with everything else but more so in this case, my attention to the subject comes and goes in phases. There are many other things about the world of computers that interest me, from artificial intelligence to the open source movement to the OS wars. I am fascinated, too, by the philosophical and methodological insights that can be drawn from computer science and applied to other areas. As for hardware, I bought a laptop in 1996, my freshman year of college. It was a Toshiba Satellite 205CDS, a P100 that had about 780M of hard drive space, an 11.5″ screen, and 24M of RAM. This was fine for a few years, but it took a noticeable dive in performance as the software I was trying to run began to surpass it. I also had to clear off hard drive space all the time to have room for my puttering. Eventually I’d had enough and started saving for a new laptop, this time one that would hopefully stay ahead of the software for a while longer. It took me two years to save for it, but finally I got a Sager 5690 at 3.2GHz with a 60GB hard drive, a gigabyte of RAM, and a 15″ screen. That’s a bit better than my old computer. In fact, so much better that it’s way more than I need, so I named it after my favorite overpowered starship Petey, the [http://www.schlockmercenary.com/d/20010325.html Tausennigan] [http://www.schlockmercenary.com/d/20010513.html Thunderhead] [http://www.schlockmercenary.com/d/20010518.html Superfortress] from the webcomic [http://www.schlockmercenary.com/ Schlock Mercenary]! I partitioned the hard drive down the middle so I could dual boot with Windows XP and Linux. So that is what I am currently operating off of, just to give you a frame of reference. Now, about this math, science, and technology section. I’m following the pattern I started when I stuffed the rest of the social sciences into a corner of the psychology page. Basically these are side interests of mine that I needed a place to put, and the computer page seemed the most natural place. My dad is an electrical engineer. I would never be an electrical engineer. But his interest in things technical extends into related fields like physics, math, and astronomy, and that is one thing I did pick up from him. In fact, in junior high I thought I might want to be a scientist when I grew up. Then one year I worked in a lab for a science fair project, and I was cured. But my interest remains. What I like about science is that it amazes me, and I like to be amazed. The natural world is a strange and incredible place. Mainly I’m into the astronomical-physical end of the science spectrum, since that’s what up with I grew. And when you apply science to practical problems, you get technology. I like to be impressed by people’s engineering creativity and the power we can wield over the physical world. That’s one of the main reasons I like Star Trek. As Arthur C. Clarke pointed out, technology is like magic. So every once in a while I’ll point you to some new bit of technological wizardry I’ve been gaping at. Math I flirt with occasionally, and I do mean occasionally. It was always my weakest subject in school, but it still intrigues me in some ways. It’s good training for logical thinking, and the philosophy of mathematics asks some interesting questions. So I’ll dip into math here every once in a while too. [[Category:STEM]] 3c7fa43abc0cc0c1e13791c1e123f8f19f702a06 0 39 129 79 2014-05-07T05:04:00Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the Weirdness category. wikitext text/x-wiki Version 1.0, 3-20-05 I ''would'' spend all my time in the normal world of everyday experience, but it’s too boring. Sometimes I need a bit of strangeness injected into my life. Hence, this section. “Weird Stuff.” If anyone can think of a better name for it, please let me know. I’ve never had a paranormal experience, and I hope to keep it that way. I just like reading and hearing about it. Books and the Internet help with the first of those, and the radio helps with the second. As a child I would often end up in the paranormal section of the library, inspecting the picture of the Brown Lady or walking out happily with the Loch Ness Monster tucked under my arm. In my early teen years I listened to Bob Larson, a controversial Christian radio talk show host who dealt with these kinds of weird things. Occasionally he even talked to demons on the air when someone called in who was possessed, if you can believe that. I got my first doses of conspiracy mania from Marlin Maddoux on his radio show ''Point of View''. In high school I dropped everything for apologetics, but in college a friend brought me back by periodically alerting me to current events in paranormalia, such as the Hale-Bopp controversy. Then I discovered Art Bell while driving home after my late night job one summer. Art Bell hosted (and still does on the weekends) the popular paranormal radio talk show ''Coast to Coast AM''. This was also the summer I discovered ''Politics and Religion'', a talk show about the end times and associated conspiracies. Since then I’ve wandered through all kinds of weird territory, mostly on the web, picking up bizarrities here and there. I also took a class at Wheaton called ''Psychology and Contemporary Mysticism'', which dealt with a lot of these topics from a scientific and Christian perspective. Needless to say, I was fascinated. It was one of my favorite classes ever, and it has greatly influenced my thinking on the subject. I explore these strange stories and ideas partly for entertainment, partly to exercise my critical thinking skills, and partly to ponder the implications, if any of it is true. These purposes take different forms depending on the topic. === Paranormal phenomena === My views on the paranormal are somewhat complicated. I’m alternately skeptical and credulous. I do think that weird things go on in the world; I’m unwilling to discount ''everything'' I hear. But I am trying to learn to be more careful in my reasoning. My general rule of thumb is that paranormal believers conclude too much from the evidence, and skeptics don’t take enough of the evidence into account. This subject is also a theological obstacle course. The aspects of paranormality that I do accept I struggle to fit into my Christian world view. I don’t completely buy the explanation that all unusual experiences are demonic. But in any case, I compare the paranormal to science fiction or fantasy. Even if it’s not real, sometimes it’s fun to consider the possibilities. === Alternative science === Any realm of science you can think of has a fringe element. The nice name for this is “alternative science.” A couple of different things go on in this arena. One is the formation of alternate theories to explain established scientific data, like the “reciprocal system of theory,” an explanation of subatomic physics. Another is the investigation of anomalous phenomena or technologies, like antigravity and free energy machines. The nice thing about alternative science is that it purports to be science. Thus, you can subject it to scientific evaluation. On the other hand, I don’t know how much of this scientific evaluation actually goes on, since most scientists seem to think they have better things to do than addressing fringe claims. Whether the alternative researchers are right or wrong, this seems like a fruitful field of study for understanding the nature and culture of science. Alternative science also tends to be very hopeful. The knowledge and technologies many of these researchers are pursuing would have a profound and positive impact on human society. If they’re on the right track, I say more power to them. === Conspiracy theories === The conspiracy theories I’m especially interested in are the global kind. I don’t really care how the CIA is involved with drugs or who shot Kennedy. The future world dictators are the ones that pique my interest (more of my fascination with the fundamental). These theories usually involve organizations like the UN and the Trilateral Commission and groups like the international bankers. I’m ambivalent toward conspiracy theories. I tend to discount them out of hand, but I’m not sure whether I like them even as entertainment. It’s intriguing to think about the idea of secret decisions being made by high-powered men to alter world events. But conspiracy theories are pretty nasty things, when you think about it. These aren’t fictional characters the theorists are accusing; they’re real people. If the theory isn’t true, it’s tantamount to slander. When the conspiracy ''is'' fictional, however, I love it. ''The X-Files'' is one of my favorite shows, and I liked ''Nowhere Man'', too, the few episodes I saw. I should probably read some Robert Ludlum novels. === Hoaxes and urban legends === Hoaxes are an especially good critical thinking builder because they represent falsehoods that have already been discredited. There’s a lot to be learned from both hoaxers and the people who discredit them, as well as from the people who get sucked in. The topic of urban legends is pretty straightforward and uncontroversial. But urban legends do tend to be unusual, which is why they get circulated. Whenever I get e-mails about suspicious sounding stories, I always go straight to the Internet and see if it’s been recognized as an urban legend. Usually they’ve been debunked, but a few urban legends are true. Of course, there is a more serious side to all this. Some people are terrorized by their strange experiences, and some are slaves to paranoia. And from a Christian standpoint, spiritual deception in this domain is rampant. But to be honest, while I sympathize with the plight of such people, I think that freeing them is someone else’s ministry. I don’t have the spiritual or psychological fortitude for it. My service is to inform. … (Now watch me eat my words!) [[Category:Weirdness]] 0b0a53b2ed8de9853b6d9c94d39db1fcbb600254 0 38 130 77 2014-05-07T05:04:03Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the Weirdness, Site, and Obsolete categories. wikitext text/x-wiki This is an index page from an old version of this site. [[Weird Stuff Introduction]] [http://del.icio.us/thinkulum/weird Weird Stuff links] === Paranormal phenomena === === Alternative science and spirituality === === Conspiracy theories === === Hoaxes, urban legends, and strange human behavior === [[Category:Weirdness]] [[Category:Site]] [[Category:Obsolete]] f01648ab2f4950741887923e3a37968519bef3be 0 30 131 61 2014-05-07T05:05:05Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the Life maintenance, Site, and Obsolete categories. wikitext text/x-wiki This is an index page from an old version of this site. [[Life Maintenance Introduction]] [http://del.icio.us/thinkulum/life-maintenance Life Maintenance links] [[Category:Life maintenance]] [[Category:Site]] [[Category:Obsolete]] ee48362567aea6fb437944f8974573e7bbbfc8db 0 31 132 63 2014-05-07T05:05:26Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the Life maintenance category. wikitext text/x-wiki Version 1.0, 5-1-05 I could do without the real world. I am essentially a lazy person. And besides, the world of ideas is so much more fun. Unfortunately, in order to keep living and to do it conveniently, you have to expend a certain amount of energy. It probably takes less in the US than in a primitive, tribal society, but still it takes some. So here I will share with you some of the things I’ve found that have made my life a little easier to maintain. Because we all have better things to do. Of course, many people make their living out of the things on this page. They actually enjoy doing things like managing finances or selling clothes or designing exercise plans. I consider such things to be necessary evils, and I take great pleasure in marginalizing these people’s whole careers. I figure if they’re going to enjoy making my life more complicated, I might as well retaliate by denigrating their chosen occupations. This page will be dedicated to the good people who make these necessary evils more invisible. These people clean up the mess created by the overenthusiastic people of the last paragraph so that I don’t have to deal with it. The less I have to think about, say, buying a car, the better. So if someone tells me exactly what I need to know to do that, they have just improved the world by holding back the evil that desires to encroach upon my life. And if no one is doing that, I’ll just have to do it myself and save both myself and other people time in the future. Hence you’ll find a few of my own stress-saving creations here too. When my mom told me to get my head out of the clouds when I was growing up, I don’t think she quite meant this … [[Category:Life maintenance]] adf13e8ce21d414bb18b902535c195892dd96b88 137 132 2014-06-01T04:40:35Z Andy Culbertson 1 Updated the contents. wikitext text/x-wiki I used to disdain the tasks that kept life running smoothly--taxes, exercise, shopping for anything that wasn't books. I preferred to live in my head. I used to want to pretend I didn't even have a body. Since then I've discovered the joy of productivity and mastering new activities, and since life maintenance tasks have a place in that world, I have made a kind of peace with them. I still dread and procrastinate on some of them, but I no longer wish they would all just go away. But they do still complicate life and make it more annoying if you're not interested in them for their own sake. Fortunately there are many people who enjoy the job of wrapping up a messy task and handing you the package so all you have to do is add water and toss it in the microwave. I like doing a bit of that myself. So in the Life Maintenance category I will share with you some of the things I’ve found or put together that have made my life a little easier to maintain. [[Category:Life maintenance]] 38da16f2ab43f187dfaf63a81db31e7cb7fc367b 0 50 138 2014-06-04T03:39:57Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the article. wikitext text/x-wiki I'm starting this topic with notes on ''[http://www.worldcat.org/title/solving-the-procrastination-puzzle-a-concise-guide-to-strategies-for-change/oclc/858799814 Solving the Procrastination Puzzle]'' by Timothy Pychyl. == Introduction == This book is based on psychological research. You can find more at [http://procrastination.ca Timothy Pychyl's website]. {xvi} == Chapter 1: What Is Procrastination? Why Does It Matter? == We delay some actions for good reasons, and this isn't procrastination. {2} Procrastination is a "reluctance to act when it is in our best interest to act." To change, we need to know why it happens, and we need strategies for change. {3} This book will provide both. {4} The first strategy for change is to observe which of your delays are from procrastination and to notice some of your procrastination patterns. # List activities that you delay from procrastination. # Next to each of these activities, list your feelings and thoughts about it. # Notice any patterns in those feelings and thoughts. {5-6} [[Category:Productivity]] fbb2792f51715ceb7d18d5272860ae6d2d75b9d4 141 138 2014-06-11T05:07:53Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added chapter 2. wikitext text/x-wiki I'm starting this topic with notes on ''[http://www.worldcat.org/title/solving-the-procrastination-puzzle-a-concise-guide-to-strategies-for-change/oclc/858799814 Solving the Procrastination Puzzle]'' by Timothy Pychyl. == Introduction == This book is based on psychological research. You can find more at [http://procrastination.ca Timothy Pychyl's website]. {xvi} == Chapter 1: What Is Procrastination? Why Does It Matter? == We delay some actions for good reasons, and this isn't procrastination. {2} Procrastination is a "reluctance to act when it is in our best interest to act." To change, we need to know why it happens, and we need strategies for change. {3} This book will provide both. {4} The first strategy for change is to observe which of your delays are from procrastination and to notice some of your procrastination patterns. # List activities that you delay from procrastination. # Next to each of these activities, list your feelings and thoughts about it. # Notice any patterns in those feelings and thoughts. {5-6} == Chapter 2: Is Procrastination Really a Problem? What Are the Costs of Procrastinating? == Procrastination is detrimental in a number of ways. It decreases achievement because it gives us less time to do the work well. {10} It lowers mood because it leads to feelings of guilt. {10-11} It lowers health by causing stress and because some of the activities we procrastinate on are health related. {11} And it prevents us from moving our lives forward. {13} To encourage change, focus your attention on the costs of procrastination and the benefits of timely action. {14, 15} # List the activities from the exercise in chapter 1. # For each activity, record how this procrastination has affected your health, emotions, relationships, and so on. You may want to discuss it with a loved one, who might tell you how your procrastination has affected them in ways you hadn't noticed. {14-15} # For each activity, also record why this goal is important to you and how you'd benefit from acting on it now. {16} [[Category:Productivity]] afef446114b9dacebf71a0b14655636858632eb1 142 141 2014-06-18T04:30:07Z Andy Culbertson 1 Replaced the beginnings of a detailed summary of Pychyl with the beginnings of a briefer one. wikitext text/x-wiki I'm starting this topic with notes on ''[http://www.worldcat.org/title/solving-the-procrastination-puzzle-a-concise-guide-to-strategies-for-change/oclc/858799814 Solving the Procrastination Puzzle]'' by Timothy Pychyl. You can find more information at [http://procrastination.ca Pychyl's website]. The main strategy in this book is to just get started on whatever activity you're putting off. This strategy is different from the Nike slogan "Just do it" because the focus isn't on finishing but on starting, which is much less intimidating. {56} You may have to "just start" many times as you do the work, if you find yourself repeatedly stopping. The strategy of just starting cuts through all the excuses we come up with for not starting. It cuts through fears, personality traits, and the tendency to "give in [to procrastination] to feel good," which is the basic reason we procrastinate. The other major strategy in the book is to use implementation intentions to plan ahead. These are if-then or when-then statements that give yourself triggers for taking particular actions. For example, "When I walk in the door, I will immediately begin cooking dinner," or, "If I feel the impulse to check Twitter, I will stay put and continue working." {54-57} Then there are ancillary strategies, which have the effect of increasing your motivation for getting the activity done or counteracting the thinking that enables procrastination. Strategies to increase motivation: * Think through the costs of procrastinating on particular activities and the benefits of acting on them in a timely manner. * Realize that you'll often feel more like doing a task once you've started doing it. {51} Antidotes to procrastinatory thinking: * Become aware of your procrastination thinking patterns. List the thoughts and feelings you have when you think about particular activities you put off, and notice any commonalities. * Realize that you won't feel more like it tomorrow and also that you don't have to feel like doing something to get started on it. * Remember that if you keep thinking tomorrow is a better time to start than now, eventually you'll feel that now was actually the best time to start. {41-42} [[Category:Productivity]] 7b77b6577b00dfc5ecd7025272b2a438517a4cf2 14 51 139 2014-06-04T03:40:54Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the category. wikitext text/x-wiki [[Category:Social science]] 49de49372a42172a9a478a3f04ac469e7cfbcc05 0 52 140 2014-06-10T03:36:43Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the article. wikitext text/x-wiki I'm starting this topic with notes on Robert Audi's [http://www.worldcat.org/title/epistemology-a-contemporary-introduction-to-the-theory-of-knowledge/oclc/851331285 Epistemology: A Contemporary Introduction to the Theory of Knowledge, 3rd Edition]. == Front Matter == === Introduction === ==== Perception, belief, and justification ==== Epistemology is the theory of knowledge and justification. Perceptions through the senses can be justification for beliefs, {1} and justified beliefs are a goal in epistemology. {2} ==== Justification as process, as status, and as property ==== Justification is a concept with several meanings that have subtle differences. If a belief is natural to believe, if someone can believe it without being intellectually lazy, deceptive, and so on, then the belief has the property of being justified. If a belief is justified for someone, then they are justified in believing it--that is, it is something they ''should'' believe because of the position they're in--whether they actually do believe it or not. We can call this situational or propositional justification. {2-3} If someone does believe a justified belief, then we say they justifiedly believe it. {2} We can call this belief or doxastic justification. It is grounded in situational justification. {3-4} If someone gives reasons for believing something, that belief is undergoing a process of justification. {2} Perception may be our most basic source of knowledge, at least in childhood. {4} ==== Knowledge and justification ==== Knowledge of something is grounded in the same thing that justifies the belief in it. But knowledge and justified belief are different. Knowledge is justified belief that is true. {4} ==== Memory, introspection, and self-consciousness ==== Memory beliefs are justified, but we're less confident in them the less vivid the memory. At a low level of confidence, we can take a position of non-belief toward a proposition. We can entertain, consider, and suspend judgment on it without believing or disbelieving it. Forming memory beliefs can involve examining your own consciousness for imagery, which is a type of introspection. Knowing you are doing this is a case of self-knowledge. {4} ==== Reason and rational reflection ==== Some beliefs are based on understanding abstract concepts, such as geometry. These concepts seem to firmly justify the beliefs and to form a basis for knowledge. {5} ==== Testimony ==== According to the commonsense view, justified belief and knowledge about general facts can be based on either generalizations from one's own perceptions or from the testimony of others or both. Of course, our own faculties are still involved in knowing through testimony, since we must perceive the testimony and store it in memory. {6} ==== Basic sources of belief, justification, and knowledge ==== These are called perceptual, memorial, introspective, a priori, inductive, and testimony-based beliefs. The basic kinds of belief are perceptual, memorial, introspective, and a priori. The belief that I'm imagining a green field could be introspective because it's based on looking within, but since it doesn't require special concentration, it could simply be self-directed. A priori beliefs arise in an intuitive way. {7} Generalizations from more basic beliefs are inductive. The basic kinds of belief are grounded in the sources they arise from. These sources provide the raw materials for inductive generalizations. Testimony can be a source for any kind of belief. Presumably knowledge gained through testimony is ultimately grounded in a basic source. ==== Three kinds of grounds of belief ==== There are at least three ways beliefs are grounded in a source: Causal := the experience produces the belief. Justificational := the experience justifies the belief. Epistemic := the belief constitutes knowledge in virtue of the experience. They often coincide, and in those cases we can simply say the belief is grounded in the source. {8} They go with common questions: Causal: Why do you believe that? Justificational: Why should I accept that? Epistemic: How do you know that? A belief can be caused by a source without being justified (e.g., brain manipulation). A belief can be justified situationally even while being caused by something else that doesn't justify it (e.g., justified by testimony but caused by brain manipulation). Sometimes knowledge must be grounded in a causal ground. A justificational ground may not be an epistemic ground. You can justifiedly believe something without knowing it {Do you mean if it's not true?}. ==== Fallibility and skepticism ==== Our sources of belief are fallible. How do we know they aren't likely to be mistaken? {9} 'We stake our lives on beliefs we take to be knowledge. It would be unsettling to say that we merely justifiedly believe them. It would produce a crisis to conclude that they aren't even justified.' For now we'll assume that beliefs based on perception, memory, consciousness, reason, and testimony can be justified and constitute knowledge. This happens in many kinds of circumstances, and we'll explore how beliefs are related to these sources. ==== Overview ==== Chapters 1-7 (Part One) explore and compare the basic sources of belief, justification, and knowledge. Part Two discusses the development and structure of knowledge and justification. Chapter 8 explores how inference and other developmental processes expand our body of konwledge and justified beliefs. {10} What structure does this body of knowledge have, and how does the structure relate to the amount and kind of knowledge and justification it contains? Part Three discusses what justification and knowledge are and what kinds of things can be known. Chapter 12 explores the apparent extent of knowledge and justification in the scientific, ethical, and religious territories. Chapters 13-14 discuss whether skepticism is justified. If it is, we must revise the commonsense assessment of the extent of knowledge and justification in Chapters 1-12. Knowledge and justification represent positive values in the life of a reasonable person. We want to know many things and to be justified in what we believe and to know if others are justified in what they tell us. {11} Well-developed concepts of knowledge and justification can be ideals. We can try to attain justification and knowledge and avoid claiming them when they aren't available. [[Category:Philosophy]] 078731e752cd3ec9303828a1f5c21aba654c980e 14 53 143 2014-06-21T03:15:22Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the category. wikitext text/x-wiki [[Category:STEM]] a1ffc30bc1a1cc8bcfd0c5061f41a417db3453bd 0 54 144 2014-06-21T03:15:37Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the article. wikitext text/x-wiki == Introduction == This project is an exploration of mathematics from the perspective of someone who has learned some, forgotten most, and wants to learn more. I'm starting from the most basic concepts of pre-algebra, and I'm hoping to work through the typical American curriculum through geometry and then to cover some advanced areas that are related to my other projects. I won't set out a more detailed roadmap until I get closer to those waypoints. I'm not a mathematician, and I'm not writing a textbook. These are just my notes and reflections on aspects of math that I think will help me understand it. Maybe they will help some of you as well. My major assumption in this project is that mathematical concepts relate to each other and to the world, and that knowing these relationships can help us understand, remember, and use these concepts. It can also help us appreciate them as objects of beauty, which can itself help us remember them. == Pre-algebra == * [[/Number Sense/]] [[Category:Mathematics]] f087a381ff027cee96af40063d79abaa28e5161e 147 144 2014-06-21T03:25:28Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the Math Relearning category. wikitext text/x-wiki == Introduction == This project is an exploration of mathematics from the perspective of someone who has learned some, forgotten most, and wants to learn more. I'm starting from the most basic concepts of pre-algebra, and I'm hoping to work through the typical American curriculum through geometry and then to cover some advanced areas that are related to my other projects. I won't set out a more detailed roadmap until I get closer to those waypoints. I'm not a mathematician, and I'm not writing a textbook. These are just my notes and reflections on aspects of math that I think will help me understand it. Maybe they will help some of you as well. My major assumption in this project is that mathematical concepts relate to each other and to the world, and that knowing these relationships can help us understand, remember, and use these concepts. It can also help us appreciate them as objects of beauty, which can itself help us remember them. == Pre-algebra == * [[/Number Sense/]] [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Mathematics]] 28d254721e1eb4dc0ac57af3bc5277658f4c5fe0 148 147 2014-08-11T00:35:22Z Andy Culbertson 1 Moved the intro to its own page and added to the contents. wikitext text/x-wiki == [[/Introduction/]] == == [[/Pre-algebra/]] == * [[/Fundamentals/]] * [[/Number Sense/]] == [[/References/]] == [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Mathematics]] 3f1ff2cc907bbac71c513f7587f3d36c896689e1 14 55 145 2014-06-21T03:24:42Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the category. wikitext text/x-wiki [[Category:Mathematics]] 60848c22bf308da25112ff52bb54784040579e57 0 56 146 2014-06-21T03:24:50Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the article. wikitext text/x-wiki Note: These paragraphs are more like topic sentences, so they won't necessarily make sense on their own. They're placeholders I'll fill out later. == Sequence == Numbers form a sequence ordered by magnitude. We represent this sequence on a diagram called the number line. We'll start with the number 1. You can think of it as a unit of distance on the number line. If we move the same distance repeatedly, we'll arrive at other numbers: 2, 3, etc. We call these the counting numbers. == Assignment == Numbers can be associated with objects, both concrete and abstract. The sequential nature of numbers and their ability to be assigned to objects gives us our three main uses for numbers: quantifying, ordering, and naming. The fact that these associations can be made and broken freely means that numbers are abstract. == Decomposition == Numbers can be split apart into smaller numbers and grouped together to form larger ones. In this way numbers have relationships with each other. You could also say numbers have behavior and that each number has its own character. == Place value == Our numeration system uses place value to represent a number by means of the regular groupings within it. Let's add the number 0 to our sequence. Its simplest use is to hold a place in a numeral that has more than one digit. When we include 0 with the counting numbers, we call the new set the whole numbers. == Classification == Numbers can be grouped into categories or sets by various criteria. For example, the whole numbers are one set, and numbers in that set can be further classified as even or odd. [[Category:Math Relearning]] 54d3450e5ceb2e84ba59e634b07f4d965d52dc09 0 57 149 2014-08-11T00:47:01Z Andy Culbertson 1 Moved the intro to this page and added to it. wikitext text/x-wiki == Introduction == This project is an exploration of mathematics from the perspective of someone who has learned some, forgotten most, and wants to learn more. I'm starting from the most basic concepts of pre-algebra, and I'm hoping to work through the typical American curriculum through geometry and then to cover some advanced areas that are related to my other projects. I won't set out a more detailed roadmap until I get closer to those waypoints. I'm not a mathematician, and I'm not writing a textbook, even though I call the sections chapters. These are just my notes and reflections on aspects of math that I think will help me understand it. I'm hoping they'll help other people as well or that they'll at least be interesting. I'll also link to other resources that seem helpful. Think of this project as a commentary on other people's math education materials. My major assumption in this project is that mathematical concepts relate to each other and to the world, and that knowing these relationships can help us understand, remember, and use these concepts. It can also help us appreciate them as objects of beauty, which can itself help us remember them. == What is mathematics? == Like many people, I started out thinking of math as the study of numbers and the formulas for working with them. But there was one wrinkle in this assumption--geometry. Why was geometry a part of math? Shapes aren't numbers. Did somebody make a mistake? Poking around on Wikipedia made me aware that math is about much more than number. Numbers are the arithmetic, number theory, and maybe algebra part of math, and they are only one type of mathematical object. Math also covers space (geometry), change (calculus), and structure, whatever that is.<ref>''Wikipedia'', s.v. “Mathematics,” last modified July 14, 2014, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mathematics; ''Wikipedia'', s.v. “Areas of mathematics,” last modified June 18, 2014, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Areas_of_mathematics</ref> Expanding the scope of my understanding of math is good, but simply listing its concerns doesn't entirely help me. I look for coherence in my definitions, so I want to know what it is these areas have in common that draws mathematicians' interest and what distinguishes them from topics outside mathematics. Since space is involved, I'm especially unclear about the boundary between math and physics. These are issues I'll address as I learn. Category theory seems like a promising avenue for exploring the idea of mathematical objects, so I'm hoping to explore that area at some point.<ref>''Wikipedia'', s.v. “Mathematical object,” last modified March 14, 2014, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mathematical_object</ref> Mathematicians sometimes characterize their field as the science of patterns. I'm not sure what to make of that yet, but it also sounds promising. I can see mathematicians studying patterns and looking for them, and I can imagine there are non-obvious patterns lying behind other mathematical concepts. But I'd like more clarity on what kinds of patterns interest mathematicians, what features of patterns they like to study, and how. I'm pretty sure, for example, they wouldn't publish papers on the emotional effects of color choices in flower-themed wallpaper patterns. Mathematical patterns seem to be related to logic. For now I'll define math as doing mathematical things with mathematical objects, and as I learn I'll refine my definition. As possibly part of that definition, I'll also keep an eye out for how math's concepts can be characterized as patterns. But for all that, math does seem preoccupied with numbers. No matter what area I'm glancing at, there's something numeric involved. As I've done my initial thinking about math, I've come up with a speculation I'd like to investigate as I learn, that math is concerned with quantity and the concepts that branch out from it in particular ways. I'll call it the Quantity Relatedness Conjecture (QRC). == Footnotes == <references/> [[Category:Math Relearning]] 8a9eb4370ece078973c24bb3d5e6b125df0231f6 0 58 150 2014-08-11T01:57:15Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the article. wikitext text/x-wiki I'm using pre-algebra to refer to elementary and maybe middle school math, but I've learned that those years over not only algebra-related topics but also basic geometry, measurement, and statistics. I'm finding that these areas are interrelated, so I'm going to take a cue from elementary school curricula and cycle through them to make it easier to build the concepts on each other. As I analyze the concepts of pre-algebra and decide how to order them, I have the sense I'm on a journey. My destination is the general math of everyday life and the more formal treatment of these areas covered in the upper grades, and I'm mapping a course through the terrains of the various areas to get there. Several questions guide my route, directing my attention and reflection: What are numbers? How can we represent them in useful ways? What can we use them for? How can we work with them to achieve these purposes? How do we find the numbers we need in a situation? [[Category:Math Relearning]] 6ae8c29aff5ed728018aea23d2cceeb0e17c4204 0 59 151 2014-08-11T01:58:46Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the article. wikitext text/x-wiki Billstein, Rick, Shlomo Libeskind, and Johnny W Lott. 2007. ''A Problem Solving Approach to Mathematics for Elementary School Teachers''. Boston: Pearson Addison Wesley. Butterworth, Brian. 1999. ''What Counts: How Every Brain Is Hardwired for Math''. New York: Free Press. Chapin, Suzanne H, and Art Johnson. 2006. ''Math Matters: Understanding the Math You Teach, Grades K-8''. Sausalito, CA: Math Solutions Publications. Dehaene, Stanislas. 2011. ''The Number Sense: How the Mind Creates Mathematics''. New York: Oxford University Press. Devlin, Keith J. 1994. ''Mathematics, the Science of Patterns: The Search for Order in Life, Mind, and the Universe''. New York: Scientific American Library. ———. 2000. ''The Math Gene: How Mathematical Thinking Evolved and Why Numbers Are like Gossip''. [New York]: Basic Books. Hatfield, Mary M. 2007. ''Mathematics Methods for Elementary and Middle School Teachers''. Hoboken, N.J.; Chichester: Wiley ; John Wiley [distributor]. Resnik, Michael D. 1997. ''Mathematics as a Science of Patterns''. Oxford; Oxford; New York: Clarendon Press ; Oxford University Press. Tall, David Orme. 2013. ''How Humans Learn to Think Mathematically: Exploring the Three Worlds of Mathematics''. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Yolkowski, James. 2013. Uses of numbers. Math Lair. Accessed July 23, 2014. http://mathlair.allfunandgames.ca/numbertypes.php. [[Category:Math Relearning]] 98c094486790500e214b9f5061b11d37cb434c0d 170 151 2015-08-11T03:53:19Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added references. Minor fixes to existing references. wikitext text/x-wiki Billstein, Rick, Shlomo Libeskind, and Johnny W Lott. 2007. ''A Problem Solving Approach to Mathematics for Elementary School Teachers''. Boston: Pearson Addison Wesley. Butterworth, Brian. 1999. ''What Counts: How Every Brain Is Hardwired for Math''. New York: Free Press. Chapin, Suzanne H, and Art Johnson. 2006. ''Math Matters: Understanding the Math You Teach, Grades K-8''. Sausalito, CA: Math Solutions Publications. Dehaene, Stanislas. 2011. ''The Number Sense: How the Mind Creates Mathematics''. New York: Oxford University Press. Devlin, Keith J. 1994. ''Mathematics, the Science of Patterns: The Search for Order in Life, Mind, and the Universe''. New York: Scientific American Library. ———. 2000. ''The Math Gene: How Mathematical Thinking Evolved and Why Numbers Are like Gossip''. [New York]: Basic Books. Dijkstra, Edsger. 1985. On anthropomorphism in science. E. W. Dijkstra Archive. http://www.cs.utexas.edu/users/EWD/transcriptions/EWD09xx/EWD936.html. ———. 1986. The nature of my research and why I do it. E. W. Dijkstra Archive. https://www.cs.utexas.edu/users/EWD/transcriptions/EWD09xx/EWD993.html. Hatfield, Mary M. 2007. ''Mathematics Methods for Elementary and Middle School Teachers''. Hoboken, N.J.; Chichester: Wiley ; John Wiley [distributor]. Hofweber, Thomas. 2011. Logic and ontology. ''The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy'', Fall 2014 ed. Edited by Edward N. Zalta. http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/fall2014/entries/logic-ontology/. Krypton Inc. n.d. Pattern. ''iCoachMath.com''. http://www.icoachmath.com/math_dictionary/pattern.html. Mehta, Hemant. 2014. About that ‘Common Core’ math problem making the rounds on Facebook.... Friendly Atheist. http://www.patheos.com/blogs/friendlyatheist/2014/03/07/about-that-common-core-math-problem-making-the-rounds-on-facebook/ Resnik, Michael D. 1997. ''Mathematics as a Science of Patterns''. Oxford; New York: Clarendon Press; Oxford University Press. Somers, James. 2011. How I failed, failed, and finally succeeded at learning how to code. ''The Atlantic'', June 3. http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2011/06/how-i-failed-failed-and-finally-succeeded-at-learning-how-to-code/239855/. Tall, David. 2013. ''How Humans Learn to Think Mathematically: Exploring the Three Worlds of Mathematics''. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Yolkowski, James. 2013. Uses of numbers. Math Lair. http://mathlair.allfunandgames.ca/numbertypes.php. Zheng, Alice. 2015. Striking parallels between mathematics and software engineering. O'Reilly Media. https://beta.oreilly.com/ideas/striking-parallels-between-mathematics-and-software-engineering. [[Category:Math Relearning]] fb4110ce87387545599c46d147b2d42635b171e9 177 170 2015-09-29T01:47:23Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added Bittinger et al. 2004 and NGACBP 2010. Added the Developing category. Corrected some entries. wikitext text/x-wiki Billstein, Rick, Shlomo Libeskind, and Johnny W Lott. 2007. ''A Problem Solving Approach to Mathematics for Elementary School Teachers'', 9th ed. Boston: Pearson Addison Wesley. Bittinger, Marvin L. and Judith A. Beecher. 2004. ''Developmental Mathematics'', 6th ed. Boston: Pearson Addison Wesley. Butterworth, Brian. 1999. ''What Counts: How Every Brain Is Hardwired for Math''. New York: Free Press. Chapin, Suzanne H, and Art Johnson. 2006. ''Math Matters: Understanding the Math You Teach, Grades K-8''. Sausalito, CA: Math Solutions Publications. Dehaene, Stanislas. 2011. ''The Number Sense: How the Mind Creates Mathematics''. New York: Oxford University Press. Devlin, Keith J. 1994. ''Mathematics, the Science of Patterns: The Search for Order in Life, Mind, and the Universe''. New York: Scientific American Library. ———. 2000. ''The Math Gene: How Mathematical Thinking Evolved and Why Numbers Are like Gossip''. [New York]: Basic Books. Dijkstra, Edsger. 1985. On anthropomorphism in science. E. W. Dijkstra Archive. http://www.cs.utexas.edu/users/EWD/transcriptions/EWD09xx/EWD936.html. ———. 1986. The nature of my research and why I do it. E. W. Dijkstra Archive. https://www.cs.utexas.edu/users/EWD/transcriptions/EWD09xx/EWD993.html. Hatfield, Mary M., Nancy Tanner Edwards, Gary G. Bitter, and Jean Morrow. 2008. ''Mathematics Methods for Elementary and Middle School Teachers'', 6th ed. Hoboken, N.J.; Chichester: Wiley ; John Wiley [distributor]. Hofweber, Thomas. 2011. Logic and ontology. ''The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy'', Fall 2014 ed. Edited by Edward N. Zalta. http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/fall2014/entries/logic-ontology/. Krypton Inc. n.d. Pattern. ''iCoachMath.com''. http://www.icoachmath.com/math_dictionary/pattern.html. Mehta, Hemant. 2014. About that ‘Common Core’ math problem making the rounds on Facebook.... Friendly Atheist. http://www.patheos.com/blogs/friendlyatheist/2014/03/07/about-that-common-core-math-problem-making-the-rounds-on-facebook/ NGACBP (National Governors Association Center for Best Practices) and Council of Chief State School Officers. 2010. ''Common Core State Standards for Mathematics''. Washington, DC: National Governors Association Center for Best Practices, Council of Chief State School Officers. http://www.corestandards.org/Math/. Resnik, Michael D. 1997. ''Mathematics as a Science of Patterns''. Oxford; New York: Clarendon Press; Oxford University Press. Somers, James. 2011. How I failed, failed, and finally succeeded at learning how to code. ''The Atlantic'', June 3. http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2011/06/how-i-failed-failed-and-finally-succeeded-at-learning-how-to-code/239855/. Tall, David. 2013. ''How Humans Learn to Think Mathematically: Exploring the Three Worlds of Mathematics''. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Yolkowski, James. 2013. Uses of numbers. Math Lair. http://mathlair.allfunandgames.ca/numbertypes.php. Zheng, Alice. 2015. Striking parallels between mathematics and software engineering. O'Reilly Media. https://beta.oreilly.com/ideas/striking-parallels-between-mathematics-and-software-engineering. [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Developing]] 1a1945098af34d24bcc01e29dbac2bdccbbbdf98 181 177 2015-10-21T05:18:05Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added Benjamin and Shermer 2006, Gaskill and Gaskill 2014, and bold formatting to mark major sources. wikitext text/x-wiki Main sources are in '''bold'''. '''Benjamin, Arthur and Michael Shermer. 2006. Secrets of Mental Math. New York: Three Rivers Press.''' '''Billstein, Rick, Shlomo Libeskind, and Johnny W Lott. 2007. ''A Problem Solving Approach to Mathematics for Elementary School Teachers'', 9th ed. Boston: Pearson Addison Wesley.''' Bittinger, Marvin L. and Judith A. Beecher. 2004. ''Developmental Mathematics'', 6th ed. Boston: Pearson Addison Wesley. Butterworth, Brian. 1999. ''What Counts: How Every Brain Is Hardwired for Math''. New York: Free Press. '''Chapin, Suzanne H, and Art Johnson. 2006. ''Math Matters: Understanding the Math You Teach, Grades K-8''. Sausalito, CA: Math Solutions Publications.''' Dehaene, Stanislas. 2011. ''The Number Sense: How the Mind Creates Mathematics''. New York: Oxford University Press. Devlin, Keith J. 1994. ''Mathematics, the Science of Patterns: The Search for Order in Life, Mind, and the Universe''. New York: Scientific American Library. ———. 2000. ''The Math Gene: How Mathematical Thinking Evolved and Why Numbers Are like Gossip''. [New York]: Basic Books. Dijkstra, Edsger. 1985. On anthropomorphism in science. E. W. Dijkstra Archive. http://www.cs.utexas.edu/users/EWD/transcriptions/EWD09xx/EWD936.html. ———. 1986. The nature of my research and why I do it. E. W. Dijkstra Archive. https://www.cs.utexas.edu/users/EWD/transcriptions/EWD09xx/EWD993.html. '''Gaskill, Herbert and Catherine Gaskill. 2014. ''Parents' Guide to Common Core Arithmetic'', 3rd ed. North Charleston, SC: printed by CreateSpace.''' '''Hatfield, Mary M., Nancy Tanner Edwards, Gary G. Bitter, and Jean Morrow. 2008. ''Mathematics Methods for Elementary and Middle School Teachers'', 6th ed. Hoboken, N.J.; Chichester: Wiley ; John Wiley [distributor].''' Hofweber, Thomas. 2011. Logic and ontology. ''The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy'', Fall 2014 ed. Edited by Edward N. Zalta. http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/fall2014/entries/logic-ontology/. Krypton Inc. n.d. Pattern. ''iCoachMath.com''. http://www.icoachmath.com/math_dictionary/pattern.html. Mehta, Hemant. 2014. About that ‘Common Core’ math problem making the rounds on Facebook.... Friendly Atheist. http://www.patheos.com/blogs/friendlyatheist/2014/03/07/about-that-common-core-math-problem-making-the-rounds-on-facebook/ '''NGACBP (National Governors Association Center for Best Practices) and Council of Chief State School Officers. 2010. ''Common Core State Standards for Mathematics''. Washington, DC: National Governors Association Center for Best Practices, Council of Chief State School Officers. http://www.corestandards.org/Math/.''' Resnik, Michael D. 1997. ''Mathematics as a Science of Patterns''. Oxford; New York: Clarendon Press; Oxford University Press. Somers, James. 2011. How I failed, failed, and finally succeeded at learning how to code. ''The Atlantic'', June 3. http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2011/06/how-i-failed-failed-and-finally-succeeded-at-learning-how-to-code/239855/. '''Tall, David. 2013. ''How Humans Learn to Think Mathematically: Exploring the Three Worlds of Mathematics''. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.''' Yolkowski, James. 2013. Uses of numbers. Math Lair. http://mathlair.allfunandgames.ca/numbertypes.php. Zheng, Alice. 2015. Striking parallels between mathematics and software engineering. O'Reilly Media. https://beta.oreilly.com/ideas/striking-parallels-between-mathematics-and-software-engineering. [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Developing]] 6b61a860add8a50a0fa2f04dcb465212ef243afa 182 181 2015-10-21T05:19:03Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added italics to the Benjamin title. wikitext text/x-wiki Main sources are in '''bold'''. '''Benjamin, Arthur and Michael Shermer. 2006. ''Secrets of Mental Math''. New York: Three Rivers Press.''' '''Billstein, Rick, Shlomo Libeskind, and Johnny W Lott. 2007. ''A Problem Solving Approach to Mathematics for Elementary School Teachers'', 9th ed. Boston: Pearson Addison Wesley.''' Bittinger, Marvin L. and Judith A. Beecher. 2004. ''Developmental Mathematics'', 6th ed. Boston: Pearson Addison Wesley. Butterworth, Brian. 1999. ''What Counts: How Every Brain Is Hardwired for Math''. New York: Free Press. '''Chapin, Suzanne H, and Art Johnson. 2006. ''Math Matters: Understanding the Math You Teach, Grades K-8''. Sausalito, CA: Math Solutions Publications.''' Dehaene, Stanislas. 2011. ''The Number Sense: How the Mind Creates Mathematics''. New York: Oxford University Press. Devlin, Keith J. 1994. ''Mathematics, the Science of Patterns: The Search for Order in Life, Mind, and the Universe''. New York: Scientific American Library. ———. 2000. ''The Math Gene: How Mathematical Thinking Evolved and Why Numbers Are like Gossip''. [New York]: Basic Books. Dijkstra, Edsger. 1985. On anthropomorphism in science. E. W. Dijkstra Archive. http://www.cs.utexas.edu/users/EWD/transcriptions/EWD09xx/EWD936.html. ———. 1986. The nature of my research and why I do it. E. W. Dijkstra Archive. https://www.cs.utexas.edu/users/EWD/transcriptions/EWD09xx/EWD993.html. '''Gaskill, Herbert and Catherine Gaskill. 2014. ''Parents' Guide to Common Core Arithmetic'', 3rd ed. North Charleston, SC: printed by CreateSpace.''' '''Hatfield, Mary M., Nancy Tanner Edwards, Gary G. Bitter, and Jean Morrow. 2008. ''Mathematics Methods for Elementary and Middle School Teachers'', 6th ed. Hoboken, N.J.; Chichester: Wiley ; John Wiley [distributor].''' Hofweber, Thomas. 2011. Logic and ontology. ''The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy'', Fall 2014 ed. Edited by Edward N. Zalta. http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/fall2014/entries/logic-ontology/. Krypton Inc. n.d. Pattern. ''iCoachMath.com''. http://www.icoachmath.com/math_dictionary/pattern.html. Mehta, Hemant. 2014. About that ‘Common Core’ math problem making the rounds on Facebook.... Friendly Atheist. http://www.patheos.com/blogs/friendlyatheist/2014/03/07/about-that-common-core-math-problem-making-the-rounds-on-facebook/ '''NGACBP (National Governors Association Center for Best Practices) and Council of Chief State School Officers. 2010. ''Common Core State Standards for Mathematics''. Washington, DC: National Governors Association Center for Best Practices, Council of Chief State School Officers. http://www.corestandards.org/Math/.''' Resnik, Michael D. 1997. ''Mathematics as a Science of Patterns''. Oxford; New York: Clarendon Press; Oxford University Press. Somers, James. 2011. How I failed, failed, and finally succeeded at learning how to code. ''The Atlantic'', June 3. http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2011/06/how-i-failed-failed-and-finally-succeeded-at-learning-how-to-code/239855/. '''Tall, David. 2013. ''How Humans Learn to Think Mathematically: Exploring the Three Worlds of Mathematics''. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.''' Yolkowski, James. 2013. Uses of numbers. Math Lair. http://mathlair.allfunandgames.ca/numbertypes.php. Zheng, Alice. 2015. Striking parallels between mathematics and software engineering. O'Reilly Media. https://beta.oreilly.com/ideas/striking-parallels-between-mathematics-and-software-engineering. [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Developing]] fc59069144de21b9f341fad2aa6d016c75945c8c 0 56 152 146 2014-08-11T02:19:00Z Andy Culbertson 1 Reorganized the material and filled out the placeholder content for every section except "Numeration systems." wikitext text/x-wiki == Why numbers? == The ancient Greeks focused on geometry, but mathematics began before them with the basic numeric calculations the Babylonians and Egyptians needed for their societies to function.<ref>Devlin 1994, 1-2</ref> Math education for children today begins with teaching them what numbers are and how they generally work. If numbers are only one type of mathematical object, then there might be more than one starting point for learning about math. But since a lot of research has been done on starting math education with numbers and since numbers pervade so much of math and may even form its basis, I thought I'd start at the same place. But there will be some differences between this project and elementary school education. I'm going to start with the most basic number-related ideas I can find and build up from there, but I'll discuss these things abstractly rather than having us all do the kinds of concrete exercises children have to do to get used to the concept. == Properties of number == What are numbers, and what are their basic features that shape how we work with them? A helpful way to understand numbers is to examine the ways we use them, the way humanity developed its knowledge of them, and the ways we learn about them now. I'll refer to these factors as I go along. From my observations so far I believe the attributes of number can be broken out along several lines: the ways people represent numbers; the skills people need to work with them; the capacities humans have that enable those skills; the functions numbers serve; the methods people use to carry them out; and the properties of numbers that enable those representations, functions, and methods. First I'll offer a preliminary, operational definition of numbers that incorporates the properties I'd like to highlight, and then I'll break it down and talk about each property and how it relates to others. Here's my definition: ''Numbers are terms representing stable, interrelated abstractions of quantity that can be associated with objects to identify their quantity-related attributes.'' I suspect this definition isn't complete or broad enough, but I think it captures the characteristics that children are taught about numbers, and so it's a convenient and adequate entry point for thinking about them and about math. The features I'll discuss are representation, quantity, association, abstraction, stability, and relatedness. One caveat to these first few chapters is that even though the topics of number sense, measurement, geometry, and the basic operations are treated separately in education and I'll be treating them separately here, they're so closely interrelated that I have trouble talking about one concept without bringing in the rest. I think this is because although math is a highly abstract activity, our knowledge of it is rooted in our interactions with the physical world, and those interactions use all these concepts at once. === Representation === At face value, numbers are words, and at least in English, the written number takes two forms, symbolic and alphabetical.<ref>Hatfield et al. 2008, 189</ref> The spoken form of each written form is the same. Sometimes there's more than one symbolic way to represent the same number, and each symbolic form can be spelled out alphabetically. As words, numbers represent things. What a number represents varies depending on how you're using it. We use numbers in three ways: quantifying, ordering, and naming. In the first case, we count and measure objects and their attributes to determine their amounts or magnitudes. This quantifying use gives us the cardinal numbers, which are the number names we use for counting. In the second case, we arrange things in some kind of order and number them to keep track of that order. This ordering use gives us the ordinal numbers: first, second, and so on. I think of ordinal numbers as a more complex type of measurement than the cardinal numbers, so I'll wait to cover them till the chapter on measurement ([[Measurement]]). In the third case, we label things with arbitrary numbers simply as a way to refer to them without having to make up new names, as in the case of player numbers in sports teams. The naming use is a linguistic use for number words rather than a mathematical one, so we'll mostly leave it behind in our discussions.<ref>Chapin and Johnson 2006, 2-3; Yolkowski 2013</ref> === Quantity === It seems to me that the fundamental, defining feature of numbers is that they represent quantities, and their other features either arise from that fact or make it useful. Quantity uniquely defines the concept of number because we don't really have another way to represent specific quantities, and most of the time when we use numbers, quantity is at least implied. Quantity is a value that identifies how much or how many of something there is. To a certain degree our grasp of quantity is inborn. Even infants have some sense of quantity,<ref>Butterworth 1999, 101-105</ref> and we recognize collections of up to three objects without having to count, a process called subitizing.<ref>Dehaene 2011, 56-57</ref> Children gain a fuller sense of quantity by rational counting (see [[Measurement]]) and by comparing quantities of different sizes (see the Relatedness section below).<ref>Hatfield et al. 2008, 132-135</ref> This is one of the first places in math that patterns come into play. A number represents the repeated experience of collections containing a particular quantity.<ref>Devlin 1994, 9</ref> === Association === Numbers can be associated with things. This is a property of number that makes quantities useable. It's certainly not unique to number, though, because associating things is characteristic of the way human minds work in general. It's how we create new words, for example. This property of numbers is a basis for all three number uses--cardinal, ordinal, and nominal. I'll cover its use for cardinal and ordinal numbers in [[Measurement]]. We can think of these things that we assign numbers to as objects, even if it's a collective object or an abstract one like temperature. It's a convenient term for the whole, enormous class of things that have the trait that something else can be associated with them. And it brings out a further feature of association, that we're very flexible in our choice of targets for our associations. For example, you can pick a single product on an assembly line and give it a serial number, or you can look at the whole group of products that were made in one day and identify their total. === Abstraction === The fact that these associations can be made and broken freely means that numbers are abstract, one of the many abstractions of math. You don't need to find or manufacture a new set of numbers every time you want to quantify a new object or attribute. Numbers are abstract also because there are many kinds of quantifiable attributes, and many kinds of objects have them. We'll especially start to see this in [[Measurement]]. Numbers are made concrete and visible by the ways we represent them.<ref>Devlin 2000, 74</ref> We notate them using symbols and diagrams, and this helps us to work with them. === Stability === One of the math learning tasks for children that Piaget identified was number conservation, the understanding that when you rearrange the objects in a collection, it still has the same number of objects.<ref>Hatfield et al. 2008, 127-128</ref> Once you've learned this, of course, it seems obvious, but I think there's a principle to keep in mind that can be consciously applied to new mathematical situations: When you don't operate on a quantity in relevant ways, it remains the same. That is, a change in a situation may affect one quantity and not another, and it's important to distinguish between them. You don't have to re-count the quantity that stayed the same, but you also can't change the quantity with that operation. === Relatedness === The inverse of the stability property is what I'll call relatedness: When you do operate on a quantity in relevant ways, you arrive at another quantity. In this way numbers have relationships with each other. You could also say that individual numbers have properties or behavior and that each number has its own character. Furthermore, there are many mathematical paths between any number and any other, and this fact makes math a powerful tool for discovery, especially when combined with the many relationships among measurable attributes. Once you know a few quantitative facts about an object, you can perform calculations to learn a lot more about it. Sometimes you'll need to find the path between what you know about the object and what you want to know about it, and that can turn math into a puzzle or a game. Children learn a few basic number relationships as they're gaining a sense of number. One is that quantities have sizes that can be compared. Even without knowing the specific quantities in two sets of objects, they can match each item in one set with an item in the other and determine which set is larger based on which has items left over. Matching the items in two sets is called one-to-one correspondence.<ref>Hatfield et al. 2008, 132</ref> Comparison is the basis for seriation, the operation of sorting objects into sequences by the size of some attribute, one of the early number tasks children learn. To order a set of objects by ascending size, for example, you compare each to the others and place it in a sequence such that each object is larger than the one before it and smaller than the one after.<ref>Hatfield et al. 2008, 128</ref> Seriation is the basis for the sequence of numbers we use in counting and other operations. Even though we've all practiced the sequence of the counting numbers to the point that they're entirely natural to us, numbers don't occur in a particular sequence out in nature. There's no physical row of numbers we need to observe when we want to learn their order or discover a new number. The number sequence is a result of sorting the numbers by magnitude. We could choose a different sorting order, such as alphabetically by the number's name, but that would be drastically less useful. Another basic number relationship children learn is what Piaget called number inclusion, that items in a set can be grouped into sets of smaller quantities and that sets can be grouped together into larger sets. Grouping numbers together to form larger numbers is also called composition, and breaking them apart into smaller numbers is called decomposition. Number inclusion is the basis for the arithmetic operations.<ref>Hatfield et al. 2008, 127-128</ref> == Classification == Just as numbers often represent sets of objects, numbers themselves can be grouped into sets. This grouping is based on various criteria.<ref>Chapin and Johnson, 1-2</ref> For example, the most basic major set of numbers we work with is the whole numbers. The whole numbers are a number system, not to be confused with the numeration systems in the next section. The whole numbers consist of the natural numbers and 0. The natural, or counting, numbers are 1, 2, 3, and so on.<ref>''Wikipedia'', s.v. “Number,” last modified August 4, 2014, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Number</ref> The whole numbers have the characteristic of representing countable quantities of whole units of whatever you're counting. There are numbers in other sets that represent part of a unit, and I'll start talking about those in the fractions chapter. As another example, whole numbers can be further classified as even or odd. You can find out if a number is even by forming pairs of items in a collection of that quantity. If you have one item left over, the number is odd. If all the items can form pairs, the number is even. So you could say an even number has the trait of being completely pairable within itself.<ref>Chapin and Johnson 2006, 9-10</ref> == Numeration systems == Our numeration system uses place value to represent a number by means of the regular groupings within it. == Footnotes == <references/> [[Category:Math Relearning]] e806fa449a8336f949e3f7a5d22a74338c47c4c8 178 152 2015-09-29T01:47:28Z Andy Culbertson 1 Removed the Numeration Systems section. Added the Complete category. Fixed a footnote. wikitext text/x-wiki == Why numbers? == The ancient Greeks focused on geometry, but mathematics began before them with the basic numeric calculations the Babylonians and Egyptians needed for their societies to function.<ref>Devlin 1994, 1-2</ref> Math education for children today begins with teaching them what numbers are and how they generally work. If numbers are only one type of mathematical object, then there might be more than one starting point for learning about math. But since a lot of research has been done on starting math education with numbers and since numbers pervade so much of math and may even form its basis, I thought I'd start at the same place. But there will be some differences between this project and elementary school education. I'm going to start with the most basic number-related ideas I can find and build up from there, but I'll discuss these things abstractly rather than having us all do the kinds of concrete exercises children have to do to get used to the concept. == Properties of number == What are numbers, and what are their basic features that shape how we work with them? A helpful way to understand numbers is to examine the ways we use them, the way humanity developed its knowledge of them, and the ways we learn about them now. I'll refer to these factors as I go along. From my observations so far I believe the attributes of number can be broken out along several lines: the ways people represent numbers; the skills people need to work with them; the capacities humans have that enable those skills; the functions numbers serve; the methods people use to carry them out; and the properties of numbers that enable those representations, functions, and methods. First I'll offer a preliminary, operational definition of numbers that incorporates the properties I'd like to highlight, and then I'll break it down and talk about each property and how it relates to others. Here's my definition: ''Numbers are terms representing stable, interrelated abstractions of quantity that can be associated with objects to identify their quantity-related attributes.'' I suspect this definition isn't complete or broad enough, but I think it captures the characteristics that children are taught about numbers, and so it's a convenient and adequate entry point for thinking about them and about math. The features I'll discuss are representation, quantity, association, abstraction, stability, and relatedness. One caveat to these first few chapters is that even though the topics of number sense, measurement, geometry, and the basic operations are treated separately in education and I'll be treating them separately here, they're so closely interrelated that I have trouble talking about one concept without bringing in the rest. I think this is because although math is a highly abstract activity, our knowledge of it is rooted in our interactions with the physical world, and those interactions use all these concepts at once. === Representation === At face value, numbers are words, and at least in English, the written number takes two forms, symbolic and alphabetical.<ref>Hatfield et al. 2008, 189</ref> The spoken form of each written form is the same. Sometimes there's more than one symbolic way to represent the same number, and each symbolic form can be spelled out alphabetically. As words, numbers represent things. What a number represents varies depending on how you're using it. We use numbers in three ways: quantifying, ordering, and naming. In the first case, we count and measure objects and their attributes to determine their amounts or magnitudes. This quantifying use gives us the cardinal numbers, which are the number names we use for counting. In the second case, we arrange things in some kind of order and number them to keep track of that order. This ordering use gives us the ordinal numbers: first, second, and so on. I think of ordinal numbers as a more complex type of measurement than the cardinal numbers, so I'll wait to cover them till the chapter on measurement ([[Measurement]]). In the third case, we label things with arbitrary numbers simply as a way to refer to them without having to make up new names, as in the case of player numbers in sports teams. The naming use is a linguistic use for number words rather than a mathematical one, so we'll mostly leave it behind in our discussions.<ref>Chapin and Johnson 2006, 2-3; Yolkowski 2013</ref> === Quantity === It seems to me that the fundamental, defining feature of numbers is that they represent quantities, and their other features either arise from that fact or make it useful. Quantity uniquely defines the concept of number because we don't really have another way to represent specific quantities, and most of the time when we use numbers, quantity is at least implied. Quantity is a value that identifies how much or how many of something there is. To a certain degree our grasp of quantity is inborn. Even infants have some sense of quantity,<ref>Butterworth 1999, 101-105</ref> and we recognize collections of up to three objects without having to count, a process called subitizing.<ref>Dehaene 2011, 56-57</ref> Children gain a fuller sense of quantity by rational counting (see [[Measurement]]) and by comparing quantities of different sizes (see the Relatedness section below).<ref>Hatfield et al. 2008, 132-135</ref> This is one of the first places in math that patterns come into play. A number represents the repeated experience of collections containing a particular quantity.<ref>Devlin 1994, 9</ref> === Association === Numbers can be associated with things. This is a property of number that makes quantities useable. It's certainly not unique to number, though, because associating things is characteristic of the way human minds work in general. It's how we create new words, for example. This property of numbers is a basis for all three number uses--cardinal, ordinal, and nominal. I'll cover its use for cardinal and ordinal numbers in [[Measurement]]. We can think of these things that we assign numbers to as objects, even if it's a collective object or an abstract one like temperature. It's a convenient term for the whole, enormous class of things that have the trait that something else can be associated with them. And it brings out a further feature of association, that we're very flexible in our choice of targets for our associations. For example, you can pick a single product on an assembly line and give it a serial number, or you can look at the whole group of products that were made in one day and identify their total. === Abstraction === The fact that these associations can be made and broken freely means that numbers are abstract, one of the many abstractions of math. You don't need to find or manufacture a new set of numbers every time you want to quantify a new object or attribute. Numbers are abstract also because there are many kinds of quantifiable attributes, and many kinds of objects have them. We'll especially start to see this in [[Measurement]]. Numbers are made concrete and visible by the ways we represent them.<ref>Devlin 2000, 74</ref> We notate them using symbols and diagrams, and this helps us to work with them. === Stability === One of the math learning tasks for children that Piaget identified was number conservation, the understanding that when you rearrange the objects in a collection, it still has the same number of objects.<ref>Hatfield et al. 2008, 127-128</ref> Once you've learned this, of course, it seems obvious, but I think there's a principle to keep in mind that can be consciously applied to new mathematical situations: When you don't operate on a quantity in relevant ways, it remains the same. That is, a change in a situation may affect one quantity and not another, and it's important to distinguish between them. You don't have to re-count the quantity that stayed the same, but you also can't change the quantity with that operation. === Relatedness === The inverse of the stability property is what I'll call relatedness: When you do operate on a quantity in relevant ways, you arrive at another quantity. In this way numbers have relationships with each other. You could also say that individual numbers have properties or behavior and that each number has its own character. Furthermore, there are many mathematical paths between any number and any other, and this fact makes math a powerful tool for discovery, especially when combined with the many relationships among measurable attributes. Once you know a few quantitative facts about an object, you can perform calculations to learn a lot more about it. Sometimes you'll need to find the path between what you know about the object and what you want to know about it, and that can turn math into a puzzle or a game. Children learn a few basic number relationships as they're gaining a sense of number. One is that quantities have sizes that can be compared. Even without knowing the specific quantities in two sets of objects, they can match each item in one set with an item in the other and determine which set is larger based on which has items left over. Matching the items in two sets is called one-to-one correspondence.<ref>Hatfield et al. 2008, 132</ref> Comparison is the basis for seriation, the operation of sorting objects into sequences by the size of some attribute, one of the early number tasks children learn. To order a set of objects by ascending size, for example, you compare each to the others and place it in a sequence such that each object is larger than the one before it and smaller than the one after.<ref>Hatfield et al. 2008, 128</ref> Seriation is the basis for the sequence of numbers we use in counting and other operations. Even though we've all practiced the sequence of the counting numbers to the point that they're entirely natural to us, numbers don't occur in a particular sequence out in nature. There's no physical row of numbers we need to observe when we want to learn their order or discover a new number. The number sequence is a result of sorting the numbers by magnitude. We could choose a different sorting order, such as alphabetically by the number's name, but that would be drastically less useful. Another basic number relationship children learn is what Piaget called number inclusion, that items in a set can be grouped into sets of smaller quantities and that sets can be grouped together into larger sets. Grouping numbers together to form larger numbers is also called composition, and breaking them apart into smaller numbers is called decomposition. Number inclusion is the basis for the arithmetic operations.<ref>Hatfield et al. 2008, 127-128</ref> == Classification == Just as numbers often represent sets of objects, numbers themselves can be grouped into sets. This grouping is based on various criteria.<ref>Chapin and Johnson 2006, 1-2</ref> For example, the most basic major set of numbers we work with is the whole numbers. The whole numbers are a number system, not to be confused with the numeration systems in the next section. The whole numbers consist of the natural numbers and 0. The natural, or counting, numbers are 1, 2, 3, and so on.<ref>''Wikipedia'', s.v. “Number,” last modified August 4, 2014, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Number</ref> The whole numbers have the characteristic of representing countable quantities of whole units of whatever you're counting. There are numbers in other sets that represent part of a unit, and I'll start talking about those in the fractions chapter. As another example, whole numbers can be further classified as even or odd. You can find out if a number is even by forming pairs of items in a collection of that quantity. If you have one item left over, the number is odd. If all the items can form pairs, the number is even. So you could say an even number has the trait of being completely pairable within itself.<ref>Chapin and Johnson 2006, 9-10</ref> == Footnotes == <references/> [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Complete]] cfce631a5278c9792556c0e4f7e28a7177ba884e 0 50 153 142 2014-08-13T07:31:52Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added a few strategies. Formatted the footnotes and added more of them. wikitext text/x-wiki I'm starting this topic with notes on ''[http://www.worldcat.org/title/solving-the-procrastination-puzzle-a-concise-guide-to-strategies-for-change/oclc/858799814 Solving the Procrastination Puzzle]'' by Timothy Pychyl. You can find more at [http://procrastination.ca Pychyl's website]. The main strategy in this book is to just get started on whatever activity you're putting off.<ref>Pychyl 2013, 53</ref> This strategy is different from the Nike slogan "Just do it" because the focus isn't on finishing but on starting, which is much less intimidating. You may have to "just start" many times as you do the work, if you find yourself repeatedly stopping.<ref>Pychyl 2013, 56</ref> The strategy of just starting cuts through all the excuses we come up with for not starting. It cuts through our fears and the tendency to "give in [to procrastination] to feel good," which is the basic reason we procrastinate.<ref>Pychyl 2013, 20, 22, 24</ref> The other major strategy in the book is to plan ahead using implementation intentions. These are if-then or when-then statements that give yourself triggers for taking particular actions. For example, "When I walk in the door, I will immediately begin cooking dinner," or, "If I feel the impulse to check Twitter, I will stay put and continue working."<ref>Pychyl 2013, 54-57</ref> Then there are ancillary strategies, which have the effect of increasing your motivation for getting the activity done or counteracting the thinking that enables procrastination. Strategies to increase motivation: # Think through the costs of procrastinating on particular activities and the benefits of acting on them in a timely manner.<ref>Pychyl 2013, 14-16</ref> # Realize that you'll often feel more like doing a task once you've started doing it, and you'll feel better about yourself and life too.<ref>Pychyl 2013, 51-54</ref> Antidotes to procrastinatory thinking: # Become aware of your procrastination thinking patterns. List the thoughts and feelings you have when you think about particular activities you put off, and notice any commonalities.<ref>Pychyl 2013, 5-6</ref> # Become aware of your painful feelings about a task while they happen so you can deal with them constructively and tell yourself to start or keep working.<ref>Pychyl 2013, 22-24</ref> # Realize that you won't feel more like it tomorrow.<ref>Pychyl 2013, 28, 32-35</ref> # Realize that you don't have to feel like doing something to get started on it.<ref>Pychyl 2013, 33</ref> # Remember that if you keep thinking tomorrow is a better time to start than now, eventually you'll feel that now was actually the best time to start.<ref>Pychyl 2013, 41-42</ref> # Realize that even a small or messy start helps.<ref>Pychyl 2013, 57</ref> == References == Pychyl, Timothy A. 2013. ''Solving the Procrastination Puzzle: A Concise Guide to Strategies for Change''. New York: Jeremy P. Tarcher/Penguin. == Footnotes == <references/> [[Category:Productivity]] 9d927be71aaaca219ec2947c84152ae1d2efeab4 155 153 2014-08-30T04:04:36Z Andy Culbertson 1 Finished taking notes on Pychyl. wikitext text/x-wiki I'm starting this topic with notes on ''[http://www.worldcat.org/title/solving-the-procrastination-puzzle-a-concise-guide-to-strategies-for-change/oclc/858799814 Solving the Procrastination Puzzle]'' by Timothy Pychyl. You can find more at [http://procrastination.ca Pychyl's website]. The main strategy in this book is to just get started on whatever activity you're putting off.<ref>Pychyl 2013, 53</ref> This strategy is different from the Nike slogan "Just do it" because the focus isn't on finishing but on starting, which is much less intimidating. You may have to "just start" many times as you do the work, if you find yourself repeatedly stopping.<ref>Pychyl 2013, 56</ref> The strategy of just starting cuts through all the excuses we come up with for not starting. It cuts through our fears and the tendency to "give in [to procrastination] to feel good," which is the basic reason we procrastinate.<ref>Pychyl 2013, 20, 22, 24</ref> The other major strategy in the book is to plan ahead using implementation intentions. These are if-then or when-then statements that give yourself triggers for taking particular actions. For example, "When I walk in the door, I will immediately begin cooking dinner," or, "If I feel the impulse to check Twitter, I will stay put and continue working."<ref>Pychyl 2013, 24-25, 54-57</ref> Then there are ancillary strategies, which have the effect of increasing your motivation for getting the activity done or counteracting the thinking that enables procrastination. Strategies to increase motivation: # Think through the costs of procrastinating on particular activities and the benefits of acting on them in a timely manner.<ref>Pychyl 2013, 14-16</ref> # Realize that you'll often feel more like doing a task once you've started doing it, and you'll feel better about yourself and life too.<ref>Pychyl 2013, 51-54</ref> # Realize that some of our greatest strengths can come from dealing with our limitations, such as the personality traits that keep us procrastinating.<ref>Pychyl 2013, 91</ref> Antidotes to procrastinatory thinking: # Become aware of your procrastination thinking patterns. List the thoughts and feelings you have when you think about particular activities you put off, and notice any commonalities.<ref>Pychyl 2013, 5-6</ref> # Become aware of your unpleasant feelings about a task while they happen so you can deal with them constructively and tell yourself to start or keep working.<ref>Pychyl 2013, 22-24</ref> # Realize that you won't feel more like it tomorrow.<ref>Pychyl 2013, 28, 32-35</ref> # Realize that you don't have to feel like doing something to get started on it.<ref>Pychyl 2013, 33</ref> # List the ways you rationalize your procrastination, and create implementation intentions to counteract them and just get started.<ref>Pychyl 2013, 47-49</ref> ## Realize that you underestimate future rewards compared to near-term rewards.<ref>Pychyl 2013, 38</ref> ## Realize that you underestimate how long tasks will take.<ref>Pychyl 2013, 39</ref> ## Notice when you procrastinate to handicap yourself in an effort to protect your self-esteem.<ref>Pychyl 2013, 39-40</ref> ## Remember that if you keep thinking tomorrow is a better time to start than now, eventually you'll feel that now was actually the best time to start.<ref>Pychyl 2013, 41-42</ref> ## Notice when perfectionism keeps you from starting.<ref>Pychyl 2013, 42</ref> ## Notice when you reduce the inner conflict of procrastinating by distracting, forgetting, trivializing, self-affirming, denying responsibility, justifying your decisions, or making downward counterfactuals ("It could have been worse.").<ref>Pychyl 2013, 43-45</ref> ## Notice when you wait for pressure to motivate you to work, and realize that you make more mistakes in those conditions rather than working better.<ref>Pychyl 2013, 45-47</ref> # Realize that even a small or messy start helps.<ref>Pychyl 2013, 57</ref> # Split a complex task into subtasks, and give each subtask an order or priority so you'll know what to just get started on.<ref>Pychyl 2013, 58-60</ref> # Realize that momentary distractions often expand into hours without our awareness.<ref>Pychyl 2013, 93-95</ref> # Realize that few people can multitask well.<ref>Pychyl 2013, 96</ref> # List potential distractions (especially online ones) or obstacles to continuing your work, and either remove them proactively or come up with implementation intentions to deal with them.<ref>Pychyl 2013, 62-69, 92-99</ref> # When your willpower feels depleted, motivate yourself to continue by reminding yourself of your overall goals and motivations for this task. Know that it's more possible to keep working than you think.<ref>Pychyl 2013, 70-75, 79</ref> # Make it easier to keep working by doing it in ways and at times that increase your willpower. ## Be aware of the kinds of work that will tire you, including social interactions.<ref>Pychyl 2013, 78-79</ref> ##Willpower increases with practice, so exercise small amounts of it on a regular basis.<ref>Pychyl 2013, 75</ref> ## Get enough sleep.<ref>Pychyl 2013, 75-76</ref> ## Do your harder work earlier in the day.<ref>Pychyl 2013, 76</ref> ## Find sources of positive emotion so your motivation overrides your fatigue.<ref>Pychyl 2013, 76</ref> ## Make implementation intentions to keep working. These make your work more automatic and overcome self-regulation depletion.<ref>Pychyl 2013, 76-78</ref> ## Blood glucose increases the energy for self-regulation, so restore it with fruit when you get tired.<ref>Pychyl 2013, 78</ref> # Notice whether you have an impulsive personality, and make implementation intentions to delay decisions on potential distractions so you can think about them.<ref>Pychyl 2013, 89</ref> # Notice whether you tend to be disorganized, and include organizing tasks like cleaning up your work area or dividing your tasks into subtasks. Do these as a precursor to work and not a substitute for it.<ref>Pychyl 2013, 89-90</ref> # Notice whether you tend to worry about failure, and challenge these thoughts when they arise.<ref>Pychyl 2013, 90</ref> # When addressing your procrastination habits, pick one or two issues to start with rather than trying to change everything at once.<ref>Pychyl 2013, 103</ref> # Forgive yourself when you slip back into your procrastination habits. Then you'll be less likely to procrastinate in the future because you won't avoid the tasks you feel guilty about.<ref>Pychyl 2013, 103-105</ref> == References == Pychyl, Timothy A. 2013. ''Solving the Procrastination Puzzle: A Concise Guide to Strategies for Change''. New York: Jeremy P. Tarcher/Penguin. == Footnotes == <references/> [[Category:Productivity]] fed31a95e11d53f57e85deee440b41be587378e8 0 52 154 140 2014-08-30T04:00:37Z Andy Culbertson 1 Rewrote the Introduction notes. Reformatted the footnotes. wikitext text/x-wiki I'm starting this topic with notes on Robert Audi's [http://www.worldcat.org/title/epistemology-a-contemporary-introduction-to-the-theory-of-knowledge/oclc/851331285 Epistemology: A Contemporary Introduction to the Theory of Knowledge, 3rd Edition]. == Front Matter == === Introduction === ==== Perception, belief, and justification ==== Epistemology is the theory of knowledge and justification. Perceptions through the senses can be justification for beliefs,<ref>Audi 2011, 1</ref> and justified beliefs are a goal in epistemology.<ref>Audi 2011, 2</ref> ==== Justification as process, as status, and as property ==== Justification is a concept with several meanings that have subtle differences. If a belief is natural to believe, if someone can believe it without being intellectually lazy, deceptive, and so on, then the belief has the property of being justified. If a belief is justified for someone, then they are justified in believing it--that is, it is something they ''should'' believe because of the position they're in--whether they actually do believe it or not. We can call this situational or propositional justification.<ref>Audi 2011, 2-3</ref> If someone does believe a justified belief, then we say they justifiedly believe it.<ref>Audi 2011, 2</ref> We can call this belief or doxastic justification. It is grounded in situational justification.<ref>Audi 2011, 3-4</ref> If someone gives reasons for believing something, that belief is undergoing a process of justification.<ref>Audi 2011, 2</ref> Perception may be our most basic source of knowledge, at least in childhood.<ref>Audi 2011, 4</ref> ==== Knowledge and justification ==== Knowledge of something is grounded in the same thing that justifies the belief in it. But knowledge and justified belief are different. Knowledge is justified belief that is true.<ref>Audi 2011, 4</ref> ==== Memory, introspection, and self-consciousness ==== Memory beliefs are justified, but we're less confident in them the less vivid the memory. At a low level of confidence, we can take a position of non-belief toward a proposition. We can entertain, consider, and suspend judgment on it without believing or disbelieving it. Forming memory beliefs can involve examining your own consciousness for imagery, which is a type of introspection. Knowing you are doing this is a case of self-knowledge.<ref>Audi 2011, 4</ref> ==== Reason and rational reflection ==== Some beliefs are based on understanding abstract concepts, such as geometry. These concepts seem to firmly justify the beliefs and seem to form a basis for knowledge.<ref>Audi 2011, 5</ref> ==== Testimony ==== According to the commonsense view, justified belief and knowledge about general facts can be based on either generalizations from one's own perceptions or from the testimony of others or both. Of course, our own faculties are still involved in knowing through testimony, since we must perceive the testimony and store it in memory.<ref>Audi 2011, 6</ref> ==== Basic sources of belief, justification, and knowledge ==== Perceptual, memorial, introspective, and a priori beliefs are the basic kinds of belief. They are grounded in their sources. The other two types of belief, inductive and testimony-based, aren't basic. Inductive beliefs are generalizations from other beliefs. Testimony can be a source for any belief, but it is at best a secondary source, since presumably the knowledge of the person giving the testimony is grounded in some other source.<ref>Audi 2011, 6-7</ref> ==== Three kinds of grounds of belief ==== There are at least three ways beliefs are grounded in a source: Causal grounding means the experience produces the belief. It goes with the question, why do you believe that? Justificational grounding means that the experience justifies the belief. It goes with the question, why should I accept that? Epistemic grounding means that the belief constitutes knowledge in virtue of the experience. It goes with the question, how do you know that? These three often coincide, and in those cases we can simply say the belief is grounded in the source. They don't always coincide, though. A belief can be caused by a source without being justified (e.g., brain manipulation). A belief can be justified situationally even while being caused by something else that doesn't justify it (e.g., justified by testimony but caused by brain manipulation). A justificational ground may not be an epistemic ground. You can justifiedly believe something without knowing it (e.g., the belief is false).<ref>Audi 2011, 7-8</ref> ==== Fallibility and skepticism ==== Our sources of belief are fallible. How do we know they aren't likely to be mistaken? It's an important question because the security and stability of human life depends on believing we can achieve knowledge, or at least justified belief, in many areas. We'll address questions of skepticism, but until then we'll explore how beliefs are related to their sources in various circumstances, and we'll see that these sources often do seem to lead to justified beliefs and knowledge.<ref>Audi 2011, 8-9</ref> ==== Overview ==== Part One explores and compares the basic sources of belief, justification, and knowledge. Part Two discusses the development and structure of knowledge and justification. Part Three discusses what justification and knowledge are and what kinds of things can be known. Knowledge and justification are ideals to strive for. We can use sound epistemological principles to attain more knowledge, to justify the knowledge we've gained, to evaluate the claims of others, and to avoid claiming knowledge and justification when they aren't available.<ref>Audi 2011, 9-11</ref> == References == Audi, Robert. 2011. ''Epistemology: A Contemporary Introduction to the Theory of Knowledge''. New York: Routledge. == Footnotes == <references/> [[Category:Philosophy]] a3f506589ca7bbde0ecd1f2b9b635647ec8f2a8e 0 60 156 2015-04-24T06:08:41Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the article. wikitext text/x-wiki In late 2014/early 2015 I massively slimmed down my book collection. In the world of libraries, they call this weeding. My main motivation was that I didn't have a lot of space, but my collection was still growing. I needed room for the new books. The weeding process involved looking at each book I owned and deciding whether to keep it. Some of these decisions were easy. A lot of them were not. So to help myself make them, I paid attention to the questions I was asking myself and gathered them into the flowchart-like list below. If you are weeding your own books or purging other possessions, maybe you can adapt these questions for your purposes. == Categories == The end goal of my weeding was to place each book into one of three categories: * Display - Put it on a shelf in my apartment. * Store - Put it in a box in my storage closet. * Toss - Get rid of it, usually by selling to a used book store. == Reasons to own a book == To help me ask good questions, I summarized what I'd noticed about books I knew I wanted to keep. I'd want to own a book for one or both of these reasons: * It's useful and I want easy access, especially if it's rare. * It's special to me for sentimental reasons, and I want to look at it and remember them. == Questions for tough decisions == These questions have three types of answers: # +1/-1: The positive numbers pushed me toward keeping the book, and the negative numbers pushed me toward tossing it. # Other questions: The further questions clarified my intentions for the book. # One of the above categories: This gave me my final action on the book. If an option for a question isn't shown, that usually means it didn't influence my decision and I moved on to the next question. * General questions ** Do I need this exact copy (for sentimental or practical reasons)? Yes: +1. No: -1. ** Is it part of a collection I want to keep? *** Yes: Do I really care about owning the whole collection? Yes: +1. No: -1. ** Does it have handwritten notes I care about (for sentimental or practical reasons)? *** Yes: Would scanning the notes be sufficient? No: +1. Yes: -1. ** Can this easily and sufficiently be replaced with an ebook? Yes: -1. ** Would someone else easily value this more than I do? Yes: -1. ** Is the (practical, financial, emotional) cost of tossing it greater than the space cost of keeping it? No: Toss. * Do I have a sentimental attachment to it? Yes: +1. No: -1. ** Did someone I care about give it to me? No: -1. *** Yes: Would they care if I tossed it? Yes: +1. No: -1. ** Does it uniquely remind me of a special person, place, time, etc.? Yes: +1. No: -1. ** Do I feel it represents important parts of me? No: -1. *** Yes: Current me or past me? Current or both: Display. Past only: Store. ** Do other things I own represent this sentimental thing to me sufficiently and better? No: +1. Yes: -1. *** Is this sentimental thing really that special to me? No: -1. ** Do I ever think about this book when I haven't seen it for a while? Yes: +1. No: -1. ** Is the memory of the book sufficient on its own? Yes: Toss. No: Store. ** Do I like seeing it? Yes: +1. No: -1. *** Maybe: Am I bored with looking at it, or won't I be eventually? Yes: -1. No: +1. ** Will I feel bad if I toss it? No: Toss. Yes: Store. * Do I use it often? Yes: Display. ** Will I really ever get around to using it again? No: Toss. *** Do I still care about this topic? No: Toss. *** Would I feel bad if I never made this use of this book? No: Toss. *** Would I pick this book if I were starting over on this topic? No: Toss. *** Is this book useful enough to own compared to all the others on this topic? No: Toss. *** Is there a newer edition I'd prefer? Yes: Toss. *** Can I rebuy it cheaply and easily, if I ever get around to needing it? No: Store. **** Yes: Will the project take long enough to justify the time for getting the book again? Yes: Toss. *** Is it in annoyingly bad condition? **** Yes: Can I replace it with a better copy? No: Store. Yes: Toss. *** Will this be for a project or regular use? **** Regular use: Store. **** Project: ***** Has someone done this project to my satisfaction already? Yes: Toss. ***** Will this project happen anytime soon? No: Store. ****** Yes: Can I get it from a library easily? No: Store. ******* Yes: Can I use it fast enough to justify a checkout? Yes: Toss. No: Store. == For more == For some other criteria and more advice on weeding your books, take a look at "[http://bookriot.com/2015/04/22/spring-cleaning-organizing-bookshelves/ Spring Cleaning (and Organizing!) Your Bookshelves]" by Jesse Doogan. {{Category:Life maintenance}} 2badd179e72c09a99f63306782d38852724ed789 157 156 2015-04-24T06:09:33Z Andy Culbertson 1 Fixed the category. wikitext text/x-wiki In late 2014/early 2015 I massively slimmed down my book collection. In the world of libraries, they call this weeding. My main motivation was that I didn't have a lot of space, but my collection was still growing. I needed room for the new books. The weeding process involved looking at each book I owned and deciding whether to keep it. Some of these decisions were easy. A lot of them were not. So to help myself make them, I paid attention to the questions I was asking myself and gathered them into the flowchart-like list below. If you are weeding your own books or purging other possessions, maybe you can adapt these questions for your purposes. == Categories == The end goal of my weeding was to place each book into one of three categories: * Display - Put it on a shelf in my apartment. * Store - Put it in a box in my storage closet. * Toss - Get rid of it, usually by selling to a used book store. == Reasons to own a book == To help me ask good questions, I summarized what I'd noticed about books I knew I wanted to keep. I'd want to own a book for one or both of these reasons: * It's useful and I want easy access, especially if it's rare. * It's special to me for sentimental reasons, and I want to look at it and remember them. == Questions for tough decisions == These questions have three types of answers: # +1/-1: The positive numbers pushed me toward keeping the book, and the negative numbers pushed me toward tossing it. # Other questions: The further questions clarified my intentions for the book. # One of the above categories: This gave me my final action on the book. If an option for a question isn't shown, that usually means it didn't influence my decision and I moved on to the next question. * General questions ** Do I need this exact copy (for sentimental or practical reasons)? Yes: +1. No: -1. ** Is it part of a collection I want to keep? *** Yes: Do I really care about owning the whole collection? Yes: +1. No: -1. ** Does it have handwritten notes I care about (for sentimental or practical reasons)? *** Yes: Would scanning the notes be sufficient? No: +1. Yes: -1. ** Can this easily and sufficiently be replaced with an ebook? Yes: -1. ** Would someone else easily value this more than I do? Yes: -1. ** Is the (practical, financial, emotional) cost of tossing it greater than the space cost of keeping it? No: Toss. * Do I have a sentimental attachment to it? Yes: +1. No: -1. ** Did someone I care about give it to me? No: -1. *** Yes: Would they care if I tossed it? Yes: +1. No: -1. ** Does it uniquely remind me of a special person, place, time, etc.? Yes: +1. No: -1. ** Do I feel it represents important parts of me? No: -1. *** Yes: Current me or past me? Current or both: Display. Past only: Store. ** Do other things I own represent this sentimental thing to me sufficiently and better? No: +1. Yes: -1. *** Is this sentimental thing really that special to me? No: -1. ** Do I ever think about this book when I haven't seen it for a while? Yes: +1. No: -1. ** Is the memory of the book sufficient on its own? Yes: Toss. No: Store. ** Do I like seeing it? Yes: +1. No: -1. *** Maybe: Am I bored with looking at it, or won't I be eventually? Yes: -1. No: +1. ** Will I feel bad if I toss it? No: Toss. Yes: Store. * Do I use it often? Yes: Display. ** Will I really ever get around to using it again? No: Toss. *** Do I still care about this topic? No: Toss. *** Would I feel bad if I never made this use of this book? No: Toss. *** Would I pick this book if I were starting over on this topic? No: Toss. *** Is this book useful enough to own compared to all the others on this topic? No: Toss. *** Is there a newer edition I'd prefer? Yes: Toss. *** Can I rebuy it cheaply and easily, if I ever get around to needing it? No: Store. **** Yes: Will the project take long enough to justify the time for getting the book again? Yes: Toss. *** Is it in annoyingly bad condition? **** Yes: Can I replace it with a better copy? No: Store. Yes: Toss. *** Will this be for a project or regular use? **** Regular use: Store. **** Project: ***** Has someone done this project to my satisfaction already? Yes: Toss. ***** Will this project happen anytime soon? No: Store. ****** Yes: Can I get it from a library easily? No: Store. ******* Yes: Can I use it fast enough to justify a checkout? Yes: Toss. No: Store. == For more == For some other criteria and more advice on weeding your books, take a look at "[http://bookriot.com/2015/04/22/spring-cleaning-organizing-bookshelves/ Spring Cleaning (and Organizing!) Your Bookshelves]" by Jesse Doogan. [[Category:Life maintenance]] a2bb87b5df0aab67c4dab81729d45db230893a5c 158 157 2015-04-24T07:04:50Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added a link to my related blog post. wikitext text/x-wiki In late 2014/early 2015 I [http://www.thinkulum.net/blog/2015/04/24/home-makeover-thinkulum-edition/ massively slimmed down my book collection]. In the world of libraries, they call this weeding. My main motivation was that I didn't have a lot of space, but my collection was still growing. I needed room for the new books. The weeding process involved looking at each book I owned and deciding whether to keep it. Some of these decisions were easy. A lot of them were not. So to help myself make them, I paid attention to the questions I was asking myself and gathered them into the flowchart-like list below. If you are weeding your own books or purging other possessions, maybe you can adapt these questions for your purposes. == Categories == The end goal of my weeding was to place each book into one of three categories: * Display - Put it on a shelf in my apartment. * Store - Put it in a box in my storage closet. * Toss - Get rid of it, usually by selling to a used book store. == Reasons to own a book == To help me ask good questions, I summarized what I'd noticed about books I knew I wanted to keep. I'd want to own a book for one or both of these reasons: * It's useful and I want easy access, especially if it's rare. * It's special to me for sentimental reasons, and I want to look at it and remember them. == Questions for tough decisions == These questions have three types of answers: # +1/-1: The positive numbers pushed me toward keeping the book, and the negative numbers pushed me toward tossing it. # Other questions: The further questions clarified my intentions for the book. # One of the above categories: This gave me my final action on the book. If an option for a question isn't shown, that usually means it didn't influence my decision and I moved on to the next question. * General questions ** Do I need this exact copy (for sentimental or practical reasons)? Yes: +1. No: -1. ** Is it part of a collection I want to keep? *** Yes: Do I really care about owning the whole collection? Yes: +1. No: -1. ** Does it have handwritten notes I care about (for sentimental or practical reasons)? *** Yes: Would scanning the notes be sufficient? No: +1. Yes: -1. ** Can this easily and sufficiently be replaced with an ebook? Yes: -1. ** Would someone else easily value this more than I do? Yes: -1. ** Is the (practical, financial, emotional) cost of tossing it greater than the space cost of keeping it? No: Toss. * Do I have a sentimental attachment to it? Yes: +1. No: -1. ** Did someone I care about give it to me? No: -1. *** Yes: Would they care if I tossed it? Yes: +1. No: -1. ** Does it uniquely remind me of a special person, place, time, etc.? Yes: +1. No: -1. ** Do I feel it represents important parts of me? No: -1. *** Yes: Current me or past me? Current or both: Display. Past only: Store. ** Do other things I own represent this sentimental thing to me sufficiently and better? No: +1. Yes: -1. *** Is this sentimental thing really that special to me? No: -1. ** Do I ever think about this book when I haven't seen it for a while? Yes: +1. No: -1. ** Is the memory of the book sufficient on its own? Yes: Toss. No: Store. ** Do I like seeing it? Yes: +1. No: -1. *** Maybe: Am I bored with looking at it, or won't I be eventually? Yes: -1. No: +1. ** Will I feel bad if I toss it? No: Toss. Yes: Store. * Do I use it often? Yes: Display. ** Will I really ever get around to using it again? No: Toss. *** Do I still care about this topic? No: Toss. *** Would I feel bad if I never made this use of this book? No: Toss. *** Would I pick this book if I were starting over on this topic? No: Toss. *** Is this book useful enough to own compared to all the others on this topic? No: Toss. *** Is there a newer edition I'd prefer? Yes: Toss. *** Can I rebuy it cheaply and easily, if I ever get around to needing it? No: Store. **** Yes: Will the project take long enough to justify the time for getting the book again? Yes: Toss. *** Is it in annoyingly bad condition? **** Yes: Can I replace it with a better copy? No: Store. Yes: Toss. *** Will this be for a project or regular use? **** Regular use: Store. **** Project: ***** Has someone done this project to my satisfaction already? Yes: Toss. ***** Will this project happen anytime soon? No: Store. ****** Yes: Can I get it from a library easily? No: Store. ******* Yes: Can I use it fast enough to justify a checkout? Yes: Toss. No: Store. == For more == For some other criteria and more advice on weeding your books, take a look at "[http://bookriot.com/2015/04/22/spring-cleaning-organizing-bookshelves/ Spring Cleaning (and Organizing!) Your Bookshelves]" by Jesse Doogan. [[Category:Life maintenance]] fb4fd442b52b52ee8be3eecd2310e4ffef9a4e77 0 61 159 2015-06-04T03:57:00Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the article. wikitext text/x-wiki This topic is about practices that promote the well-being of others. I'm starting with philosopher Milton Mayeroff's book ''[http://www.worldcat.org/title/on-caring/oclc/22669310 On Caring]''. Mayeroff defines caring in its fullest sense as helping a person or thing grow and actualize him-, her-, or itself.<ref>Mayeroff 1972, 1</ref> For simplicity we can call this person or thing the other. Caring involves seeing the other as part of myself yet respecting its independent existence.<ref>Mayeroff 1972, 5</ref> Caring doesn't have to be perfect to count as care, but it does need to fulfill those basic requirements.<ref>Mayeroff 1972, 38-40</ref> My fullest type of care is invested in my "appropriate others," by which Mayeroff means those for whom my caring engages me in a comprehensive manner, or "inclusively," as he puts it. This level of caring "involve[s] me deeply and fruitfully order[s] all areas of my life." It enables me to be "in-place," at home, in the world.<ref>Mayeroff 1972, 2, 52, 54, 58</ref> Caring involves other qualities. * It requires knowledge of the other, myself, and the situation.<ref>Mayeroff 1972, 13-15</ref> * It involves flowing with the alternating rhythms of action and reflection and of a narrower and wider focus.<ref>Mayeroff 1972, 15-17</ref> * It requires patience, actively giving the other time and space to grow, allowing for periods of confusion and waste that are necessary for growth.<ref>Mayeroff 1972, 17-18</ref> * It requires honesty, a search for the truth about the other and my own attempts to help and a genuineness.<ref>Mayeroff 1972, 18-20</ref> * It requires trust that the other can grow into what it needs to be in spite of its mistakes and without my forceful molding or overprotection. It also requires trusting my ability to care.<ref>Mayeroff 1972, 20-22</ref> And it requires the other's trust in the carer.<ref>Mayeroff 1972, 45-46</ref> * It requires humility, always learning about the other, myself, and what caring involves in each situation. Humility has wide-reaching implications, from recognizing my limitations to seeing the other as more than a means to fulfilling my own needs.<ref>Mayeroff 1972, 23-25</ref> * It requires hope, a belief that the other in the present has the capacity to grow into something more in the future.<ref>Mayeroff 1972, 25-27</ref> * It requires courage, the willingness to move into whatever unknown territory the needs of growth take me into.<ref>Mayeroff 1972, 27-28</ref> * It involves the selflessness of absorption in something that interests me.<ref>Mayeroff 1972, 29-30</ref> * It requires an orientation toward the process rather than the product, since the present is all we have to work with, though the anticipated product guides our actions.<ref>Mayeroff 1972, 31-32</ref> * It requires the carer to be able to care for the other and the other to be able to be cared for.<ref>Mayeroff 1972, 33-34</ref> * It requires a relatively long-term relationship in which both parties are available to each other.<ref>Mayeroff 1972, 34</ref> * It sometimes but not always involves reciprocal care, and some caring relationships naturally end, though they may be transformed into a more mutual relationship at that point.<ref>Mayeroff 1972, 36-38</ref> * Caring for a person (as opposed to a thing, such as an idea) requires seeing the world from the other person's perspective without losing myself.<ref>Mayeroff 1972, 41-44</ref> * It requires being on the side of the other person's growth without condescending to them or idolizing them.<ref>Mayeroff 1972, 42-43</ref> * It involves encouraging the other person to grow, especially through my admiration of their growth.<ref>Mayeroff 1972, 44-45</ref> * It involves recognizing and encouraging the other person's autonomy in making the decisions they can make.<ref>Mayeroff 1972, 46-47</ref> * Caring for myself involves seeing myself as an other and as myself at the same time.<ref>Mayeroff 1972, 47</ref> * It involves caring for others.<ref>Mayeroff 1972, 48</ref> * Caring for other people is aided by understanding what growth involves from my experience of caring for myself.<ref>Mayeroff 1972, 48-49</ref> Caring has several effects. * Caring results in my own growth, but as a side effect rather than as a purpose of caring.<ref>Mayeroff 1972, 30</ref> * Neglect in a caring relationship leads to guilt, which is overcome by renewed caring.<ref>Mayeroff 1972, 36-38</ref> * Caring elevates other values related to itself and lowers values that are irrelevant.<ref>Mayeroff 1972, 51-54</ref> * It enables me to create a home for myself.<ref>Mayeroff 1972, 54-58</ref> * It creates appropriate others in my life.<ref>Mayeroff 1972, 58-62</ref> * It creates a meaning for my life.<ref>Mayeroff 1972, 62-65</ref> * It fosters a sense of stability grounded in knowing what I'm about, in having a place to belong, and in knowing what's important to me.<ref>Mayeroff 1972, 68-72</ref> * It creates a sense that life is unfinished but fundamentally good enough to live.<ref>Mayeroff 1972, 72-74</ref> * It creates a sense that life is intelligible, in that I understand my life's purpose, but also a sense that it is unfathomable, in the sense that we all share a fundamentally mysterious existence.<ref>Mayeroff 1972, 74-78</ref> * It results in autonomy, in the sense that I'm living my own meaning driven by my own concern for my appropriate others rather than living a meaning imposed on me.<ref>Mayeroff 1972, 78-83</ref> * It fosters faith in my ability to be caring and in the world as a place I want to commit to.<ref>Mayeroff 1972, 83-85</ref> * By recognizing the uncoerced gift of being able to care and the gift of others' fulfillment of my needs, I feel an intimate dependence on them and a gratitude toward life that I express by continuing to care.<ref>Mayeroff 1972, 85-87</ref> == References == Mayeroff, Milton. 1972. ''On Caring''. Perennial Library. New York: Harper & Row. == Footnotes == <references/> [[Category:Caring]] d3a41991fdaebed2f9df2d56463dcfb9ecf5073d 161 159 2015-06-04T04:06:09Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the section "Related blog posts." Some punctuation changes. wikitext text/x-wiki This topic is about practices that promote the well-being of others. I'm starting with philosopher Milton Mayeroff's book ''[http://www.worldcat.org/title/on-caring/oclc/22669310 On Caring]''. Mayeroff defines caring in its fullest sense as helping a person or thing grow and actualize him-, her-, or itself.<ref>Mayeroff 1972, 1</ref> For simplicity we can call this person or thing the other. Caring involves seeing the other as part of myself yet respecting its independent existence.<ref>Mayeroff 1972, 5</ref> Caring doesn't have to be perfect to count as care, but it does need to fulfill those basic requirements.<ref>Mayeroff 1972, 38-40</ref> My fullest type of care is invested in my "appropriate others," by which Mayeroff means those for whom my caring engages me in a comprehensive manner, or "inclusively," as he puts it. This level of caring "involve[s] me deeply and fruitfully order[s] all areas of my life." It enables me to be "in-place," at home, in the world.<ref>Mayeroff 1972, 2, 52, 54, 58</ref> Caring involves other qualities: * It requires knowledge of the other, myself, and the situation.<ref>Mayeroff 1972, 13-15</ref> * It involves flowing with the alternating rhythms of action and reflection and of a narrower and wider focus.<ref>Mayeroff 1972, 15-17</ref> * It requires patience, actively giving the other time and space to grow, allowing for periods of confusion and waste that are necessary for growth.<ref>Mayeroff 1972, 17-18</ref> * It requires honesty, a search for the truth about the other and my own attempts to help and a genuineness.<ref>Mayeroff 1972, 18-20</ref> * It requires trust that the other can grow into what it needs to be in spite of its mistakes and without my forceful molding or overprotection. It also requires trusting my ability to care.<ref>Mayeroff 1972, 20-22</ref> And it requires the other's trust in the carer.<ref>Mayeroff 1972, 45-46</ref> * It requires humility, always learning about the other, myself, and what caring involves in each situation. Humility has wide-reaching implications, from recognizing my limitations to seeing the other as more than a means to fulfilling my own needs.<ref>Mayeroff 1972, 23-25</ref> * It requires hope, a belief that the other in the present has the capacity to grow into something more in the future.<ref>Mayeroff 1972, 25-27</ref> * It requires courage, the willingness to move into whatever unknown territory the needs of growth take me into.<ref>Mayeroff 1972, 27-28</ref> * It involves the selflessness of absorption in something that interests me.<ref>Mayeroff 1972, 29-30</ref> * It requires an orientation toward the process rather than the product, since the present is all we have to work with, though the anticipated product guides our actions.<ref>Mayeroff 1972, 31-32</ref> * It requires the carer to be able to care for the other and the other to be able to be cared for.<ref>Mayeroff 1972, 33-34</ref> * It requires a relatively long-term relationship in which both parties are available to each other.<ref>Mayeroff 1972, 34</ref> * It sometimes but not always involves reciprocal care, and some caring relationships naturally end, though they may be transformed into a more mutual relationship at that point.<ref>Mayeroff 1972, 36-38</ref> * Caring for a person (as opposed to a thing, such as an idea) requires seeing the world from the other person's perspective without losing myself.<ref>Mayeroff 1972, 41-44</ref> * It requires being on the side of the other person's growth without condescending to them or idolizing them.<ref>Mayeroff 1972, 42-43</ref> * It involves encouraging the other person to grow, especially through my admiration of their growth.<ref>Mayeroff 1972, 44-45</ref> * It involves recognizing and encouraging the other person's autonomy in making the decisions they can make.<ref>Mayeroff 1972, 46-47</ref> * Caring for myself involves seeing myself as an other and as myself at the same time.<ref>Mayeroff 1972, 47</ref> * It involves caring for others.<ref>Mayeroff 1972, 48</ref> * Caring for other people is aided by understanding what growth involves from my experience of caring for myself.<ref>Mayeroff 1972, 48-49</ref> Caring has several effects: * Caring results in my own growth, but as a side effect rather than as a purpose of caring.<ref>Mayeroff 1972, 30</ref> * Neglect in a caring relationship leads to guilt, which is overcome by renewed caring.<ref>Mayeroff 1972, 36-38</ref> * Caring elevates other values related to itself and lowers values that are irrelevant.<ref>Mayeroff 1972, 51-54</ref> * It enables me to create a home for myself.<ref>Mayeroff 1972, 54-58</ref> * It creates appropriate others in my life.<ref>Mayeroff 1972, 58-62</ref> * It creates a meaning for my life.<ref>Mayeroff 1972, 62-65</ref> * It fosters a sense of stability grounded in knowing what I'm about, in having a place to belong, and in knowing what's important to me.<ref>Mayeroff 1972, 68-72</ref> * It creates a sense that life is unfinished but fundamentally good enough to live.<ref>Mayeroff 1972, 72-74</ref> * It creates a sense that life is intelligible, in that I understand my life's purpose, but also a sense that it is unfathomable, in the sense that we all share a fundamentally mysterious existence.<ref>Mayeroff 1972, 74-78</ref> * It results in autonomy, in the sense that I'm living my own meaning driven by my own concern for my appropriate others rather than living a meaning imposed on me.<ref>Mayeroff 1972, 78-83</ref> * It fosters faith in my ability to be caring and in the world as a place I want to commit to.<ref>Mayeroff 1972, 83-85</ref> * By recognizing the uncoerced gift of being able to care and the gift of others' fulfillment of my needs, I feel an intimate dependence on them and a gratitude toward life that I express by continuing to care.<ref>Mayeroff 1972, 85-87</ref> == Related blog posts == * [http://www.thinkulum.net/blog/category/topics/caring/ Category: Caring] == References == Mayeroff, Milton. 1972. ''On Caring''. Perennial Library. New York: Harper & Row. == Footnotes == <references/> [[Category:Caring]] 971fbab3cd9a9303be74352b890b4fd748f92025 14 62 160 2015-06-04T03:58:43Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the category. wikitext text/x-wiki [[Category:Social science]] 49de49372a42172a9a478a3f04ac469e7cfbcc05 0 63 162 2015-06-26T05:02:53Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the article. wikitext text/x-wiki These are strange events, people, places, objects, and ideas that especially interest me. I don't necessarily ''like'' them (some of them are about murder, for example), and I'm skeptical of a lot of them, but I'm interested in my reactions to them and in the issues they involve. This list is for historical and fringe science weirdness. Philosophical and religious weirdness and strange fiction will go in other lists. == Finding weird cases == There's no shortage of places on the Internet to find weird things. Here are a few I like. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Mysteries Category:Mysteries - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Fringe_theory Category:Fringe theory - Wikipedia] * [http://www.dmoz.org/Society/Paranormal/ Paranormal - DMOZ] * [http://www.dmoz.org/Science/Anomalies_and_Alternative_Science/ Anomalies and Alternative Science - DMOZ] * [http://www.dmoz.org/Society/Issues/Conspiracy/ Conspiracy - DMOZ] * [http://www.stufftheydontwantyoutoknow.com/ Stuff They Don't Want You to Know] * [http://paranormal.about.com/ Paranormal Phenomena - About.com] * [http://ufos.about.com/ UFOs and Aliens - About.com] * [http://www.reddit.com/r/UnresolvedMysteries/ Unresolved Mysteries - Reddit] * [http://boards.4chan.org/x/ /x/ (Paranormal) - 4chan] ** [http://www.dailydot.com/lifestyle/4chan-x-paranormal-board-creepy-pronunciation-book-mysteries/ Meet 4chan's /x/philes, investigators of the Internet's strangest mysteries] - The article that led me to the board. * [https://www.youtube.com/user/StrangeMysteries Strange Mysteries - YouTube] == Mysterious people == === Deaths === ==== The Taman Shud Case ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taman_Shud_Case Taman Shud Case - Wikipedia] ==== The Lead Masks Case ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lead_Masks_Case Lead Masks Case - Wikipedia] ==== Elisa Lam ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_of_Elisa_Lam Death of Elisa Lam - Wikipedia] ==== The Ourang Medan ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ourang_Medan Ourang Medan - Wikipedia] ==== Isdal Woman ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isdal_Woman Isdal Woman - Wikipedia] === Disappearances === ==== The Bermuda Triangle ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bermuda_Triangle Bermuda Triangle - Wikipedia] * [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nnLaDvxgmwg 5 Terrifying & Mysterious Bermuda Triangle Stories - Top5s - YouTube] * [http://www.electronicfog.com/ Bruce Gernon's electronic fog theory] ==== Frederick Valentich ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disappearance_of_Frederick_Valentich Disappearance of Frederick Valentich - Wikipedia] === Unknown identities === ==== Benjaman Kyle ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benjaman_Kyle Benjaman Kyle - Wikipedia] === Time travelers === ==== John Titor ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Titor John Titor - Wikipedia] == Mysterious artifacts == === Toynbee tiles === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toynbee_tiles Toynbee tiles - Wikipedia] === Georgia Guidestones === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georgia_Guidestones Georgia Guidestones - Wikipedia] === Bouvet Island lifeboat === * [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1heSaBKgaeg Abandoned Boat Baffles Scientists for 70 Years - Strange Mysteries - YouTube] * [https://allkindsofhistory.wordpress.com/2011/02/13/an-abandoned-lifeboat-at-worlds-end/ An abandoned lifeboat at world's end - A Blast from the Past] == Mysterious places == === Oak Island === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oak_Island Oak Island - Wikipedia] == Codes and puzzles == === The Voynich manuscript === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voynich_manuscript Voynich manuscript - Wikipedia] === Kryptos === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kryptos Kryptos - Wikipedia] === Numbers stations === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Numbers_station Numbers station - Wikipedia] === Reddit codes === * [http://www.reddit.com/r/Solving_A858/ Solving A858 - Reddit] * [http://www.reddit.com/r/Solving_Reddit_Codes Solving Reddit Codes - Reddit] === Cicada 3301 === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cicada_3301 Cicada 3301 - Wikipedia] * [http://www.fastcompany.com/3025785/meet-the-man-who-solved-the-mysterious-cicada-3301-puzzle Meet The Man Who Solved The Mysterious Cicada 3301 Puzzle - Fast Company] == Crime == === The Dark Web === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dark_Web Dark Web - Wikipedia] * [http://www.wired.com/2015/06/dark-web-know-myth/ The Dark Web as You Know It Is a Myth - Wired] == Alternative science == === Physics === ==== The Reciprocal System of Theory ==== * [http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Reciprocal_Theory Reciprocal Theory - RationalWiki] === Cosmology === ==== The Flat Earth ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modern_flat_Earth_societies Modern flat Earth societies - Wikipedia] * [https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLltxIX4B8_URNUzDE2sXctnUAEXgEDDGn Flat Earth Clues (playlist) - Mark Sargent - YouTube] === Cryptozoology === ==== Cryptids ==== ===== The Bridgewater Triangle ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bridgewater_Triangle Bridgewater Triangle - Wikipedia] * [http://spookysouthcoast.com/ Spooky Southcoast] - A paranormal radio show located near the Bridgewater Triangle. Each year they have an episode about it. ===== Living dinosaurs ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Living_dinosaur Living dinosaur - Wikipedia] ===== The Jersey Devil ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jersey_Devil Jersey Devil - Wikipedia] ===== Skinwalker Ranch ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skinwalker_Ranch Skinwalker Ranch - Wikipedia] ===== The Mothman ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mothman Mothman - Wikipedia] ===== The Loch Ness Monster ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loch_Ness_Monster Loch Ness Monster - Wikipedia] ===== Bigfoot ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patterson–Gimlin_film Patterson–Gimlin film - Wikipedia] - I don't care much about Bigfoot in general, but this film is intriguing. ==== Cryptid researchers ==== ===== Loren Coleman ===== * [http://cryptomundo.com/lorencoleman/ Bio of Loren Coleman - Cryptomundo] === Psychology === ==== ESP ==== ===== Diane Hennacy Powell ===== * [http://dianehennacypowell.com/consciousness/telepathy-project/ The Telepathy Project - Diane Hennacy Powell] ===== Rupert Sheldrake ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rupert_Sheldrake Rupert Sheldrake - Wikipedia] ==== The pineal gland ==== * [http://www.stufftheydontwantyoutoknow.com/podcasts/pineal-gland-eye/ The Pineal Gland: A Third Eye? - Stuff They Don't Want You to Know Podcast] * [http://www.vice.com/read/dmt-you-cannot-imagine-a-stranger-drug-or-a-stranger-experience-365 DMT: You Cannot Imagine a Stranger Drug or a Stranger Experience - Vice] - I don't condone the illegal use of hallucinogens and have no plans to try them, but this research is interesting. == Conspiracies == === The New World Order === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_World_Order_(conspiracy_theory) New World Order (conspiracy theory) - Wikipedia] === The shadow government === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shadow_government_(conspiracy) Shadow government (conspiracy) - Wikipedia] === The JFK assassination === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assassination_of_John_F._Kennedy Assassination of John F. Kennedy - Wikipedia] == UFOs and aliens == === UFO sightings === ==== The Phoenix Lights ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phoenix_Lights Phoenix Lights - Wikipedia] ==== The 2006 O'Hare International Airport UFO sighting ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2006_O%27Hare_International_Airport_UFO_sighting 2006 O'Hare International Airport UFO sighting - Wikipedia] === UFO researchers === ==== Jacques Vallée ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacques_Vallée Jacques Vallée - Wikipedia] ==== Hugh Ross ==== * [http://www.toledoblade.com/Religion/2003/01/04/Astronomer-links-UFOs-to-occultism.html Astronomer links UFOs to occultism - Toledo Blade] ==== Steven Greer ==== * [http://www.disclosureproject.org/ The Disclosure Project] == Spirit beings == === Ghosts === ==== Country House Restaurant in Clarendon Hills ==== A local haunting. Chicagoland doesn't seem to have many. * [http://www.burgerone.com/clarendon/ghost-story.html Ghost Story - Clarendon Hills Country House] ==== Cecilia Carrasco ==== * [https://uk.news.yahoo.com/paranormal-push--woman-claims-she-was-shoved-by-a-ghost-132640541.html Paranormal push? Watch moment woman claims she was shoved by a GHOST - Yahoo! News UK] == Related blog posts == * [http://www.thinkulum.net/blog/2015/06/25/weird-things-are-fun/ 2015/06/25: Weird things are fun] [[Category:Weirdness]] 763b3ffcc936914929ec6d89632a9ee03a34170a 163 162 2015-06-26T18:49:03Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the Dutch to make Sumurai8 happy. wikitext text/x-wiki These are strange events, people, places, objects, and ideas that especially interest me. I don't necessarily ''like'' them (some of them are about murder, for example), and I'm skeptical of a lot of them, but I'm interested in my reactions to them and in the issues they involve. This list is for historical and fringe science weirdness. Philosophical and religious weirdness and strange fiction will go in other lists. == Finding weird cases == There's no shortage of places on the Internet to find weird things. Here are a few I like. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Mysteries Category:Mysteries - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Fringe_theory Category:Fringe theory - Wikipedia] * [http://www.dmoz.org/Society/Paranormal/ Paranormal - DMOZ] * [http://www.dmoz.org/Science/Anomalies_and_Alternative_Science/ Anomalies and Alternative Science - DMOZ] * [http://www.dmoz.org/Society/Issues/Conspiracy/ Conspiracy - DMOZ] * [http://www.stufftheydontwantyoutoknow.com/ Stuff They Don't Want You to Know] * [http://paranormal.about.com/ Paranormal Phenomena - About.com] * [http://ufos.about.com/ UFOs and Aliens - About.com] * [http://www.reddit.com/r/UnresolvedMysteries/ Unresolved Mysteries - Reddit] * [http://boards.4chan.org/x/ /x/ (Paranormal) - 4chan] ** [http://www.dailydot.com/lifestyle/4chan-x-paranormal-board-creepy-pronunciation-book-mysteries/ Meet 4chan's /x/philes, investigators of the Internet's strangest mysteries] - The article that led me to the board. * [https://www.youtube.com/user/StrangeMysteries Strange Mysteries - YouTube] == Mysterious people == === Deaths === ==== The Taman Shud Case ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taman_Shud_Case Taman Shud Case - Wikipedia] ==== The Lead Masks Case ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lead_Masks_Case Lead Masks Case - Wikipedia] ==== Elisa Lam ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_of_Elisa_Lam Death of Elisa Lam - Wikipedia] ==== The Ourang Medan ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ourang_Medan Ourang Medan - Wikipedia] ==== Isdal Woman ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isdal_Woman Isdal Woman - Wikipedia] === Disappearances === ==== The Bermuda Triangle ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bermuda_Triangle Bermuda Triangle - Wikipedia] * [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nnLaDvxgmwg 5 Terrifying & Mysterious Bermuda Triangle Stories - Top5s - YouTube] * [http://www.electronicfog.com/ Bruce Gernon's electronic fog theory] ==== Frederick Valentich ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disappearance_of_Frederick_Valentich Disappearance of Frederick Valentich - Wikipedia] === Unknown identities === ==== Benjaman Kyle ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benjaman_Kyle Benjaman Kyle - Wikipedia] === Time travelers === ==== John Titor ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Titor John Titor - Wikipedia] == Mysterious artifacts == === Toynbee tiles === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toynbee_tiles Toynbee tiles - Wikipedia] === Georgia Guidestones === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georgia_Guidestones Georgia Guidestones - Wikipedia] === Bouvet Island lifeboat === * [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1heSaBKgaeg Abandoned Boat Baffles Scientists for 70 Years - Strange Mysteries - YouTube] * [https://allkindsofhistory.wordpress.com/2011/02/13/an-abandoned-lifeboat-at-worlds-end/ An abandoned lifeboat at world's end - A Blast from the Past] == Mysterious places == === Oak Island === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oak_Island Oak Island - Wikipedia] == Codes and puzzles == === The Voynich manuscript === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voynich_manuscript Voynich manuscript - Wikipedia] === Kryptos === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kryptos Kryptos - Wikipedia] === Numbers stations === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Numbers_station Numbers station - Wikipedia] === Reddit codes === * [http://www.reddit.com/r/Solving_A858/ Solving A858 - Reddit] * [http://www.reddit.com/r/Solving_Reddit_Codes Solving Reddit Codes - Reddit] === Cicada 3301 === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cicada_3301 Cicada 3301 - Wikipedia] * [http://www.fastcompany.com/3025785/meet-the-man-who-solved-the-mysterious-cicada-3301-puzzle Meet The Man Who Solved The Mysterious Cicada 3301 Puzzle - Fast Company] == Crime == === The Dark Web === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dark_Web Dark Web - Wikipedia] * [http://www.wired.com/2015/06/dark-web-know-myth/ The Dark Web as You Know It Is a Myth - Wired] == Alternative science == === Physics === ==== The Reciprocal System of Theory ==== * [http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Reciprocal_Theory Reciprocal Theory - RationalWiki] === Cosmology === ==== The Flat Earth ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modern_flat_Earth_societies Modern flat Earth societies - Wikipedia] * [https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLltxIX4B8_URNUzDE2sXctnUAEXgEDDGn Flat Earth Clues (playlist) - Mark Sargent - YouTube] === Cryptozoology === ==== Cryptids ==== ===== The Bridgewater Triangle ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bridgewater_Triangle Bridgewater Triangle - Wikipedia] * [http://spookysouthcoast.com/ Spooky Southcoast] - A paranormal radio show located near the Bridgewater Triangle. Each year they have an episode about it. ===== Living dinosaurs ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Living_dinosaur Living dinosaur - Wikipedia] ===== The Jersey Devil ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jersey_Devil Jersey Devil - Wikipedia] ===== Skinwalker Ranch ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skinwalker_Ranch Skinwalker Ranch - Wikipedia] ===== The Mothman ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mothman Mothman - Wikipedia] ===== The Loch Ness Monster ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loch_Ness_Monster Loch Ness Monster - Wikipedia] ===== Bigfoot ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patterson–Gimlin_film Patterson–Gimlin film - Wikipedia] - I don't care much about Bigfoot in general, but this film is intriguing. ==== Cryptid researchers ==== ===== Loren Coleman ===== * [http://cryptomundo.com/lorencoleman/ Bio of Loren Coleman - Cryptomundo] === Psychology === ==== ESP ==== ===== Diane Hennacy Powell ===== * [http://dianehennacypowell.com/consciousness/telepathy-project/ The Telepathy Project - Diane Hennacy Powell] ===== Rupert Sheldrake ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rupert_Sheldrake Rupert Sheldrake - Wikipedia] ==== The pineal gland ==== * [http://www.stufftheydontwantyoutoknow.com/podcasts/pineal-gland-eye/ The Pineal Gland: A Third Eye? - Stuff They Don't Want You to Know Podcast] * [http://www.vice.com/read/dmt-you-cannot-imagine-a-stranger-drug-or-a-stranger-experience-365 DMT: You Cannot Imagine a Stranger Drug or a Stranger Experience - Vice] - I don't condone the illegal use of hallucinogens and have no plans to try them, but this research is interesting. == Conspiracies == === The New World Order === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_World_Order_(conspiracy_theory) New World Order (conspiracy theory) - Wikipedia] === The shadow government === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shadow_government_(conspiracy) Shadow government (conspiracy) - Wikipedia] === The JFK assassination === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assassination_of_John_F._Kennedy Assassination of John F. Kennedy - Wikipedia] == UFOs and aliens == === UFO sightings === ==== The Phoenix Lights ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phoenix_Lights Phoenix Lights - Wikipedia] ==== The 2006 O'Hare International Airport UFO sighting ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2006_O%27Hare_International_Airport_UFO_sighting 2006 O'Hare International Airport UFO sighting - Wikipedia] === UFO researchers === ==== Jacques Vallée ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacques_Vallée Jacques Vallée - Wikipedia] ==== Hugh Ross ==== * [http://www.toledoblade.com/Religion/2003/01/04/Astronomer-links-UFOs-to-occultism.html Astronomer links UFOs to occultism - Toledo Blade] ==== Steven Greer ==== * [http://www.disclosureproject.org/ The Disclosure Project] === Alien races === ==== The Dutch ==== It is widely known that the Netherlands is on another planet and that the country's border is a portal to this planet. The Dutch, contrary to popular belief, are not humans who colonized this planet long ago but are aliens who visit Earth whenever they travel to other countries. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Netherlands Netherlands - Wikipedia] == Spirit beings == === Ghosts === ==== Country House Restaurant in Clarendon Hills ==== A local haunting. Chicagoland doesn't seem to have many. * [http://www.burgerone.com/clarendon/ghost-story.html Ghost Story - Clarendon Hills Country House] ==== Cecilia Carrasco ==== * [https://uk.news.yahoo.com/paranormal-push--woman-claims-she-was-shoved-by-a-ghost-132640541.html Paranormal push? Watch moment woman claims she was shoved by a GHOST - Yahoo! News UK] == Related blog posts == * [http://www.thinkulum.net/blog/2015/06/25/weird-things-are-fun/ 2015/06/25: Weird things are fun] [[Category:Weirdness]] 94e8a90f37c723fc2f4098e7910dce23cfdee8c0 164 163 2015-06-26T18:57:10Z Andy Culbertson 1 Changed the Dutch link. wikitext text/x-wiki These are strange events, people, places, objects, and ideas that especially interest me. I don't necessarily ''like'' them (some of them are about murder, for example), and I'm skeptical of a lot of them, but I'm interested in my reactions to them and in the issues they involve. This list is for historical and fringe science weirdness. Philosophical and religious weirdness and strange fiction will go in other lists. == Finding weird cases == There's no shortage of places on the Internet to find weird things. Here are a few I like. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Mysteries Category:Mysteries - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Fringe_theory Category:Fringe theory - Wikipedia] * [http://www.dmoz.org/Society/Paranormal/ Paranormal - DMOZ] * [http://www.dmoz.org/Science/Anomalies_and_Alternative_Science/ Anomalies and Alternative Science - DMOZ] * [http://www.dmoz.org/Society/Issues/Conspiracy/ Conspiracy - DMOZ] * [http://www.stufftheydontwantyoutoknow.com/ Stuff They Don't Want You to Know] * [http://paranormal.about.com/ Paranormal Phenomena - About.com] * [http://ufos.about.com/ UFOs and Aliens - About.com] * [http://www.reddit.com/r/UnresolvedMysteries/ Unresolved Mysteries - Reddit] * [http://boards.4chan.org/x/ /x/ (Paranormal) - 4chan] ** [http://www.dailydot.com/lifestyle/4chan-x-paranormal-board-creepy-pronunciation-book-mysteries/ Meet 4chan's /x/philes, investigators of the Internet's strangest mysteries] - The article that led me to the board. * [https://www.youtube.com/user/StrangeMysteries Strange Mysteries - YouTube] == Mysterious people == === Deaths === ==== The Taman Shud Case ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taman_Shud_Case Taman Shud Case - Wikipedia] ==== The Lead Masks Case ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lead_Masks_Case Lead Masks Case - Wikipedia] ==== Elisa Lam ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_of_Elisa_Lam Death of Elisa Lam - Wikipedia] ==== The Ourang Medan ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ourang_Medan Ourang Medan - Wikipedia] ==== Isdal Woman ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isdal_Woman Isdal Woman - Wikipedia] === Disappearances === ==== The Bermuda Triangle ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bermuda_Triangle Bermuda Triangle - Wikipedia] * [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nnLaDvxgmwg 5 Terrifying & Mysterious Bermuda Triangle Stories - Top5s - YouTube] * [http://www.electronicfog.com/ Bruce Gernon's electronic fog theory] ==== Frederick Valentich ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disappearance_of_Frederick_Valentich Disappearance of Frederick Valentich - Wikipedia] === Unknown identities === ==== Benjaman Kyle ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benjaman_Kyle Benjaman Kyle - Wikipedia] === Time travelers === ==== John Titor ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Titor John Titor - Wikipedia] == Mysterious artifacts == === Toynbee tiles === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toynbee_tiles Toynbee tiles - Wikipedia] === Georgia Guidestones === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georgia_Guidestones Georgia Guidestones - Wikipedia] === Bouvet Island lifeboat === * [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1heSaBKgaeg Abandoned Boat Baffles Scientists for 70 Years - Strange Mysteries - YouTube] * [https://allkindsofhistory.wordpress.com/2011/02/13/an-abandoned-lifeboat-at-worlds-end/ An abandoned lifeboat at world's end - A Blast from the Past] == Mysterious places == === Oak Island === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oak_Island Oak Island - Wikipedia] == Codes and puzzles == === The Voynich manuscript === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voynich_manuscript Voynich manuscript - Wikipedia] === Kryptos === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kryptos Kryptos - Wikipedia] === Numbers stations === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Numbers_station Numbers station - Wikipedia] === Reddit codes === * [http://www.reddit.com/r/Solving_A858/ Solving A858 - Reddit] * [http://www.reddit.com/r/Solving_Reddit_Codes Solving Reddit Codes - Reddit] === Cicada 3301 === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cicada_3301 Cicada 3301 - Wikipedia] * [http://www.fastcompany.com/3025785/meet-the-man-who-solved-the-mysterious-cicada-3301-puzzle Meet The Man Who Solved The Mysterious Cicada 3301 Puzzle - Fast Company] == Crime == === The Dark Web === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dark_Web Dark Web - Wikipedia] * [http://www.wired.com/2015/06/dark-web-know-myth/ The Dark Web as You Know It Is a Myth - Wired] == Alternative science == === Physics === ==== The Reciprocal System of Theory ==== * [http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Reciprocal_Theory Reciprocal Theory - RationalWiki] === Cosmology === ==== The Flat Earth ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modern_flat_Earth_societies Modern flat Earth societies - Wikipedia] * [https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLltxIX4B8_URNUzDE2sXctnUAEXgEDDGn Flat Earth Clues (playlist) - Mark Sargent - YouTube] === Cryptozoology === ==== Cryptids ==== ===== The Bridgewater Triangle ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bridgewater_Triangle Bridgewater Triangle - Wikipedia] * [http://spookysouthcoast.com/ Spooky Southcoast] - A paranormal radio show located near the Bridgewater Triangle. Each year they have an episode about it. ===== Living dinosaurs ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Living_dinosaur Living dinosaur - Wikipedia] ===== The Jersey Devil ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jersey_Devil Jersey Devil - Wikipedia] ===== Skinwalker Ranch ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skinwalker_Ranch Skinwalker Ranch - Wikipedia] ===== The Mothman ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mothman Mothman - Wikipedia] ===== The Loch Ness Monster ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loch_Ness_Monster Loch Ness Monster - Wikipedia] ===== Bigfoot ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patterson–Gimlin_film Patterson–Gimlin film - Wikipedia] - I don't care much about Bigfoot in general, but this film is intriguing. ==== Cryptid researchers ==== ===== Loren Coleman ===== * [http://cryptomundo.com/lorencoleman/ Bio of Loren Coleman - Cryptomundo] === Psychology === ==== ESP ==== ===== Diane Hennacy Powell ===== * [http://dianehennacypowell.com/consciousness/telepathy-project/ The Telepathy Project - Diane Hennacy Powell] ===== Rupert Sheldrake ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rupert_Sheldrake Rupert Sheldrake - Wikipedia] ==== The pineal gland ==== * [http://www.stufftheydontwantyoutoknow.com/podcasts/pineal-gland-eye/ The Pineal Gland: A Third Eye? - Stuff They Don't Want You to Know Podcast] * [http://www.vice.com/read/dmt-you-cannot-imagine-a-stranger-drug-or-a-stranger-experience-365 DMT: You Cannot Imagine a Stranger Drug or a Stranger Experience - Vice] - I don't condone the illegal use of hallucinogens and have no plans to try them, but this research is interesting. == Conspiracies == === The New World Order === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_World_Order_(conspiracy_theory) New World Order (conspiracy theory) - Wikipedia] === The shadow government === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shadow_government_(conspiracy) Shadow government (conspiracy) - Wikipedia] === The JFK assassination === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assassination_of_John_F._Kennedy Assassination of John F. Kennedy - Wikipedia] == UFOs and aliens == === UFO sightings === ==== The Phoenix Lights ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phoenix_Lights Phoenix Lights - Wikipedia] ==== The 2006 O'Hare International Airport UFO sighting ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2006_O%27Hare_International_Airport_UFO_sighting 2006 O'Hare International Airport UFO sighting - Wikipedia] === UFO researchers === ==== Jacques Vallée ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacques_Vallée Jacques Vallée - Wikipedia] ==== Hugh Ross ==== * [http://www.toledoblade.com/Religion/2003/01/04/Astronomer-links-UFOs-to-occultism.html Astronomer links UFOs to occultism - Toledo Blade] ==== Steven Greer ==== * [http://www.disclosureproject.org/ The Disclosure Project] === Alien races === ==== The Dutch ==== It is widely known that the Netherlands is on another planet and that the country's border is a portal to this planet. The Dutch, contrary to popular belief, are not humans who colonized this planet long ago but are aliens who visit Earth whenever they travel to other countries. * [http://ask.fm/Togedi3/answer/127837053174 Do you deny that you Dutch are aliens? - Togedi3 - Ask.fm] == Spirit beings == === Ghosts === ==== Country House Restaurant in Clarendon Hills ==== A local haunting. Chicagoland doesn't seem to have many. * [http://www.burgerone.com/clarendon/ghost-story.html Ghost Story - Clarendon Hills Country House] ==== Cecilia Carrasco ==== * [https://uk.news.yahoo.com/paranormal-push--woman-claims-she-was-shoved-by-a-ghost-132640541.html Paranormal push? Watch moment woman claims she was shoved by a GHOST - Yahoo! News UK] == Related blog posts == * [http://www.thinkulum.net/blog/2015/06/25/weird-things-are-fun/ 2015/06/25: Weird things are fun] [[Category:Weirdness]] beb8babd0a3f2c0803b193b1dce8b87f31ad424e 165 164 2015-06-26T23:02:57Z Andy Culbertson 1 Clarified the wording on the Dutch. wikitext text/x-wiki These are strange events, people, places, objects, and ideas that especially interest me. I don't necessarily ''like'' them (some of them are about murder, for example), and I'm skeptical of a lot of them, but I'm interested in my reactions to them and in the issues they involve. This list is for historical and fringe science weirdness. Philosophical and religious weirdness and strange fiction will go in other lists. == Finding weird cases == There's no shortage of places on the Internet to find weird things. Here are a few I like. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Mysteries Category:Mysteries - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Fringe_theory Category:Fringe theory - Wikipedia] * [http://www.dmoz.org/Society/Paranormal/ Paranormal - DMOZ] * [http://www.dmoz.org/Science/Anomalies_and_Alternative_Science/ Anomalies and Alternative Science - DMOZ] * [http://www.dmoz.org/Society/Issues/Conspiracy/ Conspiracy - DMOZ] * [http://www.stufftheydontwantyoutoknow.com/ Stuff They Don't Want You to Know] * [http://paranormal.about.com/ Paranormal Phenomena - About.com] * [http://ufos.about.com/ UFOs and Aliens - About.com] * [http://www.reddit.com/r/UnresolvedMysteries/ Unresolved Mysteries - Reddit] * [http://boards.4chan.org/x/ /x/ (Paranormal) - 4chan] ** [http://www.dailydot.com/lifestyle/4chan-x-paranormal-board-creepy-pronunciation-book-mysteries/ Meet 4chan's /x/philes, investigators of the Internet's strangest mysteries] - The article that led me to the board. * [https://www.youtube.com/user/StrangeMysteries Strange Mysteries - YouTube] == Mysterious people == === Deaths === ==== The Taman Shud Case ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taman_Shud_Case Taman Shud Case - Wikipedia] ==== The Lead Masks Case ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lead_Masks_Case Lead Masks Case - Wikipedia] ==== Elisa Lam ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_of_Elisa_Lam Death of Elisa Lam - Wikipedia] ==== The Ourang Medan ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ourang_Medan Ourang Medan - Wikipedia] ==== Isdal Woman ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isdal_Woman Isdal Woman - Wikipedia] === Disappearances === ==== The Bermuda Triangle ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bermuda_Triangle Bermuda Triangle - Wikipedia] * [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nnLaDvxgmwg 5 Terrifying & Mysterious Bermuda Triangle Stories - Top5s - YouTube] * [http://www.electronicfog.com/ Bruce Gernon's electronic fog theory] ==== Frederick Valentich ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disappearance_of_Frederick_Valentich Disappearance of Frederick Valentich - Wikipedia] === Unknown identities === ==== Benjaman Kyle ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benjaman_Kyle Benjaman Kyle - Wikipedia] === Time travelers === ==== John Titor ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Titor John Titor - Wikipedia] == Mysterious artifacts == === Toynbee tiles === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toynbee_tiles Toynbee tiles - Wikipedia] === Georgia Guidestones === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georgia_Guidestones Georgia Guidestones - Wikipedia] === Bouvet Island lifeboat === * [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1heSaBKgaeg Abandoned Boat Baffles Scientists for 70 Years - Strange Mysteries - YouTube] * [https://allkindsofhistory.wordpress.com/2011/02/13/an-abandoned-lifeboat-at-worlds-end/ An abandoned lifeboat at world's end - A Blast from the Past] == Mysterious places == === Oak Island === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oak_Island Oak Island - Wikipedia] == Codes and puzzles == === The Voynich manuscript === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voynich_manuscript Voynich manuscript - Wikipedia] === Kryptos === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kryptos Kryptos - Wikipedia] === Numbers stations === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Numbers_station Numbers station - Wikipedia] === Reddit codes === * [http://www.reddit.com/r/Solving_A858/ Solving A858 - Reddit] * [http://www.reddit.com/r/Solving_Reddit_Codes Solving Reddit Codes - Reddit] === Cicada 3301 === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cicada_3301 Cicada 3301 - Wikipedia] * [http://www.fastcompany.com/3025785/meet-the-man-who-solved-the-mysterious-cicada-3301-puzzle Meet The Man Who Solved The Mysterious Cicada 3301 Puzzle - Fast Company] == Crime == === The Dark Web === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dark_Web Dark Web - Wikipedia] * [http://www.wired.com/2015/06/dark-web-know-myth/ The Dark Web as You Know It Is a Myth - Wired] == Alternative science == === Physics === ==== The Reciprocal System of Theory ==== * [http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Reciprocal_Theory Reciprocal Theory - RationalWiki] === Cosmology === ==== The Flat Earth ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modern_flat_Earth_societies Modern flat Earth societies - Wikipedia] * [https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLltxIX4B8_URNUzDE2sXctnUAEXgEDDGn Flat Earth Clues (playlist) - Mark Sargent - YouTube] === Cryptozoology === ==== Cryptids ==== ===== The Bridgewater Triangle ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bridgewater_Triangle Bridgewater Triangle - Wikipedia] * [http://spookysouthcoast.com/ Spooky Southcoast] - A paranormal radio show located near the Bridgewater Triangle. Each year they have an episode about it. ===== Living dinosaurs ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Living_dinosaur Living dinosaur - Wikipedia] ===== The Jersey Devil ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jersey_Devil Jersey Devil - Wikipedia] ===== Skinwalker Ranch ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skinwalker_Ranch Skinwalker Ranch - Wikipedia] ===== The Mothman ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mothman Mothman - Wikipedia] ===== The Loch Ness Monster ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loch_Ness_Monster Loch Ness Monster - Wikipedia] ===== Bigfoot ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patterson–Gimlin_film Patterson–Gimlin film - Wikipedia] - I don't care much about Bigfoot in general, but this film is intriguing. ==== Cryptid researchers ==== ===== Loren Coleman ===== * [http://cryptomundo.com/lorencoleman/ Bio of Loren Coleman - Cryptomundo] === Psychology === ==== ESP ==== ===== Diane Hennacy Powell ===== * [http://dianehennacypowell.com/consciousness/telepathy-project/ The Telepathy Project - Diane Hennacy Powell] ===== Rupert Sheldrake ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rupert_Sheldrake Rupert Sheldrake - Wikipedia] ==== The pineal gland ==== * [http://www.stufftheydontwantyoutoknow.com/podcasts/pineal-gland-eye/ The Pineal Gland: A Third Eye? - Stuff They Don't Want You to Know Podcast] * [http://www.vice.com/read/dmt-you-cannot-imagine-a-stranger-drug-or-a-stranger-experience-365 DMT: You Cannot Imagine a Stranger Drug or a Stranger Experience - Vice] - I don't condone the illegal use of hallucinogens and have no plans to try them, but this research is interesting. == Conspiracies == === The New World Order === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_World_Order_(conspiracy_theory) New World Order (conspiracy theory) - Wikipedia] === The shadow government === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shadow_government_(conspiracy) Shadow government (conspiracy) - Wikipedia] === The JFK assassination === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assassination_of_John_F._Kennedy Assassination of John F. Kennedy - Wikipedia] == UFOs and aliens == === UFO sightings === ==== The Phoenix Lights ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phoenix_Lights Phoenix Lights - Wikipedia] ==== The 2006 O'Hare International Airport UFO sighting ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2006_O%27Hare_International_Airport_UFO_sighting 2006 O'Hare International Airport UFO sighting - Wikipedia] === UFO researchers === ==== Jacques Vallée ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacques_Vallée Jacques Vallée - Wikipedia] ==== Hugh Ross ==== * [http://www.toledoblade.com/Religion/2003/01/04/Astronomer-links-UFOs-to-occultism.html Astronomer links UFOs to occultism - Toledo Blade] ==== Steven Greer ==== * [http://www.disclosureproject.org/ The Disclosure Project] === Alien races === ==== The Dutch ==== It is widely known that the Netherlands is on another planet and that the country's border is a portal to that planet. The Dutch, contrary to popular belief, are not humans who colonized this alien planet long ago but are aliens who visit Earth whenever they travel to other countries. * [http://ask.fm/Togedi3/answer/127837053174 Do you deny that you Dutch are aliens? - Togedi3 - Ask.fm] == Spirit beings == === Ghosts === ==== Country House Restaurant in Clarendon Hills ==== A local haunting. Chicagoland doesn't seem to have many. * [http://www.burgerone.com/clarendon/ghost-story.html Ghost Story - Clarendon Hills Country House] ==== Cecilia Carrasco ==== * [https://uk.news.yahoo.com/paranormal-push--woman-claims-she-was-shoved-by-a-ghost-132640541.html Paranormal push? Watch moment woman claims she was shoved by a GHOST - Yahoo! News UK] == Related blog posts == * [http://www.thinkulum.net/blog/2015/06/25/weird-things-are-fun/ 2015/06/25: Weird things are fun] [[Category:Weirdness]] e715bfe49cc3be8e0a7f94b50a6b7c18ea52c146 0 64 166 2015-07-08T05:39:04Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the article. wikitext text/x-wiki == Introduction == Immanuel prayer shares several key features of hypnosis, and its facilitators could benefit from understanding hypnosis and incorporating some of its techniques. This article is a rough sketch of the issue to interest people who might want to look into it further. == What is hypnosis? == For my analysis of hypnosis I'm drawing mainly from Michael Yapko's textbook for psychotherapists, ''[http://www.worldcat.org/title/trancework-an-introduction-to-the-practice-of-clinical-hypnosis/oclc/812503389 Trancework: An Introduction to the Practice of Clinical Hypnosis, Fourth Edition]''. He has produced a condensed version of ''Trancework'' for a general audience called ''[http://www.worldcat.org/title/essentials-of-hypnosis/oclc/879552996 Essentials of Hypnosis]''. Yapko describes hypnosis this way: <blockquote> Here is my own admittedly imperfect definition of hypnosis: It is a focused experience of attentional absorption that invites people to respond experientially on multiple levels to amplify and utilize their personal resources in a goal-directed fashion. Employed in the clinical context, hypnosis involves paying greater attention to the essential skills of using words and gestures in particular ways to achieve specific therapeutic outcomes, acknowledging and utilizing the many complex personal, interpersonal, and contextual factors that combine in varying degrees to influence client responsiveness.<ref>Yapko 2012, 7</ref> </blockquote> Much of ''Trancework'' is spent expanding on this description. You'll find some of the details in the rest of this article. Like Yapko's book, this article will focus on Ericksonian hypnosis, also called naturalistic or utilization hypnosis, developed by psychiatrist Milton Erickson. In contrast with the ritualistic methods of traditional approaches that involve reading standard scripts to induce hypnosis, Ericksonian hypnosis emphasizes an interactive approach that is guided by and makes use of the client's needs and responses.<ref>Yapko 2012, 52-53</ref> The following websites offer more resources on hypnosis:<ref>Yapko 2012, 543</ref> * [http://www.yapko.com Michael Yapko] * [http://www.erickson-foundation.org The Milton H. Erickson Foundation] * [http://www.asch.net American Society of Clinical Hypnosis] * [http://www.hypnosisnetwork.com The Hypnosis Network] * [http://www.ewillmarth.com Eric Willmarth, PhD] * [http://www.historyofhypnotism.com A CRITICAL History of Hypnotism] by Saul Rosenfeld == What is Immanuel prayer? == Compared to hypnosis, Immanuel prayer is a very new approach. It was developed in the mid-2000s by psychiatrist Karl Lehman, who was influenced by EMDR, [http://www.theophostic.com/ Theophostic Prayer Ministry], traditional emotional healing prayer ministries, and a Christian model of human development called the [https://www.joystartshere.com/ Life Model], developed by psychologist Jim Wilder and others at the Shepherd's House ministry.<ref>Lehman 2007, 1-9</ref><ref>Coursey 2013</ref> One of the Life Model's selling points is that it incorporates neuropsychology research from Alan Schore and Daniel Siegel, among others.<ref>Wilder 2015</ref> Here's my definition of Immanuel prayer: It is a form of conversational prayer in which a recipient, normally guided by a facilitator, is led into a relational connection with God in which issues are resolved that are hindering a deeper and more continuous connection with him. These issues especially include unresolved painful experiences and false beliefs that cause distress. A major subgoal of Immanuel is to increase the recipient's capacity for handling emotional pain. For demonstration videos and other information, see the [http://www.immanuelapproach.com/ Immanuel Approach website] and Alive and Well's [https://alivewell.org/connect/ blog] and [https://vimeo.com/aliveandwell/albums Vimeo albums]. Immanuel and hypnosis use different terms for the roles played in a session. Hypnosis, at least in a clinical context, uses the terms therapist or clinician and client, while Immanuel uses the terms facilitator and recipient. Since Immanuel prayer ministers are the main audience for this article, I'll use the Immanuel terms when talking about hypnosis and Immanuel together. == Similarities == # '''Both involve a state of absorption and dissociation.''' Absorption is sustained, focused attention. It seems to be a core component of hypnosis. Dissociation is a type of inattention. Since you can only really pay attention to one thing at a time, absorption brings dissociation with it.<ref>Yapko 2012, 41-42, 65, 68-70, 95, 168, 184-185, 302-303</ref> In hypnosis the client focuses on things like the hypnotist's suggestions, a visible object (during the induction), or their own internal events (thoughts, emotions, and bodily sensations). In Immanuel the recipient focuses on the facilitator's questions and their own internal events. They tend to dissociate from an awareness of other people in the room. Their level of focus can mean that after the session it takes them a few minutes to speed up to a normal level of alertness. # '''In both the state of absorption tends to be internally directed.'''<ref>Yapko 2012, 328</ref> It focuses on the recipient's thoughts, emotions, and sensations rather than on the environment around them. # '''Both involve suggestion.''' In a general sense, everything the facilitator asks the recipient to do is a suggestion. This includes recommending that they close their eyes and asking them what they're noticing. Suggestions come in a range of styles: direct and indirect, authoritarian and permissive, positive and negative, content and process.<ref>Yapko 2012, 257-277</ref> A key feature of hypnosis is that the client becomes very suggestible during a session. This means that some suggestions elicit an involuntary response from the client, such as lifting the arm without thinking about it when the therapist suggests the arm is getting lighter.<ref>Yapko 2012, 34</ref> In a broader sense, the facilitator's words, actions, and mere presence can influence the recipient even unintentionally.<ref>Yapko 2012, 17, 143-144, 517</ref> This is why, for example, the facilitator has to word questions carefully so they don't lead the recipient's answers or evoke an analytical rather than emotional response. Similarly, the facilitator has to watch for signs that the recipient is giving the "right" answers to gain the facilitator's approval. # '''Both pay attention to the relationship between the recipient and the facilitator.''' The session goes best when the recipient trusts the facilitator and expects good results.<ref>Yapko 2012, 9, 16, 71-74</ref> For Immanuel prayer a positive relationship is part of the method, since a caring relational connection is seen as the catalyst for change. # '''Both types of session follow a similar outline.''' Generally the session proceeds through these steps (see the next section for differences): ## Introduce the session. (Educate the recipient, build rapport, etc.) ## Induce the target state (hypnosis or relational connection with God). ## Address the presenting issues. ## Close the session.<ref>Yapko 2012, 302</ref> # '''In hypnosis terms, the Immanuel induction amounts to a process form of the relaxed-scene experience using age regression.'''<ref>Yapko 2012, 308-310</ref> Process suggestions are the counterpart to content suggestions. Content suggestions involve giving the recipient specific content to visualize or think about, whereas process suggestions only give the recipient a general category and let the recipient fill in the details.<ref>Yapko 2012, 267-270</ref> Age regression is simply guiding the recipient to imagine a memory vividly.<ref>Yapko 2012, 345-353</ref> # '''Both make use of a broad range of feedback from the recipient.'''<ref>Yapko 2012, 287</ref> This includes the recipient's words, tone of voice, and body language, along with different types of messages. The recipient's messages may include resistance and other negative reactions to the process,<ref>Yapko 2012, 463-474</ref> though the methods and the targets of resistance differ between Immanuel and hypnosis. See the next section for details. # '''Both can involve similar patterns of clinical intervention, such as reframing, though in Immanuel major features of these techniques arise spontaneously.'''<ref>Yapko 2012, 415-426</ref> See the next section. # '''Both make use of inner conflicts to process issues.''' In Immanuel this takes the form of holding a painful memory and a joyful memory together and observing what happens. In hypnosis this sometimes happens in the context of "trance logic," the way in which people under hypnosis can accept and act on suggestions that don't make sense, such as seeing a person as both visible and invisible. Trance logic can enable more creativity in a session and intensify therapeutic experiences, such as interacting with parents as if they were present.<ref>Yapko 2012, 57, 185-186, 364</ref> The logical conflicts themselves can even spark insight.<ref>Yapko 2011, 141-142</ref> # '''Both encourage echoing of the recipient's feedback.''' Using the recipient's words lets the facilitator avoid giving inaccurate interpretations so the session can stay on track with what's actually happening, and it fosters the recipient's trust.<ref>Yapko 2012, 280, 284-285</ref> # '''Both can use silence to deepen the recipient's experience.''' Silence gives the recipient time to experience and process whatever's happening inside them, though in hypnosis this may simply be to deepen a feeling of relaxation.<ref>Yapko 2012, 316-317</ref> # '''Both allow for recipient-oriented closure and follow-up.''' This lets the recipient finish their internal processing without feeling rushed.<ref>Yapko 2012, 406-408</ref> == Differences == # '''Absorption and suggestion are thought of as central features of hypnosis, whereas in Immanuel they are almost incidental, if they're acknowledged at all.''' Immanuel does recommend that the recipient close their eyes in order to focus, but the goal is simply to achieve connection with God without disruptive distractions. In hypnosis the goal of absorption is to increase suggestibility and enable the full range of hypnotic phenomena. # '''Hypnosis doesn't normally view the client's relationship with God as a central part of the process.''' That is, it doesn't see the client's problems as necessarily related to God, and it doesn't see God as necessarily part of the solution. # '''Immanuel involves a metanarrative, the Christian story of creation and redemption.''' Hypnosis leaves the question of metanarrative open. # '''Hypnosis and Immanuel are applied to overlapping but different sets of issues.''' Immanuel is applied to emotional and spiritual problems. Hypnosis is applied to emotional problems and certain medical needs. For example, it can replace anesthesia in surgery and speed the healing of wounds.<ref>Yapko 2012, 136, 497-498</ref> # '''Some of Immanuel's primary goals are more specific than those of hypnosis.''' Although Immanuel shares the open-ended goal of dealing with whatever is troubling the recipient, it adds the more specific goals of enabling a more continuous connection to God and increasing the recipient's capacity to handle pain. # '''In hypnosis the induction techniques often simply lead into the hypnotic state, which enhances the outcomes of whatever therapeutic methods the facilitator uses during the session.''' In Immanuel the induction techniques play a therapeutic role. Entering a connection with God both sets the stage for the session and enables healing to take place. # '''Immanuel inductions tend to be less verbose, since they rely more on the recipient's own internal processing.''' # '''Immanuel doesn't use confusion techniques for induction, though the recipient's internal conflicts do play a role in resolving issues.''' The purpose of confusion in hypnosis is to create a state of focus by diverting the client's attention to the confusing messages so the client is dissociated from everything else.<ref>Yapko 2012, 336-340</ref> # '''Immanuel doesn't purposefully seek to establish a response set.''' In hypnosis this typically happens right after the induction. A response set is a series of statements or questions that the client naturally agrees with that puts them in the frame of mind to respond positively to the facilitator's later suggestions. This is sometimes needed because a client may be open to following advanced suggestions but may not able to follow them right at the beginning, and a response set eases them into this level of suggestibility.<ref>Yapko 2012, 296-297, 397-398, 402</ref> # '''Immanuel makes little use of specific hypnotic phenomena.''' In particular it doesn't make purposeful use of age progression, amnesia, analgesia/anesthesia, catalepsy, dissociation, hallucinations, ideodynamic responses, sensory alterations, or time distortion.<ref>Yapko 2012, 343-387</ref> It also doesn't purposefully make use of the heightened suggestibility a client displays under hypnosis. # '''In Immanuel, the recipient's resistance is typically an inability to connect with God or an unwillingness to hear from him.''' In hypnosis, resistance is an inability or reluctance to be hypnotized or an unwillingness to follow the hypnotist's therapeutic suggestions. # '''Immanuel restricts the facilitator's input on the recipient's issues.''' In hypnosis terms, Immanuel suggestions are all process oriented rather than content oriented. Hypnosis makes room for process suggestions and leaves the question open how much interpreting of the recipient's issues the facilitator should do<ref>Yapko 2012, 96</ref>, but Immanuel recommends leaving most of the processing to the recipient. # '''Immanuel involves a particular theory of emotional healing--the pain processing pathway, the role of relationships, etc.''' Hypnosis allows for a range of therapeutic perspectives. It's more of a container for therapies than a specific therapy itself.<ref>Yapko 2012, 10-12, 42-43, 411</ref> # '''In hypnosis the therapist decides the methods for reaching the client's therapeutic goals.'''<ref>Yapko 2012, 392-393</ref> In Immanuel, the specific methods arise spontaneously as God addresses the recipient's issues. # '''Immanuel sees the key, transformative insights or mental experiences as being delivered directly from God.''' A hypnotist might attribute them to the client's subconscious, if they arise spontaneously rather than being suggested by the hypnotist. # '''Immanuel doesn't have a specific analogue to the posthypnotic suggestion.''' In hypnosis this typically happens just before closing the session. Posthypnotic suggestions are suggestions made during the session for thoughts, feelings, and actions that the client should have sometime after the session. They help the client carry the results of the session into the rest of life.<ref>Yapko 2012, 272-273, 405-406</ref> == Potential contributions of hypnosis to Immanuel prayer == # '''Immanuel practitioners could benefit from looking into the aspects of hypnosis theory and technique the two approaches have in common, such as the pervasive role of suggestion, age regression strategies, and environmental factors affecting the session.'''<ref>Yapko 2012, 197-202</ref> # '''Immanuel could incorporate other hypnosis induction techniques, such as the "as-if" method or the use of metaphors for easing clients through resistance.'''<ref>Yapko 2012, 312-314, 330-334, 440-442</ref> Since the target state in Immanuel is somewhat different (connection with God rather than simply a state of focus), hypnotic techniques would need to be adapted for the purpose of connection rather than borrowed as-is. # '''Immanuel facilitators could use a knowledge of hypnotic techniques and of approaches to various client symptoms as a guide for asking Immanuel questions.'''<ref>Yapko 2012, 411-462, 495-513</ref> # '''Immanuel could pay greater attention to the role of nonverbal communication.'''<ref>Yapko 2012, 293-294, 322, 368</ref> # '''Immanuel could benefit from the research on hypnosis with children at different stages of development.'''<ref>Yapko 2012, 475-494</ref> # '''Immanuel could adopt the role of being an aid to other forms of therapy by separating itself from particular theories of development and healing.''' That is, there might be other theories of emotion, pain processing, and so on that a facilitator could use to guide their questions within an Immanuel session. The purpose would be to give the facilitator even more flexibility, especially if they find themselves agreeing with another theoretical perspective, and possibly fit the facilitating even more closely to a particular recipient's needs. # '''Immanuel could consider what aspects of hypnosis might be happening implicitly in an Immanuel session and think through what to do with those.''' == Conclusion == Based on my examination, I would characterize Immanuel as an approach to emotional healing that uses techniques that result in a light hypnosis, which may facilitate the session's results. To put it in more spiritual terms, in Immanuel prayer God may use the brain's hypnotic mechanisms to enable healing, the way he uses the brain's capacity for language, bodily sensations, and relationships. If this is the case, Immanuel practitioners could benefit from thoughtfully integrating the findings of hypnosis researchers for guiding recipients into a focused attention on their own internal state and on the Lord's communications. == Footnotes == <references/> == References == Coursey, Chris. 2013. Joy to the world–The dream–Part II. Joy Starters. http://www.joystarters.com/2013/12/30/joy-to-the-world-the-dream-part-ii/. Lehman, K. D. 2007. Brain science, emotional trauma, & the God who is with us: Part I: A psychiatrist’s journey – A brief introduction to the Immanuel Approach. KCLehman.com. http://www.kclehman.com/download.php?doc=132. Wilder, Jim. 2015. How the 1990s changed everything we know about the brain. Life Model Works. https://www.joystartshere.com/1990s-changed-everything-know-brain/. Yapko, Michael D. 2011. ''Mindfulness and hypnosis: The power of suggestion to transform experience''. New York: Norton. Yapko, Michael D. 2012. ''Trancework: An introduction to the practice of clinical hypnosis'', 4th ed. New York: Routledge. == Related blog posts == * [http://www.thinkulum.net/blog/2015/07/08/hypnosis-and-immanuel-prayer/ 2015/07/08: Hypnosis and Immanuel prayer] [[Category:Immanuel prayer]] b8d161f5b28987d40c65e3eaa400166ce0e06889 172 166 2015-09-04T12:42:59Z Andy Culbertson 1 Clarified the definition of age regression and the use of inner conflicts in Immanuel. wikitext text/x-wiki == Introduction == Immanuel prayer shares several key features of hypnosis, and its facilitators could benefit from understanding hypnosis and incorporating some of its techniques. This article is a rough sketch of the issue to interest people who might want to look into it further. == What is hypnosis? == For my analysis of hypnosis I'm drawing mainly from Michael Yapko's textbook for psychotherapists, ''[http://www.worldcat.org/title/trancework-an-introduction-to-the-practice-of-clinical-hypnosis/oclc/812503389 Trancework: An Introduction to the Practice of Clinical Hypnosis, Fourth Edition]''. He has produced a condensed version of ''Trancework'' for a general audience called ''[http://www.worldcat.org/title/essentials-of-hypnosis/oclc/879552996 Essentials of Hypnosis]''. Yapko describes hypnosis this way: <blockquote> Here is my own admittedly imperfect definition of hypnosis: It is a focused experience of attentional absorption that invites people to respond experientially on multiple levels to amplify and utilize their personal resources in a goal-directed fashion. Employed in the clinical context, hypnosis involves paying greater attention to the essential skills of using words and gestures in particular ways to achieve specific therapeutic outcomes, acknowledging and utilizing the many complex personal, interpersonal, and contextual factors that combine in varying degrees to influence client responsiveness.<ref>Yapko 2012, 7</ref> </blockquote> Much of ''Trancework'' is spent expanding on this description. You'll find some of the details in the rest of this article. Like Yapko's book, this article will focus on Ericksonian hypnosis, also called naturalistic or utilization hypnosis, developed by psychiatrist Milton Erickson. In contrast with the ritualistic methods of traditional approaches that involve reading standard scripts to induce hypnosis, Ericksonian hypnosis emphasizes an interactive approach that is guided by and makes use of the client's needs and responses.<ref>Yapko 2012, 52-53</ref> The following websites offer more resources on hypnosis:<ref>Yapko 2012, 543</ref> * [http://www.yapko.com Michael Yapko] * [http://www.erickson-foundation.org The Milton H. Erickson Foundation] * [http://www.asch.net American Society of Clinical Hypnosis] * [http://www.hypnosisnetwork.com The Hypnosis Network] * [http://www.ewillmarth.com Eric Willmarth, PhD] * [http://www.historyofhypnotism.com A CRITICAL History of Hypnotism] by Saul Rosenfeld == What is Immanuel prayer? == Compared to hypnosis, Immanuel prayer is a very new approach. It was developed in the mid-2000s by psychiatrist Karl Lehman, who was influenced by EMDR, [http://www.theophostic.com/ Theophostic Prayer Ministry], traditional emotional healing prayer ministries, and a Christian model of human development called the [https://www.joystartshere.com/ Life Model], developed by psychologist Jim Wilder and others at the Shepherd's House ministry.<ref>Lehman 2007, 1-9</ref><ref>Coursey 2013</ref> One of the Life Model's selling points is that it incorporates neuropsychology research from Alan Schore and Daniel Siegel, among others.<ref>Wilder 2015</ref> Here's my definition of Immanuel prayer: It is a form of conversational prayer in which a recipient, normally guided by a facilitator, is led into a relational connection with God in which issues are resolved that are hindering a deeper and more continuous connection with him. These issues especially include unresolved painful experiences and false beliefs that cause distress. A major subgoal of Immanuel is to increase the recipient's capacity for handling emotional pain. For demonstration videos and other information, see the [http://www.immanuelapproach.com/ Immanuel Approach website] and Alive and Well's [https://alivewell.org/connect/ blog] and [https://vimeo.com/aliveandwell/albums Vimeo albums]. Immanuel and hypnosis use different terms for the roles played in a session. Hypnosis, at least in a clinical context, uses the terms therapist or clinician and client, while Immanuel uses the terms facilitator and recipient. Since Immanuel prayer ministers are the main audience for this article, I'll use the Immanuel terms when talking about hypnosis and Immanuel together. == Similarities == # '''Both involve a state of absorption and dissociation.''' Absorption is sustained, focused attention. It seems to be a core component of hypnosis. Dissociation is a type of inattention. Since you can only really pay attention to one thing at a time, absorption brings dissociation with it.<ref>Yapko 2012, 41-42, 65, 68-70, 95, 168, 184-185, 302-303</ref> In hypnosis the client focuses on things like the hypnotist's suggestions, a visible object (during the induction), or their own internal events (thoughts, emotions, and bodily sensations). In Immanuel the recipient focuses on the facilitator's questions and their own internal events. They tend to dissociate from an awareness of other people in the room. Their level of focus can mean that after the session it takes them a few minutes to speed up to a normal level of alertness. # '''In both the state of absorption tends to be internally directed.'''<ref>Yapko 2012, 328</ref> It focuses on the recipient's thoughts, emotions, and sensations rather than on the environment around them. # '''Both involve suggestion.''' In a general sense, everything the facilitator asks the recipient to do is a suggestion. This includes recommending that they close their eyes and asking them what they're noticing. Suggestions come in a range of styles: direct and indirect, authoritarian and permissive, positive and negative, content and process.<ref>Yapko 2012, 257-277</ref> A key feature of hypnosis is that the client becomes very suggestible during a session. This means that some suggestions elicit an involuntary response from the client, such as lifting the arm without thinking about it when the therapist suggests the arm is getting lighter.<ref>Yapko 2012, 34</ref> In a broader sense, the facilitator's words, actions, and mere presence can influence the recipient even unintentionally.<ref>Yapko 2012, 17, 143-144, 517</ref> This is why, for example, the facilitator has to word questions carefully so they don't lead the recipient's answers or evoke an analytical rather than emotional response. Similarly, the facilitator has to watch for signs that the recipient is giving the "right" answers to gain the facilitator's approval. # '''Both pay attention to the relationship between the recipient and the facilitator.''' The session goes best when the recipient trusts the facilitator and expects good results.<ref>Yapko 2012, 9, 16, 71-74</ref> For Immanuel prayer a positive relationship is part of the method, since a caring relational connection is seen as the catalyst for change. # '''Both types of session follow a similar outline.''' Generally the session proceeds through these steps (see the next section for differences): ## Introduce the session. (Educate the recipient, build rapport, etc.) ## Induce the target state (hypnosis or relational connection with God). ## Address the presenting issues. ## Close the session.<ref>Yapko 2012, 302</ref> # '''In hypnosis terms, the Immanuel induction amounts to a process form of the relaxed-scene experience using age regression.'''<ref>Yapko 2012, 308-310</ref> Process suggestions are the counterpart to content suggestions. Content suggestions involve giving the recipient specific content to visualize or think about, whereas process suggestions only give the recipient a general category and let the recipient fill in the details.<ref>Yapko 2012, 267-270</ref> There are two types of age regression. Revivification guides the recipient to reenter a memory as if it were a present experience. Hypermnesia simply guides the recipient to imagine the memory vividly.<ref>Yapko 2012, 345-353</ref> Immanuel uses hypermnesia, the less extreme form of age regression. # '''Both make use of a broad range of feedback from the recipient.'''<ref>Yapko 2012, 287</ref> This includes the recipient's words, tone of voice, and body language, along with different types of messages. The recipient's messages may include resistance and other negative reactions to the process,<ref>Yapko 2012, 463-474</ref> though the methods and the targets of resistance differ between Immanuel and hypnosis. See the next section for details. # '''Both can involve similar patterns of clinical intervention, such as reframing, though in Immanuel major features of these techniques arise spontaneously.'''<ref>Yapko 2012, 415-426</ref> See the next section. # '''Both make use of inner conflicts to process issues.''' In Immanuel this takes the form of observing what happens when the recipient moves back and forth between a painful memory and a joyful memory or when they invite Jesus to be with them as a loving presence in the painful memory. In hypnosis this sometimes happens in the context of "trance logic," the way in which people under hypnosis can accept and act on suggestions that don't make sense, such as seeing a person as both visible and invisible. Trance logic can enable more creativity in a session and intensify therapeutic experiences, such as interacting with parents as if they were present.<ref>Yapko 2012, 57, 185-186, 364</ref> The logical conflicts themselves can even spark insight.<ref>Yapko 2011, 141-142</ref> # '''Both encourage echoing of the recipient's feedback.''' Using the recipient's words lets the facilitator avoid giving inaccurate interpretations so the session can stay on track with what's actually happening, and it fosters the recipient's trust.<ref>Yapko 2012, 280, 284-285</ref> # '''Both can use silence to deepen the recipient's experience.''' Silence gives the recipient time to experience and process whatever's happening inside them, though in hypnosis this may simply be to deepen a feeling of relaxation.<ref>Yapko 2012, 316-317</ref> # '''Both allow for recipient-oriented closure and follow-up.''' This lets the recipient finish their internal processing without feeling rushed.<ref>Yapko 2012, 406-408</ref> == Differences == # '''Absorption and suggestion are thought of as central features of hypnosis, whereas in Immanuel they are almost incidental, if they're acknowledged at all.''' Immanuel does recommend that the recipient close their eyes in order to focus, but the goal is simply to achieve connection with God without disruptive distractions. In hypnosis the goal of absorption is to increase suggestibility and enable the full range of hypnotic phenomena. # '''Hypnosis doesn't normally view the client's relationship with God as a central part of the process.''' That is, it doesn't see the client's problems as necessarily related to God, and it doesn't see God as necessarily part of the solution. # '''Immanuel involves a metanarrative, the Christian story of creation and redemption.''' Hypnosis leaves the question of metanarrative open. # '''Hypnosis and Immanuel are applied to overlapping but different sets of issues.''' Immanuel is applied to emotional and spiritual problems. Hypnosis is applied to emotional problems and certain medical needs. For example, it can replace anesthesia in surgery and speed the healing of wounds.<ref>Yapko 2012, 136, 497-498</ref> # '''Some of Immanuel's primary goals are more specific than those of hypnosis.''' Although Immanuel shares the open-ended goal of dealing with whatever is troubling the recipient, it adds the more specific goals of enabling a more continuous connection to God and increasing the recipient's capacity to handle pain. # '''In hypnosis the induction techniques often simply lead into the hypnotic state, which enhances the outcomes of whatever therapeutic methods the facilitator uses during the session.''' In Immanuel the induction techniques play a therapeutic role. Entering a connection with God both sets the stage for the session and enables healing to take place. # '''Immanuel inductions tend to be less verbose, since they rely more on the recipient's own internal processing.''' # '''Immanuel doesn't use confusion techniques for induction, though the recipient's internal conflicts do play a role in resolving issues.''' The purpose of confusion in hypnosis is to create a state of focus by diverting the client's attention to the confusing messages so the client is dissociated from everything else.<ref>Yapko 2012, 336-340</ref> # '''Immanuel doesn't purposefully seek to establish a response set.''' In hypnosis this typically happens right after the induction. A response set is a series of statements or questions that the client naturally agrees with that puts them in the frame of mind to respond positively to the facilitator's later suggestions. This is sometimes needed because a client may be open to following advanced suggestions but may not able to follow them right at the beginning, and a response set eases them into this level of suggestibility.<ref>Yapko 2012, 296-297, 397-398, 402</ref> # '''Immanuel makes little use of specific hypnotic phenomena.''' In particular it doesn't make purposeful use of age progression, amnesia, analgesia/anesthesia, catalepsy, dissociation, hallucinations, ideodynamic responses, sensory alterations, or time distortion.<ref>Yapko 2012, 343-387</ref> It also doesn't purposefully make use of the heightened suggestibility a client displays under hypnosis. # '''In Immanuel, the recipient's resistance is typically an inability to connect with God or an unwillingness to hear from him.''' In hypnosis, resistance is an inability or reluctance to be hypnotized or an unwillingness to follow the hypnotist's therapeutic suggestions. # '''Immanuel restricts the facilitator's input on the recipient's issues.''' In hypnosis terms, Immanuel suggestions are all process oriented rather than content oriented. Hypnosis makes room for process suggestions and leaves the question open how much interpreting of the recipient's issues the facilitator should do<ref>Yapko 2012, 96</ref>, but Immanuel recommends leaving most of the processing to the recipient. # '''Immanuel involves a particular theory of emotional healing--the pain processing pathway, the role of relationships, etc.''' Hypnosis allows for a range of therapeutic perspectives. It's more of a container for therapies than a specific therapy itself.<ref>Yapko 2012, 10-12, 42-43, 411</ref> # '''In hypnosis the therapist decides the methods for reaching the client's therapeutic goals.'''<ref>Yapko 2012, 392-393</ref> In Immanuel, the specific methods arise spontaneously as God addresses the recipient's issues. # '''Immanuel sees the key, transformative insights or mental experiences as being delivered directly from God.''' A hypnotist might attribute them to the client's subconscious, if they arise spontaneously rather than being suggested by the hypnotist. # '''Immanuel doesn't have a specific analogue to the posthypnotic suggestion.''' In hypnosis this typically happens just before closing the session. Posthypnotic suggestions are suggestions made during the session for thoughts, feelings, and actions that the client should have sometime after the session. They help the client carry the results of the session into the rest of life.<ref>Yapko 2012, 272-273, 405-406</ref> == Potential contributions of hypnosis to Immanuel prayer == # '''Immanuel practitioners could benefit from looking into the aspects of hypnosis theory and technique the two approaches have in common, such as the pervasive role of suggestion, age regression strategies, and environmental factors affecting the session.'''<ref>Yapko 2012, 197-202</ref> # '''Immanuel could incorporate other hypnosis induction techniques, such as the "as-if" method or the use of metaphors for easing clients through resistance.'''<ref>Yapko 2012, 312-314, 330-334, 440-442</ref> Since the target state in Immanuel is somewhat different (connection with God rather than simply a state of focus), hypnotic techniques would need to be adapted for the purpose of connection rather than borrowed as-is. # '''Immanuel facilitators could use a knowledge of hypnotic techniques and of approaches to various client symptoms as a guide for asking Immanuel questions.'''<ref>Yapko 2012, 411-462, 495-513</ref> # '''Immanuel could pay greater attention to the role of nonverbal communication.'''<ref>Yapko 2012, 293-294, 322, 368</ref> # '''Immanuel could benefit from the research on hypnosis with children at different stages of development.'''<ref>Yapko 2012, 475-494</ref> # '''Immanuel could adopt the role of being an aid to other forms of therapy by separating itself from particular theories of development and healing.''' That is, there might be other theories of emotion, pain processing, and so on that a facilitator could use to guide their questions within an Immanuel session. The purpose would be to give the facilitator even more flexibility, especially if they find themselves agreeing with another theoretical perspective, and possibly fit the facilitating even more closely to a particular recipient's needs. # '''Immanuel could consider what aspects of hypnosis might be happening implicitly in an Immanuel session and think through what to do with those.''' == Conclusion == Based on my examination, I would characterize Immanuel as an approach to emotional healing that uses techniques that result in a light hypnosis, which may facilitate the session's results. To put it in more spiritual terms, in Immanuel prayer God may use the brain's hypnotic mechanisms to enable healing, the way he uses the brain's capacity for language, bodily sensations, and relationships. If this is the case, Immanuel practitioners could benefit from thoughtfully integrating the findings of hypnosis researchers for guiding recipients into a focused attention on their own internal state and on the Lord's communications. == Footnotes == <references/> == References == Coursey, Chris. 2013. Joy to the world–The dream–Part II. Joy Starters. http://www.joystarters.com/2013/12/30/joy-to-the-world-the-dream-part-ii/. Lehman, K. D. 2007. Brain science, emotional trauma, & the God who is with us: Part I: A psychiatrist’s journey – A brief introduction to the Immanuel Approach. KCLehman.com. http://www.kclehman.com/download.php?doc=132. Wilder, Jim. 2015. How the 1990s changed everything we know about the brain. Life Model Works. https://www.joystartshere.com/1990s-changed-everything-know-brain/. Yapko, Michael D. 2011. ''Mindfulness and hypnosis: The power of suggestion to transform experience''. New York: Norton. Yapko, Michael D. 2012. ''Trancework: An introduction to the practice of clinical hypnosis'', 4th ed. New York: Routledge. == Related blog posts == * [http://www.thinkulum.net/blog/2015/07/08/hypnosis-and-immanuel-prayer/ 2015/07/08: Hypnosis and Immanuel prayer] [[Category:Immanuel prayer]] 0fcf90879613d17112d8f9f91cdd1a27b4417a3a 14 65 167 2015-07-08T05:40:52Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the category. wikitext text/x-wiki [[Category:Religion]] d17955e9f8eef8b070350ffc9f6c9c9411c9dad7 0 58 168 150 2015-08-04T15:13:02Z Andy Culbertson 1 Fixed a typo. wikitext text/x-wiki I'm using pre-algebra to refer to elementary and maybe middle school math, but I've learned that those years cover not only algebra-related topics but also basic geometry, measurement, and statistics. I'm finding that these areas are interrelated, so I'm going to take a cue from elementary school curricula and cycle through them to make it easier to build the concepts on each other. As I analyze the concepts of pre-algebra and decide how to order them, I have the sense I'm on a journey. My destination is the general math of everyday life and the more formal treatment of these areas covered in the upper grades, and I'm mapping a course through the terrains of the various areas to get there. Several questions guide my route, directing my attention and reflection: What are numbers? How can we represent them in useful ways? What can we use them for? How can we work with them to achieve these purposes? How do we find the numbers we need in a situation? [[Category:Math Relearning]] 39cccba5d1946da0aaaebf58f7ea7895097fbd6d 176 168 2015-09-29T01:47:15Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the Complete category. wikitext text/x-wiki I'm using pre-algebra to refer to elementary and maybe middle school math, but I've learned that those years cover not only algebra-related topics but also basic geometry, measurement, and statistics. I'm finding that these areas are interrelated, so I'm going to take a cue from elementary school curricula and cycle through them to make it easier to build the concepts on each other. As I analyze the concepts of pre-algebra and decide how to order them, I have the sense I'm on a journey. My destination is the general math of everyday life and the more formal treatment of these areas covered in the upper grades, and I'm mapping a course through the terrains of the various areas to get there. Several questions guide my route, directing my attention and reflection: What are numbers? How can we represent them in useful ways? What can we use them for? How can we work with them to achieve these purposes? How do we find the numbers we need in a situation? [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Complete]] 68e54aec8f9c9647d3a9fd38354d4772134f0928 0 57 169 149 2015-08-11T03:51:15Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added a paragraph to "What is mathematics?" wikitext text/x-wiki == Introduction == This project is an exploration of mathematics from the perspective of someone who has learned some, forgotten most, and wants to learn more. I'm starting from the most basic concepts of pre-algebra, and I'm hoping to work through the typical American curriculum through geometry and then to cover some advanced areas that are related to my other projects. I won't set out a more detailed roadmap until I get closer to those waypoints. I'm not a mathematician, and I'm not writing a textbook, even though I call the sections chapters. These are just my notes and reflections on aspects of math that I think will help me understand it. I'm hoping they'll help other people as well or that they'll at least be interesting. I'll also link to other resources that seem helpful. Think of this project as a commentary on other people's math education materials. My major assumption in this project is that mathematical concepts relate to each other and to the world, and that knowing these relationships can help us understand, remember, and use these concepts. It can also help us appreciate them as objects of beauty, which can itself help us remember them. == What is mathematics? == Because of the different ways we use the term, there's a certain ambiguity in the question of what mathematics is. Am I asking about the academic activity of discovering mathematical concepts? the body of mathematical knowledge we've amassed? the abstract, timeless mathematical realities our knowledge is describing? the mathematical language we use to represent and communicate about those realities? I think to a certain degree the ambiguity can hang there without causing much trouble, but primarily I mean the activity of mathematical discovery. Like many people, I started out thinking of math as the study of numbers and the formulas for working with them. But there was one wrinkle in this assumption--geometry. Why was geometry a part of math? Shapes aren't numbers. Did somebody make a mistake? Poking around on Wikipedia made me aware that math is about much more than number. Numbers are the arithmetic, number theory, and maybe algebra part of math, and they are only one type of mathematical object. Math also covers space (geometry), change (calculus), and structure, whatever that is.<ref>''Wikipedia'', s.v. “Mathematics,” last modified July 14, 2014, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mathematics; ''Wikipedia'', s.v. “Areas of mathematics,” last modified June 18, 2014, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Areas_of_mathematics</ref> Expanding the scope of my understanding of math is good, but simply listing its concerns doesn't entirely help me. I look for coherence in my definitions, so I want to know what it is these areas have in common that draws mathematicians' interest and what distinguishes them from topics outside mathematics. Since space is involved, I'm especially unclear about the boundary between math and physics. These are issues I'll address as I learn. Category theory seems like a promising avenue for exploring the idea of mathematical objects, so I'm hoping to explore that area at some point.<ref>''Wikipedia'', s.v. “Mathematical object,” last modified March 14, 2014, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mathematical_object</ref> Mathematicians sometimes characterize their field as the science of patterns. I'm not sure what to make of that yet, but it also sounds promising. I can see mathematicians studying patterns and looking for them, and I can imagine there are non-obvious patterns lying behind other mathematical concepts. But I'd like more clarity on what kinds of patterns interest mathematicians, what features of patterns they like to study, and how. I'm pretty sure, for example, they wouldn't publish papers on the emotional effects of color choices in flower-themed wallpaper patterns. Mathematical patterns seem to be related to logic. For now I'll define math as doing mathematical things with mathematical objects, and as I learn I'll refine my definition. As possibly part of that definition, I'll also keep an eye out for how math's concepts can be characterized as patterns. But for all that, math does seem preoccupied with numbers. No matter what area I'm glancing at, there's something numeric involved. As I've done my initial thinking about math, I've come up with a speculation I'd like to investigate as I learn, that math is concerned with quantity and the concepts that branch out from it in particular ways. I'll call it the Quantity Relatedness Conjecture (QRC). == Footnotes == <references/> [[Category:Math Relearning]] a57a14bb238e9cbb24255fcc77e658e5eab29ad9 175 169 2015-09-29T01:47:08Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the Developing category. wikitext text/x-wiki == Introduction == This project is an exploration of mathematics from the perspective of someone who has learned some, forgotten most, and wants to learn more. I'm starting from the most basic concepts of pre-algebra, and I'm hoping to work through the typical American curriculum through geometry and then to cover some advanced areas that are related to my other projects. I won't set out a more detailed roadmap until I get closer to those waypoints. I'm not a mathematician, and I'm not writing a textbook, even though I call the sections chapters. These are just my notes and reflections on aspects of math that I think will help me understand it. I'm hoping they'll help other people as well or that they'll at least be interesting. I'll also link to other resources that seem helpful. Think of this project as a commentary on other people's math education materials. My major assumption in this project is that mathematical concepts relate to each other and to the world, and that knowing these relationships can help us understand, remember, and use these concepts. It can also help us appreciate them as objects of beauty, which can itself help us remember them. == What is mathematics? == Because of the different ways we use the term, there's a certain ambiguity in the question of what mathematics is. Am I asking about the academic activity of discovering mathematical concepts? the body of mathematical knowledge we've amassed? the abstract, timeless mathematical realities our knowledge is describing? the mathematical language we use to represent and communicate about those realities? I think to a certain degree the ambiguity can hang there without causing much trouble, but primarily I mean the activity of mathematical discovery. Like many people, I started out thinking of math as the study of numbers and the formulas for working with them. But there was one wrinkle in this assumption--geometry. Why was geometry a part of math? Shapes aren't numbers. Did somebody make a mistake? Poking around on Wikipedia made me aware that math is about much more than number. Numbers are the arithmetic, number theory, and maybe algebra part of math, and they are only one type of mathematical object. Math also covers space (geometry), change (calculus), and structure, whatever that is.<ref>''Wikipedia'', s.v. “Mathematics,” last modified July 14, 2014, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mathematics; ''Wikipedia'', s.v. “Areas of mathematics,” last modified June 18, 2014, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Areas_of_mathematics</ref> Expanding the scope of my understanding of math is good, but simply listing its concerns doesn't entirely help me. I look for coherence in my definitions, so I want to know what it is these areas have in common that draws mathematicians' interest and what distinguishes them from topics outside mathematics. Since space is involved, I'm especially unclear about the boundary between math and physics. These are issues I'll address as I learn. Category theory seems like a promising avenue for exploring the idea of mathematical objects, so I'm hoping to explore that area at some point.<ref>''Wikipedia'', s.v. “Mathematical object,” last modified March 14, 2014, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mathematical_object</ref> Mathematicians sometimes characterize their field as the science of patterns. I'm not sure what to make of that yet, but it also sounds promising. I can see mathematicians studying patterns and looking for them, and I can imagine there are non-obvious patterns lying behind other mathematical concepts. But I'd like more clarity on what kinds of patterns interest mathematicians, what features of patterns they like to study, and how. I'm pretty sure, for example, they wouldn't publish papers on the emotional effects of color choices in flower-themed wallpaper patterns. Mathematical patterns seem to be related to logic. For now I'll define math as doing mathematical things with mathematical objects, and as I learn I'll refine my definition. As possibly part of that definition, I'll also keep an eye out for how math's concepts can be characterized as patterns. But for all that, math does seem preoccupied with numbers. No matter what area I'm glancing at, there's something numeric involved. As I've done my initial thinking about math, I've come up with a speculation I'd like to investigate as I learn, that math is concerned with quantity and the concepts that branch out from it in particular ways. I'll call it the Quantity Relatedness Conjecture (QRC). == Footnotes == <references/> [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Developing]] 351db709ee4b8e8249b29ec423bd4f79260ab337 180 175 2015-10-21T05:18:02Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added Common Core to the introduction. Added the Resources and "Related blog posts" sections. wikitext text/x-wiki == Introduction == This project is an exploration of mathematics from the perspective of someone who has learned some, forgotten most, and wants to learn more. I'm starting from the most basic concepts of pre-algebra, and I'm hoping to work through the Common Core State Standards and then to cover some advanced areas that are related to my other projects. I won't set out a more detailed roadmap until I get closer to those waypoints. Common Core is controversial, and I probably won't comment on the debate, at least not for a while. I'm mainly interested in Common Core as an organizational scheme for an incremental approach to learning conceptual math. And I am fully on board with conceptual math, at least for adult learners. My major assumption in this project is that mathematical concepts relate to each other and to the world, and that knowing these relationships can help us understand, remember, and use these concepts. It can also help us appreciate them as objects of beauty, which can itself help us remember them. I'm not a mathematician, and I'm not writing a textbook, even though I call the sections chapters. These are just my notes and reflections on aspects of math that I think will help me understand it. I'm hoping they'll help other people as well or that they'll at least be interesting. I'll also link to other resources that seem helpful. Think of this project as a commentary on other people's math education materials. == Resources == What are these math education materials? Here are the main online sources I'm using. My main print sources are in [[Math_Relearning/References|References]], marked in bold. * [http://www.corestandards.org/Math/ Common Core Mathematics Standards] - The standards themselves. They're organized by grade level for K-8, then by conceptual category in high school. The standards within each grade are organized by domain. * [http://achievethecore.org/page/254/progressions-documents-for-the-common-core-state-standards-for-mathematics-detail-pg Progressions] - These trace the development of each domain and conceptual category across the grade levels. I'm reading them to get an overview and to connect ideas that will be somewhat separated when I go through them by grade. * [http://www.engageny.org/common-core-curriculum EngageNY Common Core Curriculum] - A complete P-12 curriculum under a Creative Commons license, which means all the content is free. I expect this to be my main source through precalculus. It's thousands of pages though, so I'll only be reading parts of it. I don't know if I'll get around to using these, but here are some other resources that might help you in a project like this one. * [http://community.ksde.org/Default.aspx?tabid=5646 KATM Flip Books] - For teachers, a fairly detailed summary of the instruction for each grade level. * [http://www.cgcs.org/page/244 Parent Roadmaps to the Common Core Standards: Mathematics - Council of the Great City Schools] - For parents, another summary of each grade's instruction, less detailed. * [https://homeworkhelpdesk.org/ The Homework Help Desk] - Explanations of the more confusing parts of Common Core's math methods. * [https://ccssmath.org/ CCSS Math] - Links to instructional videos for each standard. It collects the videos from several sources. * [http://www.commoncoreconversation.com/math-resources.html Math Resources - Common Core Conversation] - Links to a lot of math websites. == What is mathematics? == Because of the different ways we use the term, there's a certain ambiguity in the question of what mathematics is. Am I asking about the academic activity of discovering mathematical concepts? the body of mathematical knowledge we've amassed? the abstract, timeless mathematical realities our knowledge is describing? the mathematical language we use to represent and communicate about those realities? I think to a certain degree the ambiguity can hang there without causing much trouble, but primarily I mean the activity of mathematical discovery. Like many people, I started out thinking of math as the study of numbers and the formulas for working with them. But there was one wrinkle in this assumption--geometry. Why was geometry a part of math? Shapes aren't numbers. Did somebody make a mistake? Poking around on Wikipedia made me aware that math is about much more than number. Numbers are the arithmetic, number theory, and maybe algebra part of math, and they are only one type of mathematical object. Math also covers space (geometry), change (calculus), and structure, whatever that is.<ref>''Wikipedia'', s.v. “Mathematics,” last modified July 14, 2014, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mathematics; ''Wikipedia'', s.v. “Areas of mathematics,” last modified June 18, 2014, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Areas_of_mathematics</ref> Expanding the scope of my understanding of math is good, but simply listing its concerns doesn't entirely help me. I look for coherence in my definitions, so I want to know what it is these areas have in common that draws mathematicians' interest and what distinguishes them from topics outside mathematics. Since space is involved, I'm especially unclear about the boundary between math and physics. These are issues I'll address as I learn. Category theory seems like a promising avenue for exploring the idea of mathematical objects, so I'm hoping to explore that area at some point.<ref>''Wikipedia'', s.v. “Mathematical object,” last modified March 14, 2014, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mathematical_object</ref> Mathematicians sometimes characterize their field as the science of patterns. I'm not sure what to make of that yet, but it also sounds promising. I can see mathematicians studying patterns and looking for them, and I can imagine there are non-obvious patterns lying behind other mathematical concepts. But I'd like more clarity on what kinds of patterns interest mathematicians, what features of patterns they like to study, and how. I'm pretty sure, for example, they wouldn't publish papers on the emotional effects of color choices in flower-themed wallpaper patterns. Mathematical patterns seem to be related to logic. For now I'll define math as doing mathematical things with mathematical objects, and as I learn I'll refine my definition. As possibly part of that definition, I'll also keep an eye out for how math's concepts can be characterized as patterns. But for all that, math does seem preoccupied with numbers. No matter what area I'm glancing at, there's something numeric involved. As I've done my initial thinking about math, I've come up with a speculation I'd like to investigate as I learn, that math is concerned with quantity and the concepts that branch out from it in particular ways. I'll call it the Quantity Relatedness Conjecture (QRC). == Related blog posts == * [http://www.thinkulum.net/blog/category/topics/math-relearning/ Category: Math relearning] == Footnotes == <references/> [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Developing]] 4bef27117e5d31b428a13b4bd507c72cc6a56cf2 183 180 2015-10-21T17:06:30Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the "Achieve the Core" label to the Progressions link. wikitext text/x-wiki == Introduction == This project is an exploration of mathematics from the perspective of someone who has learned some, forgotten most, and wants to learn more. I'm starting from the most basic concepts of pre-algebra, and I'm hoping to work through the Common Core State Standards and then to cover some advanced areas that are related to my other projects. I won't set out a more detailed roadmap until I get closer to those waypoints. Common Core is controversial, and I probably won't comment on the debate, at least not for a while. I'm mainly interested in Common Core as an organizational scheme for an incremental approach to learning conceptual math. And I am fully on board with conceptual math, at least for adult learners. My major assumption in this project is that mathematical concepts relate to each other and to the world, and that knowing these relationships can help us understand, remember, and use these concepts. It can also help us appreciate them as objects of beauty, which can itself help us remember them. I'm not a mathematician, and I'm not writing a textbook, even though I call the sections chapters. These are just my notes and reflections on aspects of math that I think will help me understand it. I'm hoping they'll help other people as well or that they'll at least be interesting. I'll also link to other resources that seem helpful. Think of this project as a commentary on other people's math education materials. == Resources == What are these math education materials? Here are the main online sources I'm using. My main print sources are in [[Math_Relearning/References|References]], marked in bold. * [http://www.corestandards.org/Math/ Common Core Mathematics Standards] - The standards themselves. They're organized by grade level for K-8, then by conceptual category in high school. The standards within each grade are organized by domain. * [http://achievethecore.org/page/254/progressions-documents-for-the-common-core-state-standards-for-mathematics-detail-pg Progressions - Achieve the Core] - These trace the development of each domain and conceptual category across the grade levels. I'm reading them to get an overview and to connect ideas that will be somewhat separated when I go through them by grade. * [http://www.engageny.org/common-core-curriculum EngageNY Common Core Curriculum] - A complete P-12 curriculum under a Creative Commons license, which means all the content is free. I expect this to be my main source through precalculus. It's thousands of pages though, so I'll only be reading parts of it. I don't know if I'll get around to using these, but here are some other resources that might help you in a project like this one. * [http://community.ksde.org/Default.aspx?tabid=5646 KATM Flip Books] - For teachers, a fairly detailed summary of the instruction for each grade level. * [http://www.cgcs.org/page/244 Parent Roadmaps to the Common Core Standards: Mathematics - Council of the Great City Schools] - For parents, another summary of each grade's instruction, less detailed. * [https://homeworkhelpdesk.org/ The Homework Help Desk] - Explanations of the more confusing parts of Common Core's math methods. * [https://ccssmath.org/ CCSS Math] - Links to instructional videos for each standard. It collects the videos from several sources. * [http://www.commoncoreconversation.com/math-resources.html Math Resources - Common Core Conversation] - Links to a lot of math websites. == What is mathematics? == Because of the different ways we use the term, there's a certain ambiguity in the question of what mathematics is. Am I asking about the academic activity of discovering mathematical concepts? the body of mathematical knowledge we've amassed? the abstract, timeless mathematical realities our knowledge is describing? the mathematical language we use to represent and communicate about those realities? I think to a certain degree the ambiguity can hang there without causing much trouble, but primarily I mean the activity of mathematical discovery. Like many people, I started out thinking of math as the study of numbers and the formulas for working with them. But there was one wrinkle in this assumption--geometry. Why was geometry a part of math? Shapes aren't numbers. Did somebody make a mistake? Poking around on Wikipedia made me aware that math is about much more than number. Numbers are the arithmetic, number theory, and maybe algebra part of math, and they are only one type of mathematical object. Math also covers space (geometry), change (calculus), and structure, whatever that is.<ref>''Wikipedia'', s.v. “Mathematics,” last modified July 14, 2014, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mathematics; ''Wikipedia'', s.v. “Areas of mathematics,” last modified June 18, 2014, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Areas_of_mathematics</ref> Expanding the scope of my understanding of math is good, but simply listing its concerns doesn't entirely help me. I look for coherence in my definitions, so I want to know what it is these areas have in common that draws mathematicians' interest and what distinguishes them from topics outside mathematics. Since space is involved, I'm especially unclear about the boundary between math and physics. These are issues I'll address as I learn. Category theory seems like a promising avenue for exploring the idea of mathematical objects, so I'm hoping to explore that area at some point.<ref>''Wikipedia'', s.v. “Mathematical object,” last modified March 14, 2014, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mathematical_object</ref> Mathematicians sometimes characterize their field as the science of patterns. I'm not sure what to make of that yet, but it also sounds promising. I can see mathematicians studying patterns and looking for them, and I can imagine there are non-obvious patterns lying behind other mathematical concepts. But I'd like more clarity on what kinds of patterns interest mathematicians, what features of patterns they like to study, and how. I'm pretty sure, for example, they wouldn't publish papers on the emotional effects of color choices in flower-themed wallpaper patterns. Mathematical patterns seem to be related to logic. For now I'll define math as doing mathematical things with mathematical objects, and as I learn I'll refine my definition. As possibly part of that definition, I'll also keep an eye out for how math's concepts can be characterized as patterns. But for all that, math does seem preoccupied with numbers. No matter what area I'm glancing at, there's something numeric involved. As I've done my initial thinking about math, I've come up with a speculation I'd like to investigate as I learn, that math is concerned with quantity and the concepts that branch out from it in particular ways. I'll call it the Quantity Relatedness Conjecture (QRC). == Related blog posts == * [http://www.thinkulum.net/blog/category/topics/math-relearning/ Category: Math relearning] == Footnotes == <references/> [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Developing]] 0e53b817061dee2e9ecb4344f200e06c56366ea7 184 183 2015-10-21T18:11:58Z Andy Culbertson 1 Updated the description of CSSS Math. wikitext text/x-wiki == Introduction == This project is an exploration of mathematics from the perspective of someone who has learned some, forgotten most, and wants to learn more. I'm starting from the most basic concepts of pre-algebra, and I'm hoping to work through the Common Core State Standards and then to cover some advanced areas that are related to my other projects. I won't set out a more detailed roadmap until I get closer to those waypoints. Common Core is controversial, and I probably won't comment on the debate, at least not for a while. I'm mainly interested in Common Core as an organizational scheme for an incremental approach to learning conceptual math. And I am fully on board with conceptual math, at least for adult learners. My major assumption in this project is that mathematical concepts relate to each other and to the world, and that knowing these relationships can help us understand, remember, and use these concepts. It can also help us appreciate them as objects of beauty, which can itself help us remember them. I'm not a mathematician, and I'm not writing a textbook, even though I call the sections chapters. These are just my notes and reflections on aspects of math that I think will help me understand it. I'm hoping they'll help other people as well or that they'll at least be interesting. I'll also link to other resources that seem helpful. Think of this project as a commentary on other people's math education materials. == Resources == What are these math education materials? Here are the main online sources I'm using. My main print sources are in [[Math_Relearning/References|References]], marked in bold. * [http://www.corestandards.org/Math/ Common Core Mathematics Standards] - The standards themselves. They're organized by grade level for K-8, then by conceptual category in high school. The standards within each grade are organized by domain. * [http://achievethecore.org/page/254/progressions-documents-for-the-common-core-state-standards-for-mathematics-detail-pg Progressions - Achieve the Core] - These trace the development of each domain and conceptual category across the grade levels. I'm reading them to get an overview and to connect ideas that will be somewhat separated when I go through them by grade. * [http://www.engageny.org/common-core-curriculum EngageNY Common Core Curriculum] - A complete P-12 curriculum under a Creative Commons license, which means all the content is free. I expect this to be my main source through precalculus. It's thousands of pages though, so I'll only be reading parts of it. I don't know if I'll get around to using these, but here are some other resources that might help you in a project like this one. * [http://community.ksde.org/Default.aspx?tabid=5646 KATM Flip Books] - For teachers, a fairly detailed summary of the instruction for each grade level. * [http://www.cgcs.org/page/244 Parent Roadmaps to the Common Core Standards: Mathematics - Council of the Great City Schools] - For parents, another summary of each grade's instruction, less detailed. * [https://homeworkhelpdesk.org/ The Homework Help Desk] - Explanations of the more confusing parts of Common Core's math methods. * [https://ccssmath.org/ CCSS Math] - Links to instructional videos, activities, and lesson plans for each standard. It collects these resources from several sources. * [http://www.commoncoreconversation.com/math-resources.html Math Resources - Common Core Conversation] - Links to a lot of math websites. == What is mathematics? == Because of the different ways we use the term, there's a certain ambiguity in the question of what mathematics is. Am I asking about the academic activity of discovering mathematical concepts? the body of mathematical knowledge we've amassed? the abstract, timeless mathematical realities our knowledge is describing? the mathematical language we use to represent and communicate about those realities? I think to a certain degree the ambiguity can hang there without causing much trouble, but primarily I mean the activity of mathematical discovery. Like many people, I started out thinking of math as the study of numbers and the formulas for working with them. But there was one wrinkle in this assumption--geometry. Why was geometry a part of math? Shapes aren't numbers. Did somebody make a mistake? Poking around on Wikipedia made me aware that math is about much more than number. Numbers are the arithmetic, number theory, and maybe algebra part of math, and they are only one type of mathematical object. Math also covers space (geometry), change (calculus), and structure, whatever that is.<ref>''Wikipedia'', s.v. “Mathematics,” last modified July 14, 2014, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mathematics; ''Wikipedia'', s.v. “Areas of mathematics,” last modified June 18, 2014, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Areas_of_mathematics</ref> Expanding the scope of my understanding of math is good, but simply listing its concerns doesn't entirely help me. I look for coherence in my definitions, so I want to know what it is these areas have in common that draws mathematicians' interest and what distinguishes them from topics outside mathematics. Since space is involved, I'm especially unclear about the boundary between math and physics. These are issues I'll address as I learn. Category theory seems like a promising avenue for exploring the idea of mathematical objects, so I'm hoping to explore that area at some point.<ref>''Wikipedia'', s.v. “Mathematical object,” last modified March 14, 2014, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mathematical_object</ref> Mathematicians sometimes characterize their field as the science of patterns. I'm not sure what to make of that yet, but it also sounds promising. I can see mathematicians studying patterns and looking for them, and I can imagine there are non-obvious patterns lying behind other mathematical concepts. But I'd like more clarity on what kinds of patterns interest mathematicians, what features of patterns they like to study, and how. I'm pretty sure, for example, they wouldn't publish papers on the emotional effects of color choices in flower-themed wallpaper patterns. Mathematical patterns seem to be related to logic. For now I'll define math as doing mathematical things with mathematical objects, and as I learn I'll refine my definition. As possibly part of that definition, I'll also keep an eye out for how math's concepts can be characterized as patterns. But for all that, math does seem preoccupied with numbers. No matter what area I'm glancing at, there's something numeric involved. As I've done my initial thinking about math, I've come up with a speculation I'd like to investigate as I learn, that math is concerned with quantity and the concepts that branch out from it in particular ways. I'll call it the Quantity Relatedness Conjecture (QRC). == Related blog posts == * [http://www.thinkulum.net/blog/category/topics/math-relearning/ Category: Math relearning] == Footnotes == <references/> [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Developing]] 26276156b221037dd91d2f0bb1ec3993a1ce891d 0 66 171 2015-08-11T04:15:13Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the article. wikitext text/x-wiki This chapter covers the basic concepts, skills, and concerns that apply across most of the math I'll learn. I'll introduce them here and try to highlight them where they're especially relevant throughout the rest of the project. In his book ''[http://www.worldcat.org/title/how-humans-learn-to-think-mathematically-exploring-the-three-worlds-of-mathematics/oclc/838192705 How Humans Learn to Think Mathematically]'' David Tall has incorporated most of these aspects of math into a framework for the development of mathematical thinking, which will probably guide a lot of my learning. I'll talk about his framework after looking at each factor. == Problem solving == Since I see math as primarily a way of dealing with the world, I'll start with problem solving. Problem solving is finding a way to change a situation from an undesired state to a desired one when the changes needed aren't obvious at first.<ref>Billstein 2007, 2</ref><ref>Tall 2013, 176</ref> Problem solving serves a few purposes. The immediate benefit in everyday situations is that it makes a problem go away. But it also serves an educational purpose. It expands your understanding of the kinds of problems that can be solved and the kinds of solutions that are available. That is, it reveals new concepts and relationships in the problem's domain, in this case math. Thus it lets you create new knowledge structures, which is a key part of developing one's mathematical thinking. Ideally, studying math teaches you problem solving skills. This is because mathematical activity tends to be goal oriented and because many new math concepts are hard to grasp and apply at first, so you get regular practice at thinking creatively to expand your understanding and to achieve objectives. Then you get better at both solving familiar problems and figuring out how to solve new ones. Problem solving can also be a motivational learning tool. People like being challenged, if success feels achievable. One effective way of arranging challenges for learning is an inductive chain. Starting with simple problems, each problem to be solved teaches a concept, and each following problem uses the new concept to teach another one.<ref>Somers 2011</ref> Practically every math book I find that addresses problem solving mentions George Polya's ''[http://www.worldcat.org/title/how-to-solve-it-a-new-aspect-of-mathematical-method/oclc/523312 How to Solve It]'', a good starting point for studying problem solving, both in math and in general. == Patterns == If mathematics is the science of patterns, what is a pattern? How would you know one if you saw it? If you wanted to find one, what would you look for? A good definition is harder to find than I expected, but here's one that summarizes several points I've seen made: "A Pattern constitutes a set of numbers or objects in which all the members are related with each other by a specific rule."<ref>Krypton Inc n.d.</ref> We could also characterize a pattern as a repetition with differences. As a simple example, counting from 1 to 10 gives a pattern of whole numbers that increase by 1 each time. One procedure for recognizing a pattern might be to look for a collection of diverse items that all have something in common or that differ from each other in a repeating way.<ref>Hatfield 2007, 124-125</ref><ref>Billstein 2007, 22-23</ref> The recognition of patterns is one of the three shared human capacities that David Tall credits for our ability to develop mathematical thinking, the other two being repetition and language.<ref>Tall 2013, 21</ref> See the final section for more on those. Finding patterns is part of problem solving. If you can find the rules underlying a situation, you can often use them to learn enough about it to resolve its difficulties. == Logic == It seems logic isn't much easier to define than math,<ref>Hofweber 2011</ref> but I'll take a stab at it: Logic is the study of the rules governing implication and necessity. Roughly speaking, it deals with the truth-related relationships between statements, and those statements can be about anything. In this case, we're interested in mathematical statements. As I said in the [[Math_Relearning/Introduction|introduction]], math seems to be about the logical properties of mathematical objects such as numbers. In Tall's terminology, math is composed of crystalline concepts. A crystalline concept is a "thinkable concept that has a necessary structure as a consequence of its context." The mathematician describes, defines, and proves the properties of these concepts and their structures.<ref>Tall 2013, 27</ref> In math one major way logic is used is in proving and disproving patterns. A mathematician finds what they think is a pattern and states it as a conjecture. Then they or others either find counterexamples to disprove it or come up with a proof for it by chaining true statements together logically, ending with the conjecture they're proving.<ref>Billstein 2007, 23-24</ref> == Algorithms == An algorithm is a precise, detailed procedure for achieving a result. Math operations are carried out by algorithms. Most people are familiar with the procedure for subtracting multi-digit numbers, which involves things like stacking them on top of each other, subtracting from right to left, and borrowing. People often skip carrying out the algorithms by using a calculator, but algorithms are still in play because calculators and other computers use them for every single operation. Often there's more than one algorithm that can accomplish an operation. The subtraction algorithm I mentioned earlier is the standard one for subtraction. Schools have begun teaching children alternate algorithms for the arithmetic operations, and it has some parents frustrated and alarmed. But the new algorithms do make sense. They even reflect the way adults actually do arithmetic.<ref>Mehta 2014</ref> For the purposes of this project, looking at multiple algorithms will help us think about the nature of the operations, and understanding that nature will let us be more flexible in solving problems that involve those operations. We can distinguish between algorithms and relations. An algorithm is a series of actions you take on some data that takes up time and proceeds in a more-or-less causal fashion. If you add 3 to 2, you get 5 at the end. But 2 + 3 = 5 also represents a timeless relationship between the numbers that exists apart from anything you do with them. One way to visualize the relationship is that on a number line, 5 is three whole numbers to the right of 2. From this perspective, when you perform the addition of 3 to 2, you're not creating the number 5 or changing a 2 to a 5. You're simply moving your attention from one number to another in their static places on the number line. We'll always need algorithms. But the advantages of thinking relationally are that it's simpler and more flexible. It's similar to telling someone how to get to a building. You can give them a route, or you can hand them a map and an address, or at least a pair of cross streets. A route saves them the work of finding their own route, but it might not fit their preferences (such as avoiding toll roads) or even their starting point. If they have a map, they can tailor their route to their circumstances. They can even change it mid-journey if they run across obstacles. Another advantage of thinking relationally is that if you understand the algorithms by knowing the underlying concepts, you can remember the algorithms more easily and avoid making mistakes. Edsger Dijkstra has more to say on relations vs. algorithms, which he speaks of in terms of equivalence and implication, respectively.<ref>Dijkstra 1985</ref><ref>Dijkstra 1986</ref> == Abstraction == An abstraction is an idealized generalization of some state of affairs. It embodies certain common attributes of the state and not other attributes that vary from one circumstance to another. This process wraps up a complex concept or procedure inside a simpler one that represents it and hides its details and variations. For example, the male and female restroom icons are abstracted representations of men and women. For mathematical examples, multiplication is an abstraction of repeated addition, and exponentiation is an abstraction of repeated multiplication. Abstraction is one place patterns show up in math. The commonalities in the relationships between the elements of the pattern get abstracted into a rule that describes the pattern. Abstraction plays a major role in Tall's model, where it also goes by the phrase compression of knowledge. He divides it into three tracks: structural abstraction for working with objects, operational abstraction for actions, and formal abstraction for axioms.<ref>Tall 2013, 10, 16</ref> I'll return to these tracks in the final section. == Language == The abstractness of math and its technical use of symbols can obscure one of its important features. Math is expressed through a language, or at least a register, which is a subset of a language meant to fulfill a certain function. The language of math has both written and spoken forms. It has a vocabulary (number names, shape names, operators, etc.), a syntax, and a set of symbols. And like any language, it's used to communicate.<ref>Pimm 1987, xiii, 7-20, 75</ref> In Tall's model, language is one of the shared human capacities that enables mathematical thinking. It allows us to compress experiences and procedures into concepts and specify their properties.<ref>Tall 2013, 12, 21, 24</ref> In other words, language aids abstraction. People sometimes say that math ''is'' a language, but I like to take a broad view of math and say that it ''has'' a language, though it is more than that language. We can distinguish between the words of a language and the objects or concepts the language is referring to. So the numeral 1 is a word, and the corresponding concept is the idea of one itself. This is similar to the relation-algorithm distinction I covered earlier. Relations and concepts both refer to the mathematical patterns that exist on their own, and algorithms and words refer to methods humans use to deal with those realities. The distinction is important to keep in mind because in the end, the word we pick to represent a concept is arbitrary, which is why there are so many languages. Math symbols and the ways we string them together into formulas had to be invented. We should always leave the door open to finding new ways to think about and represent the underlying mathematical concepts when the old ways become less helpful.<ref>Zheng 2015</ref> One part of speech that math makes special use of is a hybrid of verb and noun that Tall calls a procept. For example, the expression 2 + 3 acts as both an instruction to add 3 to 2 (a verb) and an object on its own that can be manipulated and reasoned about (a noun). The addends can be flipped to create the equivalent expression 3 + 2, for instance. Or 2 + 3 can be viewed as a stand-in for the result of the calculation. There are other contexts in which people treat verbs and even whole clauses as nouns, but it's an especially prominent feature of the mathematical language. And since procepts make it possible to reason about and to build conceptually on every mathematical action we perform, they're an especially important part of developing mathematical thinking.<ref>Tall 2013, 12-14</ref> The linguistic issues surrounding math extend beyond the symbols we use to represent its concepts and operations. We use language to talk about math for several purposes with both ourselves and other people. We use it to clarify math concepts or problems in our own minds, to teach concepts to others, to make mathematical requests ("Measure this length," for example), and so on. All these ways of encoding and communicating about math have to be learned, and mathematical language is both similar enough to and different enough from everyday ways of speaking and thinking that in the beginning learners will be confused. So it's important to pay careful attention to language while learning and teaching the subject. David Pimm explores all these linguistic issues in his books ''[http://www.worldcat.org/title/speaking-mathematically-communication-in-mathematics-classrooms/oclc/14273261 Speaking Mathematically]'' and ''[http://www.worldcat.org/title/symbols-and-meanings-in-school-mathematics/oclc/31515971 Symbols and Meanings in School Mathematics]''. == Sets == As they're learning the basic concepts of math, children work with small collections of physical objects. These unsuspecting children are actually learning the basic properties of and operations on sets. Math has an area that defines these properties and operations known as set theory, and in fact, mathematicians have apparently determined that they can form a logical foundation for most of mathematics partly on a particular version of set theory.<ref>''Wikipedia'', s.v. "Hilbert's Program," last modified January 3, 2014, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hilbert's_program</ref> It'll be a while before I know enough to understand this, so here I'll just mention it. But we can make use of the main idea, that set theory has something to say about the fundamental concepts of math. It's another potentially helpful angle from which to view math concepts. As I see it the main advantage of drawing from set theory at this point is that it directly addresses some of the ways we begin to learn about math and lets us be precise about them. So even though we're starting our math self-re-education with numbers, I'm also going to bring in a different mathematical object, the set. == How mathematical thinking develops == David Tall organizes his theory of math education around three mathematical worlds, several mechanisms of thought, and three stages of development. === Worlds of mathematics === Mathematics occupies three realms: objects, actions, and axioms.<ref>Tall 2013, 6-8</ref> Thinking in each realm involves different mental capacities and different methods of development. The world of objects deals primarily with space and shapes. We interact with it through processes of mental imagery based on experiences with physical objects, processes that Tall calls conceptual embodiment.<ref>Tall 2013, 12</ref> We grow our understanding of objects through our sensory capacity for recognition, which allows us to see patterns, similarities, and differences. We use our capacity for language to categorize objects based on these observations.<ref>Tall 2013, 21</ref> Structural abstraction, this grouping of concepts through categorization, is one way we form new concepts within the world of objects.<ref>Tall 2013, 10, 15</ref> The first stage of structural abstraction is empirical abstraction, in which children play with objects to learn their properties. The second stage is Platonic abstraction, in which physical objects become idealized mental objects, such as sizeless points and widthless lines.<ref>Tall 2013, 9</ref> Tall calls the methods of development in the world of objects conceptual embodiment.<ref>Tall 2013, 16</ref> The world of actions starts with arithmetic and algebra. We interact with it by mentally moving the positions of symbols, a process Tall calls functional embodiment.<ref>Tall 2013, 11</ref> We grow our understanding in this realm through our motor capacity for repetition, which allows us to practice action sequences until we can perform them unconsciously. Language enables us to encapsulate these processes.<ref>Tall 2013, 21</ref> Grouping actions through encapsulation is called operational abstraction. The first stage in this track is pseudo-empirical abstraction, in which children learn the properties of actions on objects. For example, the operation of counting leads to the concept of number. The operation of sharing leads to the concept of fraction. The second stage is reflective abstraction, in which actions become objects to be reasoned about, or procepts. At this level, the action of addition becomes the concept of sum, and repeated addition becomes the concept of product.<ref>Tall 2013, 9-10</ref> Tall calls the methods of development in the world of actions operational symbolism.<ref>Tall 2013, 16-17</ref> The world of axioms is the subject of formal mathematics at the university level and deals largely with sets. We grow our understanding of axiomatic math through our capacity for language, which allows us to define thinkable concepts that we assemble into increasingly sophisticated knowledge structures.<ref>Tall 2013, 21</ref> This labeling and defining of concepts is also how language compresses knowledge. Language then allows us to deduce the properties of these concepts through logical proofs, the process of formal abstraction.<ref>Tall 2013, 16</ref> Tall calls the methods of development in the world of axioms axiomatic formalism.<ref>Tall 2013, 17</ref> You can imagine these worlds of mathematical development as three circles in a Venn diagram that overlap in four areas. Embodied symbolism is the area leading from conceptual embodiment to operational symbolism. Embodied formalism is concerned with Euclidean proof. Symbolic formalism is the area of algebraic proof. And the area occupied by all three worlds covers proofs that combine embodiment and symbolism.<ref>Tall 2013, 18-19</ref> I'll call each of these seven areas a region, the four areas of overlap plus the three that purely concern a particular world. === Mechanisms of thought === In addition to all the processes mentioned above, Tall discusses a couple more that act across all three worlds. The first is met-befores, a play on metaphor. These are concepts the learner has encountered earlier that they use to understand a new concept. Met-befores can be either supportive or problematic for understanding the new concept. When a learner proposes a solution or explanation, met-befores enable the teacher to ask the question, "What have you met before that makes you think that?"<ref>Tall 2013, 22-23</ref> The second mechanism is blending. The mind creates new knowledge structures and thinkable concepts by compressing knowledge through abstraction, by connecting the thinkable concepts into knowledge structures, and by blending earlier knowledge structures into new ones. Blending involves linking different modes of thought and experience together, such as vision, touch, and abstract concepts. For example, real numbers are a blend of the physical number line (embodiment), the idea of decimal numbers (symbolism), and a particular set definition (formalism).<ref>Tall 2013, 24-25</ref> === Stages of development === Mathematical reasoning and proof develop in three stages, each of which involves multiple worlds. The first stage is practical mathematics, which explores geometry using physical objects and explores arithmetic using calculation. The second is theoretical mathematics, which covers Euclidean and algebraic proofs. The third is formal mathematics, which involves proving theorems from set-theoretic axioms.<ref>Tall 2013, 18-20</ref> Putting all the stages, capacities, and processes together, we arrive at an outline that looks like this:<ref>Tall 2013, 17, 19</ref> * Stage: practical mathematics ** Region: embodiment *** Concepts: space and shape *** Capacity: recognition (perception) *** Method: conceptual embodiment *** Embodiment: conceptual *** Abstraction: empirical ** Region: embodied symbolism *** Capacity: repetition (action) ** Region: symbolism *** Concepts: number, arithmetic, generalized arithmetic *** Method: operational symbolism *** Embodiment: functional *** Abstraction: pseudo-empirical * Stage: theoretical mathematics ** Region: embodied formalism *** Abstraction: Platonic ** Region: symbolic formalism *** Concepts: algebra, algebraic proof *** Abstraction: reflective ** Region: proof combining embodiment and symbolism * Stage: formal mathematics ** Region: formalism *** Method: axiomatic formalism *** Abstraction: formal Tall summarizes, "The whole development of mathematical thinking is presented as a combination of compression and blending of knowledge structures to produce crystalline concepts that can lead to imaginative new ways of thinking mathematically in new contexts."<ref>Tall 2013, 28</ref> == Open questions == * What gave us the idea that numbers are ruled by logic? * What is the relationship between numbers and sets? == Footnotes == <references/> [[Category:Math Relearning]] c269a024141fe636eb09cd93c524cf21d81b8118 179 171 2015-09-29T01:47:41Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the Complete category. Fixed some footnotes. wikitext text/x-wiki This chapter covers the basic concepts, skills, and concerns that apply across most of the math I'll learn. I'll introduce them here and try to highlight them where they're especially relevant throughout the rest of the project. In his book ''[http://www.worldcat.org/title/how-humans-learn-to-think-mathematically-exploring-the-three-worlds-of-mathematics/oclc/838192705 How Humans Learn to Think Mathematically]'' David Tall has incorporated most of these aspects of math into a framework for the development of mathematical thinking, which will probably guide a lot of my learning. I'll talk about his framework after looking at each factor. == Problem solving == Since I see math as primarily a way of dealing with the world, I'll start with problem solving. Problem solving is finding a way to change a situation from an undesired state to a desired one when the changes needed aren't obvious at first.<ref>Billstein et al. 2007, 2</ref><ref>Tall 2013, 176</ref> Problem solving serves a few purposes. The immediate benefit in everyday situations is that it makes a problem go away. But it also serves an educational purpose. It expands your understanding of the kinds of problems that can be solved and the kinds of solutions that are available. That is, it reveals new concepts and relationships in the problem's domain, in this case math. Thus it lets you create new knowledge structures, which is a key part of developing one's mathematical thinking. Ideally, studying math teaches you problem solving skills. This is because mathematical activity tends to be goal oriented and because many new math concepts are hard to grasp and apply at first, so you get regular practice at thinking creatively to expand your understanding and to achieve objectives. Then you get better at both solving familiar problems and figuring out how to solve new ones. Problem solving can also be a motivational learning tool. People like being challenged, if success feels achievable. One effective way of arranging challenges for learning is an inductive chain. Starting with simple problems, each problem to be solved teaches a concept, and each following problem uses the new concept to teach another one.<ref>Somers 2011</ref> Practically every math book I find that addresses problem solving mentions George Polya's ''[http://www.worldcat.org/title/how-to-solve-it-a-new-aspect-of-mathematical-method/oclc/523312 How to Solve It]'', a good starting point for studying problem solving, both in math and in general. == Patterns == If mathematics is the science of patterns, what is a pattern? How would you know one if you saw it? If you wanted to find one, what would you look for? A good definition is harder to find than I expected, but here's one that summarizes several points I've seen made: "A Pattern constitutes a set of numbers or objects in which all the members are related with each other by a specific rule."<ref>Krypton Inc n.d.</ref> We could also characterize a pattern as a repetition with differences. As a simple example, counting from 1 to 10 gives a pattern of whole numbers that increase by 1 each time. One procedure for recognizing a pattern might be to look for a collection of diverse items that all have something in common or that differ from each other in a repeating way.<ref>Hatfield et al. 2008, 124-125</ref><ref>Billstein et al. 2007, 22-23</ref> The recognition of patterns is one of the three shared human capacities that David Tall credits for our ability to develop mathematical thinking, the other two being repetition and language.<ref>Tall 2013, 21</ref> See the final section for more on those. Finding patterns is part of problem solving. If you can find the rules underlying a situation, you can often use them to learn enough about it to resolve its difficulties. == Logic == It seems logic isn't much easier to define than math,<ref>Hofweber 2011</ref> but I'll take a stab at it: Logic is the study of the rules governing implication and necessity. Roughly speaking, it deals with the truth-related relationships between statements, and those statements can be about anything. In this case, we're interested in mathematical statements. As I said in the [[Math_Relearning/Introduction|introduction]], math seems to be about the logical properties of mathematical objects such as numbers. In Tall's terminology, math is composed of crystalline concepts. A crystalline concept is a "thinkable concept that has a necessary structure as a consequence of its context." The mathematician describes, defines, and proves the properties of these concepts and their structures.<ref>Tall 2013, 27</ref> In math one major way logic is used is in proving and disproving patterns. A mathematician finds what they think is a pattern and states it as a conjecture. Then they or others either find counterexamples to disprove it or come up with a proof for it by chaining true statements together logically, ending with the conjecture they're proving.<ref>Billstein et al. 2007, 23-24</ref> == Algorithms == An algorithm is a precise, detailed procedure for achieving a result. Math operations are carried out by algorithms. Most people are familiar with the procedure for subtracting multi-digit numbers, which involves things like stacking them on top of each other, subtracting from right to left, and borrowing. People often skip carrying out the algorithms by using a calculator, but algorithms are still in play because calculators and other computers use them for every single operation. Often there's more than one algorithm that can accomplish an operation. The subtraction algorithm I mentioned earlier is the standard one for subtraction. Schools have begun teaching children alternate algorithms for the arithmetic operations, and it has some parents frustrated and alarmed. But the new algorithms do make sense. They even reflect the way adults actually do arithmetic.<ref>Mehta 2014</ref> For the purposes of this project, looking at multiple algorithms will help us think about the nature of the operations, and understanding that nature will let us be more flexible in solving problems that involve those operations. We can distinguish between algorithms and relations. An algorithm is a series of actions you take on some data that takes up time and proceeds in a more-or-less causal fashion. If you add 3 to 2, you get 5 at the end. But 2 + 3 = 5 also represents a timeless relationship between the numbers that exists apart from anything you do with them. One way to visualize the relationship is that on a number line, 5 is three whole numbers to the right of 2. From this perspective, when you perform the addition of 3 to 2, you're not creating the number 5 or changing a 2 to a 5. You're simply moving your attention from one number to another in their static places on the number line. We'll always need algorithms. But the advantages of thinking relationally are that it's simpler and more flexible. It's similar to telling someone how to get to a building. You can give them a route, or you can hand them a map and an address, or at least a pair of cross streets. A route saves them the work of finding their own route, but it might not fit their preferences (such as avoiding toll roads) or even their starting point. If they have a map, they can tailor their route to their circumstances. They can even change it mid-journey if they run across obstacles. Another advantage of thinking relationally is that if you understand the algorithms by knowing the underlying concepts, you can remember the algorithms more easily and avoid making mistakes. Edsger Dijkstra has more to say on relations vs. algorithms, which he speaks of in terms of equivalence and implication, respectively.<ref>Dijkstra 1985</ref><ref>Dijkstra 1986</ref> == Abstraction == An abstraction is an idealized generalization of some state of affairs. It embodies certain common attributes of the state and not other attributes that vary from one circumstance to another. This process wraps up a complex concept or procedure inside a simpler one that represents it and hides its details and variations. For example, the male and female restroom icons are abstracted representations of men and women. For mathematical examples, multiplication is an abstraction of repeated addition, and exponentiation is an abstraction of repeated multiplication. Abstraction is one place patterns show up in math. The commonalities in the relationships between the elements of the pattern get abstracted into a rule that describes the pattern. Abstraction plays a major role in Tall's model, where it also goes by the phrase compression of knowledge. He divides it into three tracks: structural abstraction for working with objects, operational abstraction for actions, and formal abstraction for axioms.<ref>Tall 2013, 10, 16</ref> I'll return to these tracks in the final section. == Language == The abstractness of math and its technical use of symbols can obscure one of its important features. Math is expressed through a language, or at least a register, which is a subset of a language meant to fulfill a certain function. The language of math has both written and spoken forms. It has a vocabulary (number names, shape names, operators, etc.), a syntax, and a set of symbols. And like any language, it's used to communicate.<ref>Pimm 1987, xiii, 7-20, 75</ref> In Tall's model, language is one of the shared human capacities that enables mathematical thinking. It allows us to compress experiences and procedures into concepts and specify their properties.<ref>Tall 2013, 12, 21, 24</ref> In other words, language aids abstraction. People sometimes say that math ''is'' a language, but I like to take a broad view of math and say that it ''has'' a language, though it is more than that language. We can distinguish between the words of a language and the objects or concepts the language is referring to. So the numeral 1 is a word, and the corresponding concept is the idea of one itself. This is similar to the relation-algorithm distinction I covered earlier. Relations and concepts both refer to the mathematical patterns that exist on their own, and algorithms and words refer to methods humans use to deal with those realities. The distinction is important to keep in mind because in the end, the word we pick to represent a concept is arbitrary, which is why there are so many languages. Math symbols and the ways we string them together into formulas had to be invented. We should always leave the door open to finding new ways to think about and represent the underlying mathematical concepts when the old ways become less helpful.<ref>Zheng 2015</ref> One part of speech that math makes special use of is a hybrid of verb and noun that Tall calls a procept. For example, the expression 2 + 3 acts as both an instruction to add 3 to 2 (a verb) and an object on its own that can be manipulated and reasoned about (a noun). The addends can be flipped to create the equivalent expression 3 + 2, for instance. Or 2 + 3 can be viewed as a stand-in for the result of the calculation. There are other contexts in which people treat verbs and even whole clauses as nouns, but it's an especially prominent feature of the mathematical language. And since procepts make it possible to reason about and to build conceptually on every mathematical action we perform, they're an especially important part of developing mathematical thinking.<ref>Tall 2013, 12-14</ref> The linguistic issues surrounding math extend beyond the symbols we use to represent its concepts and operations. We use language to talk about math for several purposes with both ourselves and other people. We use it to clarify math concepts or problems in our own minds, to teach concepts to others, to make mathematical requests ("Measure this length," for example), and so on. All these ways of encoding and communicating about math have to be learned, and mathematical language is both similar enough to and different enough from everyday ways of speaking and thinking that in the beginning learners will be confused. So it's important to pay careful attention to language while learning and teaching the subject. David Pimm explores all these linguistic issues in his books ''[http://www.worldcat.org/title/speaking-mathematically-communication-in-mathematics-classrooms/oclc/14273261 Speaking Mathematically]'' and ''[http://www.worldcat.org/title/symbols-and-meanings-in-school-mathematics/oclc/31515971 Symbols and Meanings in School Mathematics]''. == Sets == As they're learning the basic concepts of math, children work with small collections of physical objects. These unsuspecting children are actually learning the basic properties of and operations on sets. Math has an area that defines these properties and operations known as set theory, and in fact, mathematicians have apparently determined that they can form a logical foundation for most of mathematics partly on a particular version of set theory.<ref>''Wikipedia'', s.v. "Hilbert's Program," last modified January 3, 2014, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hilbert's_program</ref> It'll be a while before I know enough to understand this, so here I'll just mention it. But we can make use of the main idea, that set theory has something to say about the fundamental concepts of math. It's another potentially helpful angle from which to view math concepts. As I see it the main advantage of drawing from set theory at this point is that it directly addresses some of the ways we begin to learn about math and lets us be precise about them. So even though we're starting our math self-re-education with numbers, I'm also going to bring in a different mathematical object, the set. == How mathematical thinking develops == David Tall organizes his theory of math education around three mathematical worlds, several mechanisms of thought, and three stages of development. === Worlds of mathematics === Mathematics occupies three realms: objects, actions, and axioms.<ref>Tall 2013, 6-8</ref> Thinking in each realm involves different mental capacities and different methods of development. The world of objects deals primarily with space and shapes. We interact with it through processes of mental imagery based on experiences with physical objects, processes that Tall calls conceptual embodiment.<ref>Tall 2013, 12</ref> We grow our understanding of objects through our sensory capacity for recognition, which allows us to see patterns, similarities, and differences. We use our capacity for language to categorize objects based on these observations.<ref>Tall 2013, 21</ref> Structural abstraction, this grouping of concepts through categorization, is one way we form new concepts within the world of objects.<ref>Tall 2013, 10, 15</ref> The first stage of structural abstraction is empirical abstraction, in which children play with objects to learn their properties. The second stage is Platonic abstraction, in which physical objects become idealized mental objects, such as sizeless points and widthless lines.<ref>Tall 2013, 9</ref> Tall calls the methods of development in the world of objects conceptual embodiment.<ref>Tall 2013, 16</ref> The world of actions starts with arithmetic and algebra. We interact with it by mentally moving the positions of symbols, a process Tall calls functional embodiment.<ref>Tall 2013, 11</ref> We grow our understanding in this realm through our motor capacity for repetition, which allows us to practice action sequences until we can perform them unconsciously. Language enables us to encapsulate these processes.<ref>Tall 2013, 21</ref> Grouping actions through encapsulation is called operational abstraction. The first stage in this track is pseudo-empirical abstraction, in which children learn the properties of actions on objects. For example, the operation of counting leads to the concept of number. The operation of sharing leads to the concept of fraction. The second stage is reflective abstraction, in which actions become objects to be reasoned about, or procepts. At this level, the action of addition becomes the concept of sum, and repeated addition becomes the concept of product.<ref>Tall 2013, 9-10</ref> Tall calls the methods of development in the world of actions operational symbolism.<ref>Tall 2013, 16-17</ref> The world of axioms is the subject of formal mathematics at the university level and deals largely with sets. We grow our understanding of axiomatic math through our capacity for language, which allows us to define thinkable concepts that we assemble into increasingly sophisticated knowledge structures.<ref>Tall 2013, 21</ref> This labeling and defining of concepts is also how language compresses knowledge. Language then allows us to deduce the properties of these concepts through logical proofs, the process of formal abstraction.<ref>Tall 2013, 16</ref> Tall calls the methods of development in the world of axioms axiomatic formalism.<ref>Tall 2013, 17</ref> You can imagine these worlds of mathematical development as three circles in a Venn diagram that overlap in four areas. Embodied symbolism is the area leading from conceptual embodiment to operational symbolism. Embodied formalism is concerned with Euclidean proof. Symbolic formalism is the area of algebraic proof. And the area occupied by all three worlds covers proofs that combine embodiment and symbolism.<ref>Tall 2013, 18-19</ref> I'll call each of these seven areas a region, the four areas of overlap plus the three that purely concern a particular world. === Mechanisms of thought === In addition to all the processes mentioned above, Tall discusses a couple more that act across all three worlds. The first is met-befores, a play on metaphor. These are concepts the learner has encountered earlier that they use to understand a new concept. Met-befores can be either supportive or problematic for understanding the new concept. When a learner proposes a solution or explanation, met-befores enable the teacher to ask the question, "What have you met before that makes you think that?"<ref>Tall 2013, 22-23</ref> The second mechanism is blending. The mind creates new knowledge structures and thinkable concepts by compressing knowledge through abstraction, by connecting the thinkable concepts into knowledge structures, and by blending earlier knowledge structures into new ones. Blending involves linking different modes of thought and experience together, such as vision, touch, and abstract concepts. For example, real numbers are a blend of the physical number line (embodiment), the idea of decimal numbers (symbolism), and a particular set definition (formalism).<ref>Tall 2013, 24-25</ref> === Stages of development === Mathematical reasoning and proof develop in three stages, each of which involves multiple worlds. The first stage is practical mathematics, which explores geometry using physical objects and explores arithmetic using calculation. The second is theoretical mathematics, which covers Euclidean and algebraic proofs. The third is formal mathematics, which involves proving theorems from set-theoretic axioms.<ref>Tall 2013, 18-20</ref> Putting all the stages, capacities, and processes together, we arrive at an outline that looks like this:<ref>Tall 2013, 17, 19</ref> * Stage: practical mathematics ** Region: embodiment *** Concepts: space and shape *** Capacity: recognition (perception) *** Method: conceptual embodiment *** Embodiment: conceptual *** Abstraction: empirical ** Region: embodied symbolism *** Capacity: repetition (action) ** Region: symbolism *** Concepts: number, arithmetic, generalized arithmetic *** Method: operational symbolism *** Embodiment: functional *** Abstraction: pseudo-empirical * Stage: theoretical mathematics ** Region: embodied formalism *** Abstraction: Platonic ** Region: symbolic formalism *** Concepts: algebra, algebraic proof *** Abstraction: reflective ** Region: proof combining embodiment and symbolism * Stage: formal mathematics ** Region: formalism *** Method: axiomatic formalism *** Abstraction: formal Tall summarizes, "The whole development of mathematical thinking is presented as a combination of compression and blending of knowledge structures to produce crystalline concepts that can lead to imaginative new ways of thinking mathematically in new contexts."<ref>Tall 2013, 28</ref> == Open questions == * What gave us the idea that numbers are ruled by logic? * What is the relationship between numbers and sets? == Footnotes == <references/> [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Complete]] 60848004a3fa454341d00643be87224d34d570a8 0 54 173 148 2015-09-29T01:46:53Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the Measurement chapter. Added the Developing category. wikitext text/x-wiki == [[/Introduction/]] == == [[/Pre-algebra/]] == * [[/Fundamentals/]] * [[/Number Sense/]] * [[/Measurement/]] == [[/References/]] == [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Mathematics]] [[Category:Developing]] 909f3218fdf64e7b266cce9e73aa1e3d54140c4a 185 173 2016-03-06T03:22:43Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the Progressions and Mathematical Practice. Moved Fundamentals and Number Sense into a new Preliminaries section. wikitext text/x-wiki == [[/Introduction/]] == == Preliminaries == * [[/Fundamentals/]] * [[/Number Sense/]] == [[/Progressions/|Common Core Math Progressions]] == * [[/Progressions/Preface/]] * [[/Progressions/K-5 Counting and Cardinality, Operations and Algebraic Thinking/]] * [[/Progressions/K-5 Number and Operations in Base Ten/]] * [[/Progressions/K-5 Data/]] * [[/Progressions/K-5 Measurement/]] * [[/Progressions/K-6 Geometry/]] * [[/Progressions/3-5 Fractions/]] * [[/Progressions/6-7 Ratios and Proportional Relationships/]] * [[/Progressions/6-8 Expressions and Equations/]] * [[/Progressions/6-8 Statistics and Probability/]] * [[/Progressions/6-8 The Number System and High School Number/]] * [[/Progressions/High School Functions/]] * [[/Progressions/High School Algebra/]] * [[/Progressions/High School Statistics and Probability/]] * [[/Progressions/High School Modeling/]] == Common Core State Standards == * [[/Mathematical Practice/]] == [[/Pre-algebra/]] == * [[/Measurement/]] == [[/References/]] == [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Mathematics]] [[Category:Developing]] 5055f1c56bacaef025ce573bce4f3676e9b349b8 0 67 174 2015-09-29T01:47:02Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the article. wikitext text/x-wiki == Topics to cover == * concepts ** comparison<ref>Chapin and Johnson 2006, 272</ref><ref>Bittinger and Beecher 2004, 7</ref> ** conservation<ref>Chapin and Johnson 2006, 271, 272</ref> ** coverage (overlaps, gaps)<ref>Chapin and Johnson 2006, 273-274</ref><ref>NGACBP 2010, 16</ref> ** one-to-one correspondence<ref>Hatfield et al. 2008, 132</ref> ** partitioning<ref>Hatfield et al. 2008, 354</ref> ** proportionality/the compensatory principle<ref>Chapin and Johnson 2006, 273</ref><ref>Hatfield et al. 2008, 354</ref> ** ratio ** reference measurement/benchmark, context<ref>Hatfield et al. 2008, 354</ref><ref>Chapin and Johnson 2006, 274</ref> ** reference point, zero-point orientation<ref>Hatfield et al. 2008, 354</ref> ** transitivity<ref>Chapin and Johnson 2006, 271, 273</ref> ** unit complexity ** unit iteration<ref>Chapin and Johnson 2006, 273</ref><ref>Hatfield et al. 2008, 354, 359</ref> ** unit size<ref>Hatfield et al. 2008, 354</ref> ** unit transformation ** unit type<ref>Chapin and Johnson 2006, 273</ref> ** units ** measurement methods *** estimation<ref>Billstein et al. 2007, 741</ref><ref>Chapin and Johnson 2006, 274</ref> *** direct measurement<ref>Chapin and Johnson 2006, 272-273</ref><ref>Hatfield et al. 2008, 354</ref> *** calculation ** measurement quality<ref>Billstein et al. 2007, 352-354</ref> *** accuracy<ref>Chapin and Johnson 2006, 275</ref> *** precision<ref>Chapin and Johnson 2006, 275</ref> *** rounding ** measurement system<ref>Hatfield et al. 2008, 356-358</ref> *** metric system<ref>Chapin and Johnson 2006, 277-278</ref> *** English system/US customary system<ref>Chapin and Johnson 2006, 283-284</ref> ** data continuity *** discrete quantities<ref>Chapin and Johnson 2006, 277</ref> *** continuous quantities<ref>Chapin and Johnson 2006, 277</ref><ref>Hatfield et al. 2008, 354</ref> * measurement procedure<ref>Bittinger and Beecher 2004, 1164</ref><ref>Chapin and Johnson 2006, 271</ref><ref>Hatfield et al. 2008, 355</ref> * measurable attributes<ref>NGACBP 2010, 12</ref> ** count<ref>Tall 2013, 97</ref> *** rote counting<ref>Chapin and Johnson 2006, 2-3</ref> *** rational counting<ref>Chapin and Johnson 2006, 2</ref> *** counting procedure *** cardinality<ref>Chapin and Johnson 2006, 3</ref><ref>Hatfield et al. 2008, 133</ref> ** space *** dimension *** length<ref>Bittinger and Beecher 2004, 1164-1173</ref><ref>Chapin and Johnson 2006, 278</ref><ref>Hatfield et al. 2008, 358-360</ref> *** area<ref>Chapin and Johnson 2006, 279-281</ref><ref>Hatfield et al. 2008, 361-368, 379-380</ref> *** volume and capacity<ref>Bittinger and Beecher 2004, 1185-1187</ref><ref>Chapin and Johnson 2006, 281-282</ref><ref>Hatfield et al. 2008, 368-370</ref> *** number line, coordinate systems<ref>Chapin and Johnson 2006, 24-25</ref><ref>Billstein et al. 2007, 98-99</ref><ref>Bittinger and Beecher 2004, 487</ref> ** position *** ordinality<ref>Chapin and Johnson 2006, 3</ref> *** seriation<ref>Hatfield et al. 2008, 128</ref> ** mass and weight<ref>Billstein et al. 2007, 813-815</ref><ref>Bittinger and Beecher 2004, 1178-1181</ref><ref>Chapin and Johnson 2006, 282-283</ref><ref>Hatfield et al. 2008, 370-372</ref> ** temperature<ref>Billstein et al. 2007, 815</ref><ref>Bittinger and Beecher 2004, 1191</ref><ref>Hatfield et al. 2008, 376-377</ref> ** time<ref>Bittinger and Beecher 2004, 1190</ref><ref>Hatfield et al. 2008, 372-376, 378-379</ref> * numeration systems<ref>Hatfield et al. 2008, 187-213</ref><ref>Chapin and Johnson 2006, 25-29</ref><ref>Bittinger and Beecher 2004, 3-6</ref><ref>Billstein et al. 2007, 153-166</ref><ref>Tall 2013, 215-223</ref> == Footnotes == <references/> [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Developing]] 696b7e381d2d22ed162af76d31e9ba3ca3b2c4bd 0 68 186 2016-03-06T03:25:05Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the article. wikitext text/x-wiki These pages are my random thoughts on the Common Core Math Progressions. The Common Core Standards are divided by grade level and, within each grade level, grouped by domain (in the lower grades) or conceptual category (in high school). The Progressions trace the development of each domain or conceptual category across the grades. These documents are helpful for understanding the Common Core approach to teaching math and getting a high-level overview of the topics a CC curriculum will cover. Each article in this section links to the related Progressions document at the top. At the start of each comment I've given a page number or phrase to indicate what I'm commenting on in the document. My comments are mostly notes to myself about my personal reactions to the material, so maybe only a few of them are of interest to anyone else. But they're here just in case. If I refer to things you aren't familiar with, there might be an explanation in another part of the Math Relearning project. Otherwise refer to the relevant Progressions document for context. The index page for the Progressions themselves: [http://achievethecore.org/page/254/progressions-documents-for-the-common-core-state-standards-for-mathematics Progressions Documents for the Common Core State Standards for Mathematics] * [[/Preface/]] * [[/K-5 Counting and Cardinality, Operations and Algebraic Thinking/]] * [[/K-5 Number and Operations in Base Ten/]] * [[/K-5 Data/]] * [[/K-5 Measurement/]] * [[/K-6 Geometry/]] * [[/3-5 Fractions/]] * [[/6-7 Ratios and Proportional Relationships/]] * [[/6-8 Expressions and Equations/]] * [[/6-8 Statistics and Probability/]] * [[/6-8 The Number System and High School Number/]] * [[/High School Functions/]] * [[/High School Algebra/]] * [[/High School Statistics and Probability/]] * [[/High School Modeling/]] [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Complete]] c6f8efe357f7c7d27ca28264f5d03ac334dd8524 0 69 187 2016-03-06T03:28:58Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the article. wikitext text/x-wiki These are my comments on the Common Core Math Progressions document [http://achievethecore.org/file/1493 Preface] (PDF). == Preface for the Draft Progressions == These people seem to think like I do, especially in their concern for tying math together conceptually, tracing its development from basic to advanced concepts, and clarifying its vocabulary. I also share their concern for paying attention to the ways people learn and the misunderstandings of what they learn that hold them back. The "Other sources of information" seem worth reading. == Introduction == p. 8 - Aha! I'm not the only one who uses the terms operational and relational! The sources in the footnotes seem worth reading too. Especially http://commoncoretools.me/2012/06/09/jason-zimbas-wiring-diagram/. === Organization of the Common Core State Standards for Mathematics === The discussion of the structure of the Standards is confusing to me. I don't get the distinctions between some of the categories of features. === Reconceptualized topics; changed notation and terminology === New to me (NTM): "Notation for remainders in division of whole numbers." I've wondered how remainders fit into math for a while. This strikes me as a very good way to think of and notate them. === Terms and usage in the Standards and Progressions === [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Comments]] [[Category:Complete]] 5ce645b3d716f6a98cef548b03875789f23a30f4 0 70 188 2016-03-06T03:30:42Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the article. wikitext text/x-wiki These are my comments on the Common Core Math Progressions document [http://achievethecore.org/file/1172 Counting & Cardinality and Operations & Algebraic Thinking: Grades K-5] (PDF). == Counting and Cardinality == There's a lot of overlap between this section and what I was going to say, but each of us said things the other didn't. If I wanted to define math concepts in terms of their physical meaning, I'd need to separate them from the teaching techniques that are meant to aid the mind in handling the operations (managing the memory load, etc.). On the opposite end, I'd like to try to understand what these concepts mean on the most abstract level. That would let me say with certainty what the concepts mean so I can be sure I'm relating them correctly. But I don't know if it's possible to get away from the models and physical representations. Can the mind really think in pure abstractions? Does every model for a math concept (eg, the number line) distort it in some way? Unlike my other sources, this doc explains how comparison relates to counting. == Operations and Algebraic Thinking == === Overview of Grades K–2 === Table 1 was confusing to me for some reason, or at least it took me longer than I expected to read through it and translate the words to the equations. In some cases I didn't know what the difference was between the situations. They made some fine distinctions. But maybe it's clearer to me now. Still, it's worth analyzing the differences between these situations. One question I have with these situations is when you'd ever not know the unknown. That should be part of any word problem if you want the student to be more engaged with it. === Kindergarten === "Mathematize" - Yes, everything has a quantitative aspect. I imagine putting on glasses with a filter that highlights the mathematical features of an object or situation. === Grade 1 === "Put together ... Addend Unknown" - The situations reveal different aspects of the nature of addition/subtraction. "algebraic perspective" - I thought this was out of place at first because I didn't learn algebra till junior high, but surely younger kids can understand it. "Linking equations" - I want to catalog these representations and think about what I can learn from them about problem solving in general. New to me (NTM): "where the total is" - This is already very useful to me. "decomposing one addend" - I really like the idea, but it starts to get hard to remember all the numbers. These conceptual math procedures can still be done rotely, so you have to connect the concepts to the different procedures. I suppose the evidence of conceptual thinking comes out in solving new problems and in explaining your reasons for selecting a procedure. === Grade 2 === With two-step problems, math is starting to feel hard, if I'm doing it in my head. Too many numbers to remember. But part of problem solving is simplifying the problem, breaking it up, or transforming it in some other way so it's more manageable, so maybe that's the case here. === Summary of K–2 Operations and Algebraic Thinking === "within 100" - I guess I'll have to wait till the curriculum to find out about this, but it seems like this would suggest learning some other algorithms. It seems strange that the progressions would go into such detail and then skip over this part. Actually I think it's in NBT. "all sums of two-digit numbers from memory" - Isn't that thousands of facts? === Grade 3 === "no general strategies" - Explore what this means exactly. The distiction between equal groups and arrays seems very fine. The 5+n chart is confusing. === Grade 4 === I've noticed that problem with "more than" language in multiplication comparisons. NTM: Differences in remainder problems. NTM: Looking for pair reversals when factoring. Maybe I learned that. Milgram points out that CC doesn't cover prime factorization. I've seen people insert it a couple of different places. In his TEDx talk at USU (https://tedx.usu.edu/portfolio-items/david-brown/) David Brown points out that you don't necessarily know how a pattern will continue, so a better test question is to explain how each of several next numbers would continue it. I like this idea and want to be on the lookout for this kind of reasoning about how math works and what it's about, which is at a deeper level than even some of these CC documents. === Grade 5 === p. 32 - Students "write expressions to express a calculation." They also examine the relationships between numerical patterns they make up. I'd like to explore the idea of all the mathematical operations as explorations of the relationships among numbers. === Connections to NF and NBT in Grades 3 through 5 === Why do we group only these four operations into arithmetic? === Where the Operations and Algebraic Thinking Progression is heading === p. 34 - NTM: "Understand solving an equation or inequality as a process of answering a question: which values from a specified set, if any, make the equation or inequality true?" {6.EE.5} pp. 34-35 - NTM: Situation equation vs solution equation. == Appendix. Methods used for solving single-digit addition and subtraction problems == === Level 1. Direct Modeling by Counting All or Taking Away. === === Level 2. Counting On. === This taking away method is like the counting up method for giving change. p. 36 - Why is counting down "difficult and error-prone"? When I start to feel bored or lost as I'm reading, it helps to remind myself of the basic nature of what I'm studying. I like to think of math (at least at this level) as the relationships between numbers on the number line as revealed by our operations on them. === Level 3. Convert to an Easier Equivalent Problem. === What makes subtracting finding an unknown addend? I know the answer is obvious at one level, but I want to think more about it. What makes transformations between representations possible? [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Comments]] [[Category:Complete]] a5cfd3bf0266d87c21be94518ea4e8d182bb01ce 0 71 189 2016-03-06T03:31:23Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the article. wikitext text/x-wiki These are my comments on the Common Core Math Progressions document [http://achievethecore.org/file/1172 Counting & Cardinality and Operations & Algebraic Thinking: Grades K-5] (PDF). == Counting and Cardinality == There's a lot of overlap between this section and what I was going to say, but each of us said things the other didn't. If I wanted to define math concepts in terms of their physical meaning, I'd need to separate them from the teaching techniques that are meant to aid the mind in handling the operations (managing the memory load, etc.). On the opposite end, I'd like to try to understand what these concepts mean on the most abstract level. That would let me say with certainty what the concepts mean so I can be sure I'm relating them correctly. But I don't know if it's possible to get away from the models and physical representations. Can the mind really think in pure abstractions? Does every model for a math concept (eg, the number line) distort it in some way? Unlike my other sources, this doc explains how comparison relates to counting. == Operations and Algebraic Thinking == === Overview of Grades K–2 === Table 1 was confusing to me for some reason, or at least it took me longer than I expected to read through it and translate the words to the equations. In some cases I didn't know what the difference was between the situations. They made some fine distinctions. But maybe it's clearer to me now. Still, it's worth analyzing the differences between these situations. One question I have with these situations is when you'd ever not know the unknown. That should be part of any word problem if you want the student to be more engaged with it. === Kindergarten === "Mathematize" - Yes, everything has a quantitative aspect. I imagine putting on glasses with a filter that highlights the mathematical features of an object or situation. === Grade 1 === "Put together ... Addend Unknown" - The situations reveal different aspects of the nature of addition/subtraction. "algebraic perspective" - I thought this was out of place at first because I didn't learn algebra till junior high, but surely younger kids can understand it. "Linking equations" - I want to catalog these representations and think about what I can learn from them about problem solving in general. New to me (NTM): "where the total is" - This is already very useful to me. "decomposing one addend" - I really like the idea, but it starts to get hard to remember all the numbers. These conceptual math procedures can still be done rotely, so you have to connect the concepts to the different procedures. I suppose the evidence of conceptual thinking comes out in solving new problems and in explaining your reasons for selecting a procedure. === Grade 2 === With two-step problems, math is starting to feel hard, if I'm doing it in my head. Too many numbers to remember. But part of problem solving is simplifying the problem, breaking it up, or transforming it in some other way so it's more manageable, so maybe that's the case here. === Summary of K–2 Operations and Algebraic Thinking === "within 100" - I guess I'll have to wait till the curriculum to find out about this, but it seems like this would suggest learning some other algorithms. It seems strange that the progressions would go into such detail and then skip over this part. Actually I think it's in NBT. "all sums of two-digit numbers from memory" - Isn't that thousands of facts? === Grade 3 === "no general strategies" - Explore what this means exactly. The distiction between equal groups and arrays seems very fine. The 5+n chart is confusing. === Grade 4 === I've noticed that problem with "more than" language in multiplication comparisons. NTM: Differences in remainder problems. NTM: Looking for pair reversals when factoring. Maybe I learned that. Milgram points out that CC doesn't cover prime factorization. I've seen people insert it a couple of different places. In his TEDx talk at USU (https://tedx.usu.edu/portfolio-items/david-brown/) David Brown points out that you don't necessarily know how a pattern will continue, so a better test question is to explain how each of several next numbers would continue it. I like this idea and want to be on the lookout for this kind of reasoning about how math works and what it's about, which is at a deeper level than even some of these CC documents. === Grade 5 === p. 32 - Students "write expressions to express a calculation." They also examine the relationships between numerical patterns they make up. I'd like to explore the idea of all the mathematical operations as explorations of the relationships among numbers. === Connections to NF and NBT in Grades 3 through 5 === Why do we group only these four operations into arithmetic? === Where the Operations and Algebraic Thinking Progression is heading === p. 34 - NTM: "Understand solving an equation or inequality as a process of answering a question: which values from a specified set, if any, make the equation or inequality true?" {6.EE.5} pp. 34-35 - NTM: Situation equation vs solution equation. == Appendix. Methods used for solving single-digit addition and subtraction problems == === Level 1. Direct Modeling by Counting All or Taking Away. === === Level 2. Counting On. === This taking away method is like the counting up method for giving change. p. 36 - Why is counting down "difficult and error-prone"? When I start to feel bored or lost as I'm reading, it helps to remind myself of the basic nature of what I'm studying. I like to think of math (at least at this level) as the relationships between numbers on the number line as revealed by our operations on them. === Level 3. Convert to an Easier Equivalent Problem. === What makes subtracting finding an unknown addend? I know the answer is obvious at one level, but I want to think more about it. What makes transformations between representations possible? [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Comments]] [[Category:Complete]] a5cfd3bf0266d87c21be94518ea4e8d182bb01ce 0 72 190 2016-03-06T03:32:05Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the article. wikitext text/x-wiki These are my comments on the Common Core Math Progressions document [http://achievethecore.org/file/1170 Measurement & Data (data part): Grades K-5] (PDF). == Overview == line plot - Something I'll want to explore throughout this domain is the logic of the design of these different data displays. How necessary or flexible is the design? What does it accomplish? What data situations does each cover? Do the displays fall into families? What does each variation accomplish? Why do we order and place the elements as we do? context - This seems like a very important point that I want to keep in mind. Hmm, the GAISE report, another freely available document on conceptual math education. I feel like I should look for more of these. But maybe I shouldn't spend time on that and only collect them as they come up. I should at least keep a list of them on the website. == Measurement Data == === Grade 2 === It would also be good to ask what kinds of steps are involved in moving from data collection to representation. Also why do we pick out these features of the situation to represent in the display? "greatest and least values" - What questions do we typically ask of data? Why these particular questions? "fill in gaps" - Are there any categories that do act like numbers and would need to have gaps filled in? Letters come to mind maybe. "dots will 'pile up'" - Dots are a form of tally, and shorthand for tallies are numbers, which suggests a table. So why do we make plots, graphs, and other such displays? === Grade 5 === I'm listening to my [http://www.pandora.com/station/1214310825114920401 Pandora math station], as usual, and the numbers song from Einstein on the Beach is on. It occurred to me that the numbers could have multiple meanings that change based on the context. It would be interesting to explore that technique with words other than numbers. == Where the Measurement Data Progression is heading == Thinking more about why we represent data visually, do we do much with treating graphs like geometric figures? I guess I should get Tufte's quantitative information book to help me answer some of these questions. "not in order to make any claims" - You have to know how to read graphs in order not to draw inappropriate conclusions from them. [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Comments]] [[Category:Complete]] 4f44df6fab830d579c1e2fd8cf13c305c8107998 0 73 191 2016-03-06T03:32:58Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the article. wikitext text/x-wiki These are my comments on the Common Core Math Progressions document [http://achievethecore.org/file/1169 Measurement & Data (measurement part): Grades K-5] (PDF). == Overview == Ah, they agree with me on the centrality of measurement. These math educators always contrast measurement and counting, but I want to highlight their similarities. They both use units, for example. The Standards don't distinguish between mass and weight. Shame, shame! "direct comparison" - My earlier sources annoyingly didn't explain that direct comparison was meant to happen without measurement as a step on the way to measurement, so I was having trouble fitting it into my logical map of measurement concepts. The list of measurable attributes in this section reminds me of Thad Roberts' TEDx talk where he reduced all the units to five basic ones: length, mass, time, charge, and temperature (http://einsteinsintuition.com/what-is-qst/constants-of-nature/). One of the recurring questions of my life: Why are there multiple measurable attributes that an object can have? Why isn't everything just length or something? "comparing it to the amount" - This corresponds to my idea that measurement is a ratio. It also hints at the idea that at a certain point, the magnitude of a unit has to be established by direct experience if we're going to make any sense of it. A numeric measurement doesn't mean much on its own. "object is subdivided" - It's interesting to contrast this with division. "parallels the number concepts" - Good point comparing the metric system to place value. "Scientists measure" - Fair enough. They don't mind using length as a synonym for distance, and they explicitly define it so it can be. They even describe volume as entailing three lengths simultaneously. They agree with me that length is a core concept and for the same kinds of reasons I was giving. Area - This is where we get into things I hadn't thought about yet. == Kindergarten == How do we know conservation is true? In any case, it has nuances. And I think the concept is somewhat different between math and science. == Grade 1 == Seriation - A good opportunity to teach sorting algorithms. :) "no gaps or overlaps" - I have some thoughts on this, which I call coverage, in my measurement notes. inequalities - Impressive. Must've been a gifted student. :P paper-folding - Interesting about congruent parts. It can teach other math concepts too! Though maybe not in grade 1. "one-dimensional unit structure" - Yes, many measurements are conversions to length. == Grade 2 == "begin counting" - Off by 1! But yes, even rulers have semiotics. I vaguely recall being confused about the start-or-covered question in some counting situations with some tool or other. Actually redstone power in Minecraft is one. "units of different sizes" - This reminds me of the scene in Spirited Away where the girl had to hold her breath as she was crossing the bridge. The commentary said this was to illustrate the childhood experience of having to follow the seemingly arbitrary rules adults establish. Hence, I note that when kids try to guess the rules, they get it wrong. accumulation - Interesting, and that wasn't in my earlier sources or thinking. zero-point - Measurement is relative to a reference point. "length-unit size" - Yes, in counting, the unit size is one object. This is true for ordinal numbers too. "inverse relationship" - This would add a level of unpredictability that would make me anxious to find out if there was a way to predict the measurement given the unit size. What button is it pushing for me? regular vs jumbo paperclips - Another example of how math concepts can be mixed and matched to reveal more relationships and avenues to knowledge. So what is it about units that's being reapplied, and how? I feel like notating the concepts with some kind of symbolic shorthand would help with the analysis. So "the larger the unit, the fewer number of units in a given measurement" means something like, "if unit[a] > unit[b], num[a] < num[b]." Then "if object A is 10 regular paperclips long and object B is 10 jumbo paperclips long, the number of units is the same, but the units have different sizes, so the lengths of A and B are different." This means "If num[a] = num[b] and unit[a] < unit[b], then len[a] < len[b]." So we're using transitivity. Hmm, sort of. Anyway, it's good to keep in mind the phrase, "So with that, we can ..." and look to see where we can apply pieces of the concepts we've learned. "benchmark lengths" - Find lists of these. Maybe EngageNY will have enough. == Grade 3 == multiplying side lengths = counting tiles - Yes, and why they're the same as scaling. "areas are preserved under rotation" - This is true physically, at least with solids, but why is it always true mathematically? Maybe it helps to think of numbers as rigid like solids. They always take up the same (quantitative) space. independence of area and perimeter - How does that work? With rectangles it's because the sides of the square units can be part of the edge or interior, depending on their arrangement. perimeter formula verbal summaries - It would be interesting to spell out the steps in translating the verbal summaries into the formulas and vice versa. == Grade 4 == "emphasizes the step" - I hadn't thought of using particular formulas as memory aids. Formulas can have other kinds of advantages, such as illustrating the distributive property or reducing the number of calculations (see earlier). "How long is the garden?" - Sometimes I read word problems and wonder, "Why would that be unknown?" One set of cases would be if you were gathering the data from different sources or occasions. One piece could've been collected for one purpose and another for another, and now you have enough information to learn more by calculating instead of measuring. Coming up with situation equations involves knowing which operations are appropriate for the numeric relationships within the situation. What tells us that, for example, perimeter is additive? "concepts of angle" - This is similar to what I'd been thinking about angle but hadn't written yet. I like the "change in direction" language. I think I was tying angle to the difference between circles and shapes with vertices, which I thought of in terms of the discrete-continuous distinction. Circles (or ellipses) are made of a line that changes direction continuously, whereas vertex shapes (is there a name for this category?) are made of a line that changes direction discretely. I'm sure there's a more mathematically correect way to say that. I was contrasting angle with distance. Angle is a type of distance but a rotational one rather than linear. Explore the nature of this distinction. The different ways of describing angles reminds me that I've seen different ways to define a circle. Explore the relationships among these definitiinos. Why do we use 360 degrees? Why are 90 degree angles special, and why are they called right? They might be special because they're half a straight angle, which is just a line. I was thinking it was because they're symmetrical when you rotate them or some such thing. I'm looking forward to geometry, by the way. There's something about space that's so interesting and inviting. Plus I like visual things. What's a relational way to define angle? Rotation sounds operational. Maybe the difference between two directions. That still seems to have rotation in the background, since you could try to measure the difference linearly, but maybe there's a relational way to define rotation. "angles in a variety of situations" - Ah, yes, angle is an abstraction of these kinds of situations. How would a blind person learn geometry? angle of turtle rotation vs angle formed - What? Guess I'd have to see it. Why a turtle? Maybe because its legs form crosshairs and its head tells you which direction it'll be moving. What makes me want to skip over the examples on p. 25? I'm going to try not to skip exercises and to ask that question a lot when I'm going through the actual curriculum. In this case, and I suspect in many, it's the mental load of remembering numbers and relationships. Being able to write things down would make it easier. I can with the pencil tool in my PDF software. Another thing that bothers me about math problems is sorting out the path to the solution when you have a lot of pieces to coordinate, like in this example. Again, writing might help. == Grade 5 == "Convert like measurement units" - How do fractions and decimals relate? I know the procedures. I just want to trace what happens, because now that I think about it, it seems strange to me. How does division turn a fraction into a decimal? Kumi problem - The diagram reveals something I wouldn't have thought of, that half of what remains after subtracting 1/5 is 2/5, so to find the value of 1/5, just divide by 2. Now that I say that, it's interesting to me that one number can represent another number. What's happening there? decompose right rectangular prism - For the three axes I was just imagining someone bending over at a right angle with their arms outstretched, or maybe held to the sides and bent outward at the elbows. All that partitioning is awfully organized. What would measurement be like if we were partitioning into irregular, organic shapes? Why do we need regular intervals for measurement? It's obvious that we do, but I want to see it expressed in case I learn anything. I just want to know why we privilege square-related shapes in geometric measurement. But maybe there are other types of measurement that use other shapes, such as angles, which use circles. See? I noticed a relationship. packing and filling - Packing depends on the fact that volume is additive. I have http://www.twitch.tv/bobross playing in the background, sometimes looking and laughing at the chat. Then I return to this somber math reading. I wonder what makes a math joke. There are puns, but I wonder what other kind of math humor is possible. This could be important for education. == Where the Geometric Measurement Progression is heading == The geometry progression does seem kind of slow. [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Comments]] [[Category:Complete]] 5eeb23d5cbfcb00c7ba36954a7cb5d2bf08178dc 0 74 192 2016-03-06T03:34:07Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the article. wikitext text/x-wiki These are my comments on the Common Core Math Progressions document [http://achievethecore.org/file/1168 Geometry: Grades K-6] (PDF). Yay! I was looking forward to geometry. == Overview == "Levels of Geometric Thinking" - These distinctions seem vague. "Classification of Quadrilaterals" - Interesting topic for a book. I'm curious what benefits different definitions and classification schemes give us. "do not learn limited concepts" - Even if we decide not to require much math, we still have to teach the parts we do carefully, and it's probably more than non-specialists expect (definitely not just arithmetic like this article suggests: http://www.newsday.com/opinion/oped/if-you-want-kids-to-learn-math-stop-teaching-it-1.10206785). decomposing by covering - Interesting, I wouldn't have thought that would count. composing with units of units - I wonder if there are canonical or typical sets of compositions, maybe progressions of units. spatial structuring - Isn't this just mentally decomposing? == Grade 1 == "geometrically defining attributes" - Why do we pick these and not other attributes? I was going to dismiss the task of distinguishing between defining attributes and others, since I already basically know those, but then I thought I should examine the issue in my typical way, and I quickly arrived at that question, which I think will be enlightening to answer, so I'm glad I took another look. I was thinking later about how satisfying it is to dig up new concepts like that, or at least the questions that would lead to them, and how I won't get to do that as much now since the conceptual math people have already done so much. But then I thought it might achieve a similar result if I came up with the kinds of questions that could have led to the insights of those researchers. So I might do some of that. "like combining 10 ones ... foundations for later mathematics" - How far do the parallels go between shapes and counting or arithmetic? Area is a model for multiplication. The number line can model a lot. Geometry can be done through coordinates. What else? == Grade 2 == "need not have the same shape" - It would be good to explore how this works. It's closely related to the area-perimeter relationship. tangrams - I didn't know they were related to isosceles right triangles. I've wondered about the history/context of these puzzles, so I should look them up. "transformed into" - This confused me for a second, but I think they mean decomposing the first shape and composing the pieces into the second. This could be an interesting general model of some kinds of transformation. == Grade 3 == classification of shapes - This feels like an especially preparatory step, and it reminds me of the reason-orientedness of my project. The goal is largely to ask why we do things the way we do in math. Along those lines I can also ask why we learn the things we do. I know math is continually growing, like every other field, but are there key intermediate goals in math knowledge? Tasks we typically want to accomplish at certain points that require specific background knowledge? Relatedly, how do we select what to teach? Are there other lower level concepts we don't teach because they don't matter to our later goals? Are there concepts on those levels that we haven't investigated because they haven't really interested anyone? Things like the Ulam spiral. It's a pretty basic idea, but we didn't come up with it until 1963. "without making a priori assumptions regarding their classification ... may still need work building or drawing squares" - These progressions split up math tasks and skills very finely. Some of these distinctions might be worth pursuing for this project (concepts, problem types such as solving for various unknowns), and others would be less relevant (mental or physical abilities like drawing straight lines). == Grade 4 == "turtle geometry" - It's interesting that a feature of a particular computer program gets a type of geometry named after it. "connect what are often initially isolated ideas" - It's interesting that building shapes with the turtle can do this. "triangular (isometric) grids" - Interesting. I hadn't heard of this one. Hopefully EngageNY will cover the different kinds of grids. "shape is fixed by the side lengths" - Explore how this works. == Grade 5 == A lot of this and grade 4 seems like repetition of concepts and skills found elsewhere in the progressions, maybe with more technical terminology and combined in slightly different ways. At least it gives me less to write about. The relationship between spatial structuring and the coordinate plane does seem significant though. It's described as sort of a paradigm shift for the students. Venn diagram of quadrilaterals - Very useful! == Grade 6 == The concepts and skills are starting to rush past, so I'll wait to figure out what it all means until the curriculum. It's crossed my mind a few times whether the progressions would be adequate for pre-algebra, but I think I really will need the lesson plans. == Where the Geometry Progression is Heading == It's nice to know composition and decomposition aren't just training wheels for elementary school but are used past high school math. They do feel sort of like crutches, but it's reassuring that everyone uses them. The progressions give the impression that Common Core geometry ends after grade 6, but the standards continue it through high school, thankfully. In fact, James Milgram criticizes the CC technique of teaching geometry using rigid transformations after that point, saying it may be the only rigorous method we have, but it's also too advanced for most teachers. Well, that isn't really relevant to my project, so for now I'm happy with whatever's in store. [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Comments]] [[Category:Complete]] 8b1799dd1a0e4d6418ab93cdb55343b58106f9f5 0 75 193 2016-03-06T03:39:04Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the article. wikitext text/x-wiki These are my comments on the Common Core Math Progressions document [http://achievethecore.org/file/1173 Number & Operations-Fractions: Grades 3-5] (PDF). == Grade 3 == "The meaning of fractions" - I like this, but what about Chapin and Johnson's other meanings? Of course, that's too much to cover in grade 3. I'd also like to explore the complex nature of the fraction representation. It's a single number that's represented using more than one number, to start with. "same shape and size" - Isn't size the only real requirement? "The importance of specifying the whole" - It seems like a lot of things (everything?) in math are identified in relation to something else. "basic building block of fractions" - This is the kind of thing I would come up with. "Estimate lengths" - This reminds me about a difference I observed between measurement and fractions. Fractions divide a whole into equal parts. Measurement adds up equal parts to reveal the amount of a whole, which may not be a multiple of a single part. I'm sure there's a better way to say that. == Grade 4 == (4 * 7)/(4 * 9) = 7/9 - Very interesting! There are some subtleties I want to understand here. Fractions are an interesting representation, since they have multiple parts, and their parts don't work quite like regular integers. "no mathematical reason" - Aha! Some things we do in math are for convenience, not for mathematical necessity. Take that, Jeremy! "multiplying by 1" - This is an example of a seemingly useless move that is very useful in a particular context. It works in this case because you're not just multiplying by 1 but by an equivalent in another representation. You've translated the 1 into a more powerful form. "2/3 + 5/8 as a length" - I notice the diagram doesn't mark the length of the whole. Instead it seems to base the fractional lengths on each other. This made me realize you can view two fractions as a ratio or proportion. "decimal as a fraction generalizes" - I don't see how a visual fraction model wouldn't generalize. Maybe I don't know what cases they mean. With these fraction examples I'm finding myself taking the symbol-manipulation shortcuts. I'm going to have to slow down when I'm doing the lessons and think about the problems conceptually. But as the concepts build on each other, I'll have to find summary models that'll remind me of what the more advanced concepts mean so I don't have to think through the whole chain of concepts for each problem. Conceptual understanding isn't just about being able to picture the meaning of the procedures but about being able to think about the concepts flexibly to solve problems, which means breaking down the situation and transforming it into more suitable forms for solving, perhaps largely by mixing and matching the conceptual pieces. So that's a skill to concentrate on. == Grade 5 == "least common denominator" - Interesting. I always thought that's just what you did, but I see that its non-necessity is an extension of the fact that simplifying fractions isn't mathematically necessary. fractions as division - Explore the relationship between this and fractions as addition or multiplication of parts. "contribute 1/3 of itself" - I usually think of division linearly as the objects being grouped as wholes except where the dividing lines cut through them, sort of like the second example solution with the sack of rice. "general formula for the product of two fractions" - The formula reminds me of how detailed math is and how long it would take to list all the concepts and formulas at a fine grained level. I sometimes think that would be a good thing to do, I think to give me a more concrete basis for mathematical problem solving, but the prospect is intimidating. This makes me think being decent at problem solving with math takes commitment! There are a lot of details to know and interrelate. "reason out many examples" - I might still have gaps to fill with my own investigation as I'm going through Common Core conceptual math. One type of question I still might ask is how these concepts might have developed in the first place, or at least how someone might develop them from experience and necessity, even if we don't know how they actually came about. "same as multiplying the number by a unit fraction, 1/3 x 5" - Wouldn't that be 5 x 1/3? I don't quite know how to conceptualize 5 x 1/3 = 5 ÷ 3. I only know that's the rule, and following it comes very easily to me. However, I do see that when you divide a part into parts, you get more (and smaller) parts, and maybe that's the key. area model for 3/4 x 5/3 - I wonder how people came up with these explanations for math concepts. They seem clever. That's another type of question worth exploring. Explanations of fraction operations would also be a good place to experiment with rewording the explanations to answer my own difficulties in understanding. Maybe translating the operations into English that makes sense to me would help. To take a later example, 3 ÷ 1/6 means "1/6 goes into 3 how many times?" "Multiplication as scaling" - I'm glad they're covering this. Keith Devlin is happy about it too, I'm sure. But I would've thought the scaling factor would come second in the expression, so 3 x 5 and 3 x 1/2 in the examples. You present what you have and then how you're changing it. I'm curious how they're conceptualizing the mathematical statement they're expressing. [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Comments]] [[Category:Complete]] 3caf193c224592187b3a1826263e76e263948165 0 76 194 2016-03-06T03:40:25Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the article. wikitext text/x-wiki These are my comments on the Common Core Math Progressions document [http://achievethecore.org/file/1177 Ratios & Proportional Relationships: Grades 6-7] (PDF). == Overview == "Ratios have associated rates." - So a rate is a ratio where one side is set to one. And a proportion is an equality between two ratios? I couldn't quite tell if they were distinguishing between proportions and proportional relationships. And a percent is a ... rate, I think. Ratios and proportions are another area that will be hard to wrap my mind around. I think it's because, like fractions, they involve relating two or more numbers. Of course, every number is related to a reference point, if only 0. But fractions, ratios, and so on add numbers to relate to each other. My mind gets quickly overwhelmed with the moving parts. But I can think of it like a game. Actually I don't know how much that helps. Games can be pretty confusing too. But it's at least an interesting way to look at it. One thing that I think would help is translating the math into English. So what's involved in these relationships, and why do mathematicians pick these to study and teach? "collection of equivalent ratios" - So a coordinate can be seen as a ratio, and a line with certain conditions (e.g., through the origin) marks a collection of ratios that are equivalent and represents a proportional relationship between the two components of the ratios (right terms?). == Grade 6 == "Solving a percent problem" - This is an example of how falling behind in math causes problems when trying to learn later math. I'm not fluent with my fraction problem solving strategies, so I feel like I'm lagging when I follow the solution to this problem. Especially I haven't grasped how the fraction concepts relate to the rules I learned, so I fumble around when I try to connect the concepts to these ratio problems. I can imagine what it might be like for a student struggling with their homework or a test without the time needed to truly grasp what they're doing, feeling desperation or despair or resignation. Learning the concepts is supposed to help with problem solving, so to explore how the concepts help to think flexibly it would be good to concentrate on how the concepts translate into the various representations and skills and connect them. == Grade 7 == "Ratio problem specified by natural numbers" - These solutions all have implicit steps, which will confuse people like me who don't have a firm grasp on them. Some parts of the solution seem to work backward from the step's destination, like solving a maze from the other end. You have to know you can do this and how. Why make 6 batches, for example? Of course, hopefully by grade 7 students will have gotten enough instruction and practice to know these things. "what fraction of the paint is blue" - There's some ambiguity in using fractions in cases like this, if you're not thinking carefully. There's a fraction already involving blue paint in the problem, but you have to ask, a fraction of what? What's given is a fraction of a cup, but what you're looking for in this step is the fraction of the total paint. "not the case that for every 10 years" - At least at this stage, math is largely tied to application, and you have to understand the domain you're applying it to, in this case aging. "Correspondence among a table" - Even this helpful diagram has at least one key implicit step: deducing the 2/5 increase in y for every 1 increase in x. Obviously it comes from the 2 cups peach for every 5 grape, but it would make things crystal clear if we could see how that transformation happens via another diagram or two and the symbolic manipulation involved. "rationale from cross-multiplying" - Ah, finally. And it makes sense to me. Except that now I need the rationale for canceling out. "obscured by the traditional method" - I'm glad they acknowledge that some ways of expressing things can obscure more helpful methods of solving a problem. "Skateboard problem 1" - I dismissed tape diagrams at first, but I keep seeing how they're really useful for breaking down certain kinds of problems and translating them into other problems. In this case 80% becomes four of 20%, which highlights that you can divide the cost by 4 to give you a basis for the solution, which is to find 100%. That's only one possible method, of course. Tape diagrams are also useful for showing the difference between the first and second skateboard problems in terms of what wholes the 20% are referring to. The factoring and canceling of 140 * 100 / 80 in the second method is interesting. Explore that. "Using percentages in comparisons" - "25% more" sounds ambiguous to me. Does it mean 25% of the smaller or larger number? The smaller, as it turns out. This highlights the need to understand certain details of English grammar and usage. "I used percentages" - How do the multiplicative ratio table and the percentages relate? I'm always interested in how it is that different problem solving methods are equivalent. == Appendix == "Definitions and essential characteristics" - Lists like this of definitions and such are helpful for analyzing without extra, distracting explanations and comments on things like educational concerns. [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Comments]] [[Category:Complete]] fbd48fdbb62fca36b8d15fefc7d2074d7db3072c 0 77 195 2016-03-06T03:44:59Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the article. wikitext text/x-wiki These are my comments on the Common Core Math Progressions document [http://achievethecore.org/file/1175 Expressions & Equations: Grades 6-8] (PDF). This is one of the topics I've been looking forward to, though I didn't really realize it. It feels like home base for me, a central stopping point for math skills. Earlier concepts were leading to it, and it leads to a bunch of others. Plus it's what I normally think about when I think of math, and I feel like I'm pretty good at this part. == Overview == "a series of nested or parallel operations" - This reminds me that I want to find various ways to represent complex structures like math expressions, ways like parse trees. == Grade 6 == "objects in their own right" - They must've read Tall. This sounds like procepts. "what is the meaning of the 7?" - Interesting, I hadn't really thought of coefficients as having their own meaning, but obviously it makes sense. "Looking for structure ... sequence of operations" - Structure vs sequence is a good pair of terms for the relation-operation dichotomy. Also, I've been privileging structure because Dijkstra did, but sequences have their own logic that's worth studying, and everything we do comes down to them anyway. The way we use it, at least in programming, structure is partly just a translation of sequence meant to hide (from) its difficulties. But sequence is unavoidable in many cases (microprocessors?, games, music), and it's long been mysterious to me. It's often a magical process I can't quite follow of transitioning from one state to a quite different one. "any order, any grouping" - I hadn't heard of that one. It seems like it should have a more formal name. I wonder if EngageNY will cover it. "hold numerical expressions unevaluated" - This seems related to my idea of translations as ways of making expressions more powerful for particular purposes. "does not necessarily dictate how to calculate them" - Another expression of relation vs operation, and an interesting one. The operation properties give you ways to regroup the quantities. "The distributive law is of fundamental importance" - Good to know. "accustomed to solving such problems by division" - It occurs to me that I should learn how the rules of transforming expressions work. This might mean tracing the meanings back to the basics, and for doing this, it might be good to have a list of concepts and skills and the visual models that represent them. "solving equations of the form" - It's interesting and helpful that we teach equations by grouping them by their form. It's worth asking why these groupings. "the number satisfying the equation" - I'm kind of impatient to get to graphing because I feel like it makes it easier for me to work out these solutions. Visualizations are reassuring and satisfying at least. "Analogous arithmetical and algebraic solutions" - I wonder why parents don't complain that algebra overcomplicates arithmetic. If they did, how would the teacher argue for algebra? == Grade 7 == "two different possible next steps" - I hadn't thought that there would be more than one way to simplify an expression. Reversing the distributive property is new to me. == Grade 8 == "Properties of Integer Exponents" - I'll need to see how these work. "we define 10^0 = 1 because" - Ah, a different explanation from the one I'd seen, which was based on division. Very interesting. And I used to think these questions were mysteries I'd have to dig for the answers to. Of course, maybe some of them still are. "sqrt p is defined to mean" - Why? "Know that sqrt 2 is irrational" - How did we find that out? How do we calculate it? I've seen an algorithm online somewhere. "visual representation of the relationship" - What does graphing do for us exactly? How does a visual representation help? "geometry of similar triangles" - Interesting! I'm looking forward to relating geometry and algebra. "easier for students than reasoning through a numerical solution" - Ah, good, an example of how algebra helps. "Linear equations also arise" - How did we get the idea to graph equations? What other kinds of coordinate systems are there, and how would the same equations look in each? "problems that lead to simultaneous equations" - The theater problem is actually an interesting one. It's a good example of a situation where math would give me a handle on a question that's too complex for me to guess at. I might like simultaneous equations. [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Comments]] [[Category:Complete]] a28cf72d4cce6037c6abdfe4236256e8d3ad8423 0 78 196 2016-03-06T03:45:29Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the article. wikitext text/x-wiki These are my comments on the Common Core Math Progressions document [http://achievethecore.org/file/1174 Statistics & Probability: Grades 6-8] (PDF). Statistics and probability aren't the most scintillating topics to me, but they're extremely important for most of the non-math subjects that do interest me. == Overview == "random sampling, a probabilistic concept" - I usually think of probability and statistics as two sides of a coin, but I'm sure that isn't their real relationship, since I'm ignorant about them, so it'll be good to learn that. So far I see that statistics depends on probability for random sampling. == Grade 6 == "interquartile range" - This is all more than I remember learning about statistics in school. And even at the time I noticed that they never seemed to teach us probability. It's like they changed the curriculum and our class ended up skipping it. == Grade 7 == "Chance processes and probability models" - Something I've always wondered is how probability works. It seems like magic to me. "structure is known" -> probability; "structure is unknown" -> statistics - What a concise and informative comparison! "'What proportion ...'" - Is this using proportion in the same sense as in the ratio progression? "taking a sample of 50 chips" - I'd probably get tired of this exercise quickly, since it seems tedious and I wouldn't immediately see the point. Asking myself how one would normally do the real task in the real world (e.g., surveying a bunch of people) might help me appreciate the purpose and also the ease of doing a simulation. "Why are sample sizes in public opinion polls" - If this was the point of the exercise, I'd like to have it spelled out at the beginning. I'll look ahead for things like that when I'm going through the curriculum. Keeping the goals in mind helps me pay attention to the right things while I'm working. "some knowledge of the amount of variation to expect" - At this point I got distracted imagining how I would teach people about variation and why they'd need to know it. [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Comments]] [[Category:Complete]] 91e824fe2e4255bd1e55df71fda46b654f97cf63 0 79 197 2016-03-06T03:46:02Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the article. wikitext text/x-wiki These are my comments on the Common Core Math Progressions document [http://achievethecore.org/file/1176 The Number System: Grades 6-8 & Number and Quantity Standards (number part): High School] (PDF). === Overview === "mysterious acceptance that 'of' must mean multiplication" - Yes, I've never quite understood that translation. I suppose this explanation with the commutative property makes sense. The scaling model also seems to make sense of it. === Grade 6 === "measurement interpretation of division" - This makes me think of remainders and fractions as results of division and ask how they're related. What does it mean that 9 / 4 = 4 * 2 + 1 = 2 1/4? The larger point is that there are all kinds of angles on these operations to relate to each other. I may want to try to identify what can be related in case the curriculum doesn't do it all and I want to explore them. It's probably not necessary, but it could help with the flexible thinking needed for problem solving. Noting examples like this one I happen to think of will help me think about what to look for. "8/3 ÷ 2/3 = 4, because 4 is how many" - If you're muddle headed like me, you might be confused about what to do with which parts of this problem, and remembering something about dividing lengths of the number line into smaller parts from some earlier problem, you might try to solve this by dividing each third into thirds and then count off two of them at a time, which would give you 12. If you were on a better track, you might remember that third is a unit here, so you're just dividing 8 by 2. But if you're still a bit muddled, you might not know why one is a more correct approach than the other, so it would help to explore how the grammar of such an equation translates into a procedure. "linguistically different ... mathematically the same" - In this case it's because the answer to "how many" is "a fraction of one," which leads to the second question, "how much of one?" "find a common unit" - If you're working only with the visual model and not applying rules like "multiply the denominators," how would you decide on the common unit? "2/3 of a cup fills 3/4 of the container" - When there are multiple fractions in a situation, it starts to get hard to think about. It would help to have frameworks or guidelines for thinking about such problems, things to notice and ways to relate them. For example, you could make sure to pay attention to the units (cup, container) and what number is "of" another number (the liquid is filling an amount of the container). "The shaded area is 3/4 of the entire strip." - Maybe this will be clear with practice, but at first glance I'm confused by how the diagram relates to the equations. "leads us directly to the invert-and-multiply" - Ah, another procedure I've been wondering about. "denominator equal to a power of 10" - So are the denominators of irrational numbers infinity? What would that mean? I still need to find out how long division works in terms of place value and fractions and such. "prime factorization ... can be time-consuming and distract" - What do you have to say to that, James Milgram? They skip it on purpose. "In some cases 0 has an essential meaning" - Yes, though it seems relatively rare that 0 means what people normally think of, which is nothing, so that negative numbers are somehow less than nothing. It just means some chosen reference point. "line segments acquire direction" - That relates to a conclusion I came to when initially thinking about numbers in this project, that numbers, at least signed ones, are vectors, since they have both magnitude and direction. So even a simple number has some level of complexity. "larger in magnitude" - So there is a sense in which -7 is larger than -5. === Grade 7 === "the number located a distance |q|" - Interesting bringing absolute value into addition. "one-dimensional vector addition" - Aha! "integer chips are not suited" - I think Chapin and Johnson bring up another problem with using chips. "how you get from" - This way of expressing subtraction is very clear to me. "rely increasingly on the properties of operations" - I both welcome and dread this. Welcome because it's moving along the development of mathematical thinking that Tall describes toward abstract reasoning. Dread because I feel like it'll be harder for me to get a sense of what the math means without visual models. "a choice we make" - Are there really no real world situations where it applies? "you want to be able to say that" - What would happen if the distributive property didn't apply to negative numbers? And how would we know it didn't? I think the demonstration of multiplying p and q shows why the distributive property applies. "can extend division" - We are definitely getting into territory that ties my brain in knots, at least until I get more used to these ways of thinking about fractions. Right now my mind automatically applies the rules I learned, but I know I don't really understand what they mean. "an extension of the fraction notation" - Very interesting. This gets to C&J's list of interpretations of fractions. It's like some kind of trick. Somehow we apply a meaning of fractional notation that makes sense for one kind of number to another kind of number, where it still makes sense in one way but is nonsensical in another. I must ponder this when I get back to it in the curriculum. It's interesting that the physical world is limited in the ways it can directly express math, yet somehow we can still use other parts of math to reason about the world. I've read that some of these uses of math are like shortcuts for making real-world calculations, such as the use of imaginary numbers for the time dimension in equations related to the Big Bang. I'm sure math plays other indirect roles. I'll try to explore those as I go. "a sort of address system" - Is this not true for fractions with denominators that aren't powers of ten? Maybe this analogy is just meant to illustrate the progressive refinement of increasing the denominator or something. "1/3 is always sitting one third of the way" - How do we know this? Apparently the answer ("a rigorous treatment of this mysterious infinite expansion") will have to wait till after middle school. === Grade 8 === == High School, Number == === The Real Number System === "rational exponents" - Are there irrational exponents? "good practice for mathematical reasoning habits" - Is there really no practical relevance for irrational numbers? For example, knowing a number is irrational means you expect to be able to calculate it more precisely if needed. Is that too trivial? === Complex Numbers === How did we conclude complex numbers exist, that the square root of -1 has an actual solution? How do we know when some operation doesn't have a solution, such as dividing by zero? [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Comments]] [[Category:Complete]] 7ac75c69b0b5afababaefec2d9d924318ee90f44 0 80 198 2016-03-06T03:48:14Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the article. wikitext text/x-wiki These are my comments on the Common Core Math Progressions document [http://achievethecore.org/file/1180 Functions: Grades 8-High School] (PDF). == Overview == "this document does not treat in detail all of the material studied" - At this point I'm not trying very hard to understand, since I'm sure they're about to get into territory I barely remember and they're not going into much detail. I'll understand it when I get there in the curriculum, and the faster I get through the progressions, the sooner I can start. "reasonable in the context" - It's kind of annoying that you can't figure everything out just by looking at the calculations, but it could be interesting to think about the relationship between the math and its context. And are mathematicians missing something by divorcing math from any context and thinking of it as a symbol manipulation game? "algebraic expressions may not be suitable" - I'm looking forward to learning the other options. == Grade 8 == "a linear function does not have a slope" - Why not? Just because it's not visual in itself? Is the function different from whatever you use to calculate the slope of its graph? "describe the relationships qualitatively" - Yes, it's good to remember that people are still human when they think about math. == High School == === Interpreting Functions === "Although it is common to say" - These kinds of language distinctions are important to me, so I want to come back to this when I get here in the curriculum. Actually I'm thinking of revisiting all the progressions as I go through the curriculum. "the vertical line test is problematic" - I don't know what this is about, but it sounds like the kind of thing I want to know. The discussion distinguishes between a flawed method and a better one, and it tries to get down to the real issue in the mathematical task it's addressing. "The square root function" - I've read that +/- 3 isn't the right solution but not why, so I'm glad they cover this. There's so much useful, in-depth information in the Common Core that I think people who dismiss it are cheating themselves. Unless they don't care to know math, in which case they may still be cheating themselves. "all students are expected to develop fluency" - At this point I do wonder why we make everyone learn so much math. Most people don't ever need these functions after school. How does it benefit them? If they're relevant to the kinds of statistics that inform public policy, that would be a good reason, but otherwise the only reasons I can come up with sound like rationalizations. "looking for and making use of structure" - This seems to be what some people mean when they talk about patterns, rather than simply noting and interpreting ambiguous, surface patterns like sequences. "To avoid this problem" - I'm glad these exercises are on Illustrative Mathematics. It might make me more likely to remember to come back to them when I'm in the curriculum. === Building Functions === "subtleties and pitfalls" - Sounds like fun. :) Until I get into it and feel the strain. "from scratch ... special recipes" - Yes, that's what I'm hoping this time, to learn the principles behind the recipes, so I can make my own math. "Some students might" - I'm glad I figured out early that it's a basic feature of math that operations can be converted into each other. It helped me understand some other reading I was doing today. It's important to look at math from different angles like that one--what math means, how it works, etc. I'm sure there are other angles I haven't learned about yet. My notes are starting to get repetitive, so I'm going to speed through the rest of the progressions. === Linear and Exponential Models === === Trigonometric Functions === I like that mathematicians have so fully studied circles. It's nice to completely understand something, at least the things you consider important about it. I wonder if it's possible to design a good, single diagram that displays all of a circle's important mathematical features. "Prove and apply trigonometric identities" - I'd like to try translating mathematical proofs into some other logical notation, just to clarify how the grammar of math relates to the grammar of logic. They're not the same thing. [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Comments]] [[Category:Complete]] fca233d0883f135288928e894a5683f5859600f3 0 81 199 2016-03-06T03:48:48Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the article. wikitext text/x-wiki These are my comments on the Common Core Math Progressions document [http://achievethecore.org/file/1179 Algebra: High School] (PDF). == Overview == "This insight allows for the method" - Occasionally I pause and have to find the point again--why are we learning these things? What's interesting or useful about them? Right now I'm thinking of the set of all math facts as an infinite, dense, undifferentiated field of necessary possibilities. That is, they're concepts that could become instantiated by real events and would then dictate certain features and outcomes of the situation. When we use or study a particular math concept, we're letting it stand out from the field for some reason. Maybe it helps us accomplish certain real-world goals; maybe it's a general concept that leads us to others we care about; maybe it gives us an organized way to think about the larger concepts they're a part of. == Seeing Structure in Expressions == "try possible manipulations mentally" - Keep this in mind as a skill. "simplest form ... [vs] equivalent forms that are suitable" - Important distinction. == Arithmetic with Polynomials and Rational Expressions == "equivalent expressions ... naming some underlying thing" - It would be nice to explore both approaches, (1) identifying the function the equivalent expressions define and (2) using the properties of operations to transform polynomials, treating polynomials as elements of a formal number system. Apparently a particular curriculum will or should use only one of the approaches, I assume to minimize confusion. "Polynomials form a rich ground" - Sounds great. I wonder what features will transform these math terms from vague concepts into familiar ones. Will I imagine a paradigmatic graph? Will I have in mind paradigmatic uses for each kind of formula? All of this reminds me of the progressive, building nature of math. I wonder what ways you could gamify math education. I'm sure people have at least started to do that somewhere. "Binomial Theorem" - Long equations like this look a little terrifying. I wonder if it would help me learn them with less intimidation if I knew how they were (or could be) developed. It looks like that's one of the exercises for learning this theorem ("why this rule follows algebraically from ..."). "construct polynomial functions with specified zeros" - I imagine the thought processes are similar to writing a program to achieve a particular result. "a computer algebra system" - This reminds me of reading [https://mitpress.mit.edu/sicp/ SICP], which so far is almost as much about math as it is about programming. This reminds me that knowing math might make the difference in my programming classes between sitting in a puddle of insecurity and participating energetically. This makes me wonder if I could approach my math education partly by thinking about what I'd like to know comfortably when I have math discussions with other people. What would I like to be able to reason about with them? == Creating Equations == "much more strategic in formulating" - It's like a game. This happens a lot in the games I play. "solution to an equation might involve more" - At what point does math get more complicated than is useful to an average person? I'm sure we've passed that point in these progressions. But how much math does a programmer generally need to know? This makes me think of the GCF discussion in SICP, which is used in later sections of the book. The main mathematical issue in programming is probably deciding on an algorithm. Sometimes you know of several that will achieve a solution. The way math algorithms are presented often makes it sound like mathematicians are only guessing with a shrug about good or best ways to calculate a formula. Well, how did we come up with the formulas in the first place, and does that give us any clues about good/best algorithms? It's kind of disturbing that algorithms don't seem as perfect or logically necessary as math generally is. == Reasoning with Equations and Inequalities == [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Comments]] [[Category:Complete]] 2860a813e17360babcf0151e470ca02574926aa7 0 82 200 2016-03-06T03:49:36Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the article. wikitext text/x-wiki These are my comments on the Common Core Math Progressions document [http://achievethecore.org/file/1178 Statistics & Probability: High School] (PDF). == Overview == "Probability is presented as an essential tool" - Right up my alley. And I'm so glad I'm studying this now, because I somehow missed it in school. I did take a statistics course in college though. It was for psychology majors. It was also at 8 in the morning. == Interpreting categorical and quantitative data == "decide on the median or mean" - I've always wondered this. I probably learned it in college and forgot. "accounting for possible effects of extreme data points" - I always wonder what to do with these. It sounds like there are ways of dealing with them that are more disciplined than the hand wringing I do. Honestly I feel like I'm guessing half the time I try to do anything meaningful with statistics. "Perhaps a better (and simpler) model" - Fitting lines to data is a good example of the importance of learning about functions. "always the possibility of a closer fit" - Does statistical software run through possibilities at least semi-automatically? It should. == Making inferences and justifying conclusions == "repeatedly drawing random samples of size 50" - Very interesting! I wonder if this technique has a name. I imagine there's a way to calculate the findings without actually drawing the samples. "no extreme data points" - Is there a mathematical way to determine if a data point is extreme, if you can't quite tell by looking? "re-randomizing" - Another interesting technique. == Conditional probability and the rules of probability == == Using probability to make decisions == == Where the Statistics and Probability Progression might lead == This is good info for students. I think probability and statistics is one of the most useful areas of math for the general population. So much human knowledge is statistical. [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Comments]] [[Category:Complete]] 95e32ed943e9ddcb446183be74c9f3bc3f1c7d96 0 83 201 2016-03-06T03:50:05Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the article. wikitext text/x-wiki These are my comments on the Common Core Math Progressions document [http://achievethecore.org/file/1181 Modeling: High School] (PDF). == Introduction == == Modeling in K-12 == == The Modeling Process == "Complex models are often built hierarchically" - I've wondered. I thought the designers of those were just geniuses. "nominal dollars ... [vs] constant dollars" - You really do have to understand the context to choose the right model. I don't understand these money concepts, and I'm sure I'd get the model wrong. == Modeling in High School == === The Modeling Cycle === "Judgment, approximation, and critical thinking" - This will be a leap in difficulty, so it's important to prepare students for it and guide them through it. I think modeling will help some of them understand that math is useful. Some will still wonder why *they* have to learn math, since they won't be using it for any of these situations. They're content to let experts do the math for them. === Units and Modeling === === Modeling and the Standards for Mathematical Practice === "mathematics and statistics" - I wonder why people separate these. "a capstone experience" - That's my impression. This progression hasn't taught anything new mathematically, just tied together what was taught in the other areas. "looking for entry points" - Yes, this is how I was thinking of the process. "reason inductively about data" - This is all the kind of reasoning people have to do in general, not just about math. It's probably worth mentioning this to students. Mathematical modeling is good practice, though I can see some students protesting that they could practice on the non-mathematical problems they actually care about. Math provides some rigor, though, that keeps a learner from fudging. But it's worth thinking through the parallels between mathematical modeling and reasoning in other contexts. "educed from some context" - I thought this was a typo. I learned a new word. "technology can enable" - I'm glad the standards don't ignore technology and insist that students do all the math with the power of their minds. Technology exists, and students will use it both as students and in their careers. Plus mathematicians use it. "the issue of uncertainty" - I'm glad the standards list all these aspects of modeling. It's a complex enough activity that a list will help me feel less overwhelmed. === Modeling and Reasonableness of Answers === "Stat-Spotting" - Sounds like a helpful book. === Statistics and Probability === == Developing High School Modeling == "situations that can become more complex" - You know, the Standards might move more slowly in the upper grades and not cover as many concepts as our curriculum did, but modeling sure sounds demanding, and I don't think we did much of it. === Linear and Exponential Models === "a distance d in t hours" - This reminds me that I'd like to learn physics alongside math, partly as a source of math applications to help me think about how math relates to the world. I don't know if I'll want to take the time for all that though. I might put physics off till later. "comparing quantities and making decisions" - Good point, and it's hard to argue with the fuel-efficient car example. People probably aren't going to bring their car buying decision to their local math expert. Or they should feel bad if they do, if they really could figure it out themselves. "horizontal intercept ... is the break-even point" - It's interesting to see this everyday example being expressed in mathematical terms and to know they're relevant to the problem. Being technical has a point. I wonder if students would be more interested in math if more of the examples came from everyday parts of their lives like video games. You could model Pokemon and learn interesting things about it that could help your gameplay. "question the assumptions" - Math gives you a more disciplined way to do this. Many of the assumptions have to be articulated as parts of the equations, so they're easier to notice and vary later. "learn to question why" - This is a good discussion of the example. It would be good to observe what kinds of questions come up in these discussions. What does math make it easier to ask? === Counting, Probability, Odds and Modeling === "reconcile accounts of probability" - Very interesting and important. Another set of examples it's hard to argue with. "everyday language and feelings" - Also interesting and important. "the birthday problem provides rich learning experiences" - Indeed! They get a lot of mileage of it. === Key Features to Model === === Formulas as Models === "Formulas are mathematical models" - I've been using formulas as a general term for expressions, equations, and whatever else, so I'll need to pick a different term. "mulch" - Another good example. You can't always just look mathematical things up or plug them into an app, although you might in this case. But sometimes you have to solve things dynamically, in uncommon situations that arise as life happens and aren't anticipated by software developers. Or instead of searching for an app, you could solve it yourself and feel more in control of the situation. I think those subjective benefits should be emphasized. There's a sense of satisfaction and power in doing math. It might also help to present examples humorously in terms of regret--"if only he had paid more attention in math class." "used in forensic science" - Interesting. An application of an application of math. == Where the Modeling Progression might lead == "extend simpler models" - Is this circular motion example supposed to be one that can be understood simply at first and then be examined more in depth as new concepts are introduced? [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Comments]] [[Category:Complete]] d84e5a319a99bb83fd797025da9f5232c6181b6e 0 84 202 2016-03-06T03:55:11Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the article. wikitext text/x-wiki Comments on the [http://www.corestandards.org/Math/Practice/ Common Core Standards for Mathematical Practice]. After having read the Progressions, I'm reading these because they're starting to sound important. When I first read the K-8 standards, it was just to get ideas for creating my own curriculum, and I didn't think I needed the MP standards for that. I want to break these descriptions out into lists so the pieces are easier to work with for various purposes. Side note: I really like the font in the CC standards. I might try to match it for my personal font, if Google or whoever has something close. == Make sense of problems and persevere in solving them. == "explain correspondences between" - This reminds me of just how many math concepts there are to learn. It's a little intimidating. At the same time I suspect there are fewer than it seems because so many words are used to describe them. This reminds me that the CC standards are stated in terms of tasks, and the concepts are buried in the tasks. Furthermore, some of the concepts are split across tasks, probably mainly in the lower grades (e.g., working within certain number ranges in certain grades). I'll need to separate out the concepts and combine them when it makes sense. Separating things out would involve attending to the different levels and modes of concepts, especially whether something is a procedure or a reason for a procedure. I've often thought during my math reading that if you want puzzles to solve, you don't have to go any farther than your math textbooks, assuming the exercises are well written. == Reason abstractly and quantitatively. == Ah, all that talk of context relates to this standard, and it's only half the picture. I hadn't connected abstraction (decontextualization) and contextualization. "Quantitative reasoning entails" - I suspect once I get more familiar with math, I'll be able to introspect about the quantitative aspects of a situation like I do about its personal aspects. == Construct viable arguments and critique the reasoning of others. == == Model with mathematics. == == Use appropriate tools strategically. == == Attend to precision. == == Look for and make use of structure. == "drawing an auxiliary line" - So hopefully learning more geometry will give me clues for solving the world's hardest easy geometry problem. "step back for an overview and shift perspective" - I do this for non-mathematical situations a lot. It's nice to see this technique applies to math too. "single objects or as being composed" - Tall's procepts. == Look for and express regularity in repeated reasoning. == Isn't a generalization from specific data a conjecture, and doesn't it have to be proven afterward? I'm looking forward to learning how this happens. [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Comments]] [[Category:Complete]] c273804af0abb1ebbacab305a288e99fd0b8aac3 14 85 203 2016-03-06T04:00:24Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the category. wikitext text/x-wiki These are my comments on someone else's work. You'll probably have to refer to the original source to make sense of my remarks. [[Category:Genres]] c4693b50811e8d1ecb3c362141ee9d24dec692c6 0 86 204 2016-03-26T15:05:44Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the article. wikitext text/x-wiki == Introduction == This article is a collection of thoughts on the nature of mental concentration and an informal record of my experiments with improving mine. I've grouped them into topical sections, but otherwise the organization is a jumble right now because I wrote things as I thought of them, and in the interests of posting quickly, I only lightly edited the content. I'll revise it all later and give it a better flow. Try these techniques if they seem promising for you, but you might need other methods. Different brains work differently, and different circumstances will need different approaches. When I say "you" in these notes, I mean me. I wrote this to myself. The key features of my situation are that (1) I spend a lot of time doing complex knowledge work at a computer, (2) it's often not what I want to be doing because it's boring and tedious or downright difficult, and (3) I'm easily distracted by easier and more interesting tasks that arise from my mind or my environment from moment to moment. There are people for whom focus and determination seem to come naturally. I'm glad for these people, but I'm not like them. I need lots of help. Any problem will involve multiple factors, and the solution will presumably involve changing one or more of them. That gives you several approaches to try. In these thoughts I'll address various facets of the problem. Keep in mind that some of these ideas are untested, mostly the ones phrased tentatively. == General == Here are some first steps for a knowledge work session. These apply to me and not necessarily everyone else: # Get the task list and other tools ready, and put yourself in the frame of mind to add things to them whenever the job gets hard. # Get in the frame of mind to regularly draw information from the depths of your mind. This is one of my biggest barriers to work. One helpful image is of a conveyor that continually runs from my abdomen (where the information is deeply stored) out through my forehead. If I sit there with my eyes closed for a minute, I can usually grab enough of a thread that I can pull out the rest of what I need. # Minimize distractions physically and mentally. # Read this list to remind yourself of what you need. One size does not fit all when it comes to focusing. I need different techniques, images, or messages for different states of mind. States of mind: * Sleepy - I tend to be very distractible in this state and not to care about diligence. * Distracted - Another topic is on my mind, and I want to think about only that. * Disengaged - Not distracted, but not wanting to fill my mind with my work, usually because it's hard or boring. One thing to try for the distracted state is to find a transition topic, something that draws and holds my attention but doesn't lead me down another rabbit trail. Then I can let that go and move into work. For example, when I'm distracted, I could spend some time writing about what I'd really prefer to be doing. That might be more satisfying than jotting one line in a task list. == Fatigue == Honestly I think half of this advice becomes unnecessary, or at least more effective, if you follow this [https://twitter.com/picardtips/status/700889294576099329 Picard management tip]: "When you've gotten enough sleep, an impossible task becomes an interesting challenge." Since I usually haven't, during the workday my mind is frequently in a desperate state of grasping for life and energy, and for me life and energy come more from non-work activities than from work. [https://m.signalvnoise.com/sleep-deprivation-is-not-a-badge-of-honor-f24fbff47a75#.fr9ml1h5p David Heinemeier Hansson knows what I'm talking about]. This desperation will come through a lot in the thoughts that follow, and it doesn't paint the most flattering picture of me. But I think there are helpful insights and techniques to be gained from studying my mind's dissatisfied and fatigue-addled state, so I present them here. If you get tired: * Stretch. * Stand up and walk around. If you get tired of working on the same thing for a long time, break up the time and alternate that work with other types of tasks, if possible. Dividing up tasks and recording them in a list really does help take off the strain. It keeps tedious work from feeling endless. Since I get so tired in the afternoon, at least when I've had too little sleep, I should try to do easier tasks then. When I'm really tired, I'm really distractable. I don't feel the importance of staying focused or the satisfaction I'll feel at the end of my work. My world is reduced to the moment and the fact that I want to be doing something else that will liven me up and not take so much effort. Maybe there's nothing wrong with a little break for that purpose, just not a long rabbit trail. Often when I'm very distractable, time and work feel endless, so work feels oppressive and time feels unimportant. So I can afford to waste time, and I ''should'' waste it to keep work from smothering me. That's why I want objectives for my work sessions--to give my work some definition--and I think listing my tasks more consistently would help with my sense of time. When I find that I'm tired, I need to pause and redouble my efforts on focusing. I'm noticing I can concentrate okay in the morning when I take the time to get focused, but by midday my focus has frayed. Work tires me out; I see the amount of time I still have to work; and potential distractions have seeped in simply from those few hours of thinking. It's worse when I'm tired, because at a certain point the distractions feel *way* more important than work and I just stop caring about diligence. Until it's the end of the day and I feel I have to work longer to be fair to my employer. So I need to find a way to keep working even in those conditions. == Motivation == I feel satisfied when I achieve goals, and I work more intently when I'm pursuing them, especially when the time frame is short or I just want to get past them, usually so I can pursue another goal afterward. So a good addition to my work preparation would be to list objectives for that day or work session and maybe their purposes. Backward planning would help here. Keep track of what motivates you. I find that creating things I can use to make my life better is one motivation. Helping people is another. Gratitude isn't really one, such as gratitude for having a job. I can imagine motivating scenarios for the work I'm doing if my determination is flagging. Determined work looks different from the inside than the outside, so I'm not sure imagining myself being industrious would really work. But sometimes I feel inspired when I hear about other people being industrious, so I can imagine that. I keep a list of these people so I can remind myself of them. The suggestion that I can be interested in my work when at first it doesn't appeal to me is motivating. I got this idea from Nick Fiore's flow exercise in ''The Now Habit''. The idea takes different forms, depending on the target for interest. I can be interested in the problem I'm solving, in the process of solving it, in the blocks I feel to working on it. I can be interested in the possibility of finding surprising interest in what I'm doing. And through mindfulness meditation, I've found that I really can find interest in the present moment. In fact, curiosity about the moment's minute subtleties is what I'm relying on to keep me focused on it. When I'm in a foggy, dazed state of mind, I often just follow whatever ideas enter my head instead of filtering them. Part of the problem is that often I'm not engaged with my work. I don't really care about it, and so I'm not deeply focused on it. Maybe I can use the techniques of [http://www.immanuelapproach.com/ Immanuel prayer] or hypnosis to enter into it before I start working. This is different from simply focusing in general. It's focusing on the particular subject matter of my work. So what would a guided descent into a topic look like? It would be a sequence of questions guided by the responses, and the questions would include these: * What are you experiencing right now about your work? * What tasks are you facing? * Which one would you like to start with? * Where are you on that task now? * What's involved in it? * What is it like to work on this kind of task? * What can it be like to work on it, given the right state of mind and methods? * What would make this task easier? * What will it be like to finish this task? * Is there a goal that depends on this task, or is there something you'd like to work on after it's done? * Is there anything outside of work that's preoccupying you? I haven't tried this yet. Remind yourself of how much better things will be when you finish the current task or project. That will help it not seem so endless. == Difficult work == When faced with a project you don't want to do, [[Procrastination|just get started]]. In doing this, it helps to have in mind some ways to make the job less daunting, boring, or otherwise unpleasant. These ways are skills, so it'll take practice to make them automatic. They are also tasks that can be put off, so you have to just get started on them too. The limits of my own mind are a chief demotivator for me, at least when doing knowledge work. So it helps to have external tools at the ready to extend its capabilities: * A physical notepad for free-form problem solving. * A task manager app for splitting into subtasks, tracking progress, and noting distractions for later attention. I use <a href="https://nirvanahq.com/">Nirvana</a>. * A wiki app for recording and searching free-form notes. I use <a href="https://evernote.com/">Evernote</a>. Whenever possible, survey your project's tasks, and put them in your task manager. You may have to do this multiple times during the project whenever new tasks become apparent or an existing tasks turns out to be complicated. Side note, I'm using the terms ''job'' and ''project'' synonymously. When you're starting a job or task and you feel stuck, not knowing what to do, sit with your eyes closed, and ask yourself a few questions: * What needs attention? * What is a current objective in this project? (What was I doing just now, or what am I doing next?) * What can I look at that will help me find these answers? When you have even a word, write it in one of your tools, probably the task manager. If that brings more info, keep writing. Otherwise, go back to closed-eyed sitting. Remember that "List tasks" is a task that can be listed! That will at least let you feel like you've accomplished something, however small, and that your project is a little more concrete, and those may encourage you enough for your ideas to flow a little faster. You can also list questions for the same effect. Plus they'll remind you later of what you still need to find out. Once you've brainstormed the latest tasks, clean up the list and put it in order. Look at the list. If there's something you can do now and you don't feel like listing more tasks, do the thing! Keep track of the degree to which different kinds of tasks are hard or absorbing for you. When you're looking at the task list and a task seems large, complicated, and daunting, note it as a task to split into subtasks. You can even list a task for splitting it. When you pause for a break, make it obvious where you left off. Make a note somewhere, or leave your work out in a way that it's clear what you were doing. If you come back and it's not obvious, sit and draw out from your mind what you need to do next. At the start of the work session, gather all the materials you think you'll need so you don't have to stop to gather them so much during the session. If it's hard to keep in mind everything you'll need, list them at the start of the session. If more materials are needed in the middle, gather them all at once rather than one at a time. If a task becomes more complicated, slow down and be patient. If you run into a hard task, figure out the very next step you need to take, and then just get started. If your setup or materials are hard to work with, modify them if possible. When my task list gets long and I don't want to keep reordering everything, I'm starring my current item to keep my place. It's okay to remake problem-solving diagrams that have become messy. In fact, I should probably expect to do that. When my mind is stuck not knowing what I need to do next, especially when I'm tired, I find that looking at relevant things to help me jog my thinking is important. Physical cues seem to be more helpful for me than mental cues, maybe partly because they're more immediately available. I sometimes have to drag up the mental cues along with the info they're supposed to be cuing. Of course, I also have to drag up which physical cues to consult, but in their case I only have to call to mind the identity and location of the cue and not all its details. When I have only mental info to draw on, recording my thoughts gives me physical cues to return to. I think one reason writing helps me feel better in general is that I'm gradually relieved of the burden of having to recall the info from only my mind. When thinking about where to find the info I'm looking for, it helps to think about where or how I wish I could find it so I can possibly reorganize the material. It also helps, of course, to think about how I'll search for it in the material as it is. When a task feels hard, I feel defeated before I even start. So I try to escape by distracting myself, and when I come back to the task, I feel even more defeated because I failed to stick with it. One way out of the initial defeat might be to ask myself what would count as a victory in this case. That is, what is the key obstacle to moving forward, and what would it look like to succeed? What is the general scenario on the other side of the obstacle? Even if I don't know the specifics yet (ignorance could be the obstacle), I usually have ''some'' idea of what a successful result would be. Visualizing that result can be motivating as well as giving you some kind of concrete goal. The next step is to look at the situation in front of you and then to plan the steps between the two scenarios. Ask yourself what feels hard about what you see. Then it might help get the work moving if you just try the first step toward a solution you think of. Later you can collect more ideas and conduct a more orderly process. If the first step you think of immediately fails, then think a little more and follow the next step you come up with. Sometimes it's hard to gain momentum when I'm dealing with a programming project with a lot of hard tasks in a row. It might help to journal about each hard task as it comes up. For me journaling is in some ways like collaborating is for other people. It helps me focus on my tasks and clarify my thoughts. The idea of a lot of these techniques is to make hard tasks easier and thus more inviting by creating stepping stones across them. I also want to experiment with more problem solving techniques, ways of easing my mind into a problem and smoothing the path to a solution, such as planning an algorithm in columns for the different types of info they need. == Distractions == Keep track of the degree to which different things distract you. Familiar instrumental music tends to be my least distracting background activity. If you get distracted, gently bring yourself back to your work, and reset your frame of mind, if needed. When considering what to do with a distraction, ask yourself if it will still be waiting for you later and if you'll already get some timely reminder of it, if it's time sensitive at all. If yes, then see if you can drop it and keep working. If you need a reminder, put it in your distractions list. Don't "just take care of it," because it'll take longer than you think or want. Be aware of when you're taking an action that you think will only take a minute but could lead to a much longer distraction, and decide before you take it not to continue on past the first step. When you're tempted to let your mind wander, remind yourself that even if you feel like you're being tortured by work, you'll still be happier if you focus. Craig Hassed notes, "You might feel tempted to answer that we are happiest when the mind is wandering to pleasant topics. In fact, according to a study from Harvard University, people report being happiest while their mind is not wandering from what they are doing" ("<a href="http://www.yvg.vic.edu.au/file.php?fileID=5502">The health benefits of meditation and being mindful</a>"). One reason I might feel more like following my distractions than working is that they're there, reminding me of how great they are. If I kept them at a distance by not making them so available, it might be easier to absorb myself in my work. One problem I have with distractions is when they arise in my mind and they're so compelling that I feel I have to follow them right then. It'll probably just happen a bit at first, but when you see it happening and you can get yourself to stop, get yourself back into a frame of mind for focusing on work. Some mental imagery about the situation might help. Stopping the pursuit of a distraction might look like slamming on the brakes on a large, speeding truck. Maybe it skids to a stop but flips over from its momentum. Returning to work might look like entering a thicket of brambles and pushing your way through. On the other side is a soothing bath of aloe vera gel. (These are the kinds of odd, overly dramatic images that pop into my head.) What can also help is getting back into a mind frame of entering distractions into a task list so you know you can follow them later. Distractions can be passive or active. Passive distractions arise from my environment and pull my attention towards them. Active distractions are ones I look for, such as suddenly wanting to chat with someone. Passive distractions are the main kind to record in my distractions list. When I'm actively distracted, it might be worthwhile to observe the situation to see why I might be motivated to distract myself. I suspect it's usually because I've run up against a hard task without noticing. If the opportunity to take advantage of the distraction really is temporary, see if you can let go of it. When I feel very distractible, maybe it would help to repeatedly push myself just a little. I'd tell myself I'll do just a little more before I follow the distraction. Try a [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3lPrRdaH5XQ conveyor belt image] for addressing persistent distractions. The idea is to imagine thoughts on a conveyor belt coming toward you, and when they reach you, you drop them into buckets based on their categories. The categories are things like, "later this evening thoughts" or "anxious thoughts." One helpful little technique for when I'm feeling mindlessly distractible is to start asking myself, whenever I think of something to do, whether this is work. If it's not, then no. This is similar to ADD Crusher's [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MCyWnsX4boU "Is this what I'm doing now?"] Try a more distraction-free work environment by simply keeping your browsers closed except for the moments you need them for work. Ideally I want to be able to resist distractions, but I think for mental training, it's more effective to remove them. I think mental training works differently from weight training, where resistance is what's necessary. In mental training you have to give your mind the space and context to learn different ways of working. You put yourself in an environment compatible with the new way of thinking and then let your mind learn what it's like and conform to it. The absence of the usual stimuli is sometimes itself a form of resistance. One type of distraction occurs when I turn away from a hard spot in my work to do something more interesting. Why should this be necessary though? Why do the mild despair and boredom at hitting a mental block mean I have to do something to keep myself entertained? It occurs to me that I can become okay with feeling dead if it means I stick to my work rather than veering completely away from it. I might stare blankly at the screen for a minute (or two, or five), but at least I would minimize the time my work wasn't progressing. One thing I hate about getting distracted, at least at work, is that I completely forget what I was doing before, so when I come back to my task, I have to rack my brain to remember what it was. I think that shows how disengaged I am from my work at those times. == Meditation == Take time to reset your mind after a break, especially lunch. When I meditate successfully, I feel like I'm entering a different world, a dark, cushiony tunnel. Sometimes I need help entering it, so I'm looking for things that can help. Maybe the specific suggestions I give myself would do it. I think calming music also helps. Probably other environmental factors such as light level, temperature, and resting surface, but I have control over those less often. But I don't want to go to sleep usually, because I'm trying to focus for work. So I have to find a balance between drifting off and staying alert. Visualizing a conducive context could help entering the focused world, such as being wrapped in a warm blanket or even something more imaginative, such as being in a flow of water yet being able to breathe. So could remembering the feeling of focus I'm aiming for. One question I have about mindfulness meditation (MM) is whether the goal is focusing on one stimulus or simply attending to the present. I find that my mind has room to wander if it doesn't have multiple anchors, so I like the idea of paying attention to whatever's happening through whichever senses. But I'm not sure if that fosters the kind of focus I want. Maybe a middle ground would work, focusing on all the stimuli coming from a narrow range of sources, such as the sensations within my body rather than sounds from my environment. What I'm aiming for is a single stream of activity, like riding through a landscape in a minecart in ''Minecraft''. Distractions such as monsters come by, but I'm zipping along so fast that they don't seem important enough to hold my attention. For a while this has been the script of my focus exercise for work. They summarize a lot of my reflections on the subject: <blockquote> Focus with five deep breaths. Now ... If I focus instead of wandering, I'll be happy. I'll be like the industrious people I admire. When I finish this work, I'll feel relieved, happy, and satisfied. I'll be a source of relief to my coworkers. When a task gets harder, I can slow down and be curious about it. I can draw from my mind and find outside cues. I can work through it in my task list. I can diagram it on my notepad. When a distraction comes up, I can record it for later in my task manager. When a distraction is a fleeting opportunity, I can question it and maybe let it go. When I look for a distraction, I can let it go and address the underlying problem. Now ... List the day's or session's objectives and their purposes with backwards planning. List preliminary tasks. And gather all the materials you'll need. </blockquote> I put it in a text-to-speech program and output an audio file, which ideally I'll listen to most mornings and sometimes at other times during the workday. Something I keep losing sight of is that my focusing exercise isn't an impenetrable shield against distraction, at least at this point. If I turn on distraction generators like YouTube (listening to the videos while I work), my mind will make use of them. I need to keep in mind that a large part of the purpose of the exercise is to help me feel okay about creating a large distraction-free zone of time in which to work. Then the other part is to help me sweep away the remaining distractions. The website Gnostic Teachings gives a helpful technique in their [http://gnosticteachings.org/courses/gnostic-meditation/111-mental-discipline.html Mental Discipline lecture], mentally narrating your actions. <blockquote> You need to be more mindful during the day, you need to pay attention to what you are doing in every moment and do one thing at a time. And from that naturally your Meditation will deepen, your concentration will deepen. In the beginning, you can utilize the mind itself in this effort; if the mind will not be quiet on its own, make it focus on what you are doing by identifying your actions in thought. If you are washing the dishes, think, "I am doing the dishes, I am washing a fork." This can help you move toward doing things without thought. Eventually, you wash without thought, yet with perfect awareness. No thought. Just mindfulness. That power moves you deeper, that practice moves you deeper. </blockquote> I've tried using it to help me concentrate on complex tasks so I don't lose the thread of what I'm doing, as I do constantly when I'm not engaged with it. It does help. As usual, however, my practice petered out after a day or two. == Music == Something I'm trying is listening to minimalist music while working. Some kinds of music can lead to rabbit trails (because I want to research something about them), ambient music is calming but not engaging enough, a lot of music just bores me, but most minimalism I've heard is active enough to keep part of my brain occupied but not distracting enough to steal my attention. That's my hypothesis anyway. I think minimalism works for me because there's not much happening, but it happens a lot, so my brain has time to study it. It does explicitly what my mind does implicitly when it's trying to understand something: It retreads the same ground over and over, examining the pieces and their relationships. Minimalist music does seem to help. It gives me that zoney feeling, like when I'm daydreaming, except that I'm getting things done. Here's the Spotify playlist I created, [https://open.spotify.com/user/thinkulum/playlist/3BIcWQv3SdMngfikxyDEWB Minimalism for Focus]. Note that I will change it over time. == Choice of work == Reading all this, you may wonder why I don't just get a different job that's easier or that I enjoy more. I have a multipart answer to this: # For various reasons, I'm not ready to leave yet. # The kind of work I care about will always involve some of these difficulties, and I'm not willing to give it up for the sake of ease. So a better solution is to learn to focus, and I think of my current job as a training ground. But if you have trouble with your work, if those reasons don't apply to you, and if you have a chance to take an easier, more enjoyable job that will support you well enough and so on, then by all means take it. == Related blog entries == * [http://www.thinkulum.net/blog/category/topics/focus/ Category: Focus] [[Category:Productivity]] [[Category:Essay]] [[Category:Developing]] c8bea070e843944c58c83e6b2aec3e1c037550c7 205 204 2016-03-26T15:11:59Z Andy Culbertson 1 Fixed the Essays category. wikitext text/x-wiki == Introduction == This article is a collection of thoughts on the nature of mental concentration and an informal record of my experiments with improving mine. I've grouped them into topical sections, but otherwise the organization is a jumble right now because I wrote things as I thought of them, and in the interests of posting quickly, I only lightly edited the content. I'll revise it all later and give it a better flow. Try these techniques if they seem promising for you, but you might need other methods. Different brains work differently, and different circumstances will need different approaches. When I say "you" in these notes, I mean me. I wrote this to myself. The key features of my situation are that (1) I spend a lot of time doing complex knowledge work at a computer, (2) it's often not what I want to be doing because it's boring and tedious or downright difficult, and (3) I'm easily distracted by easier and more interesting tasks that arise from my mind or my environment from moment to moment. There are people for whom focus and determination seem to come naturally. I'm glad for these people, but I'm not like them. I need lots of help. Any problem will involve multiple factors, and the solution will presumably involve changing one or more of them. That gives you several approaches to try. In these thoughts I'll address various facets of the problem. Keep in mind that some of these ideas are untested, mostly the ones phrased tentatively. == General == Here are some first steps for a knowledge work session. These apply to me and not necessarily everyone else: # Get the task list and other tools ready, and put yourself in the frame of mind to add things to them whenever the job gets hard. # Get in the frame of mind to regularly draw information from the depths of your mind. This is one of my biggest barriers to work. One helpful image is of a conveyor that continually runs from my abdomen (where the information is deeply stored) out through my forehead. If I sit there with my eyes closed for a minute, I can usually grab enough of a thread that I can pull out the rest of what I need. # Minimize distractions physically and mentally. # Read this list to remind yourself of what you need. One size does not fit all when it comes to focusing. I need different techniques, images, or messages for different states of mind. States of mind: * Sleepy - I tend to be very distractible in this state and not to care about diligence. * Distracted - Another topic is on my mind, and I want to think about only that. * Disengaged - Not distracted, but not wanting to fill my mind with my work, usually because it's hard or boring. One thing to try for the distracted state is to find a transition topic, something that draws and holds my attention but doesn't lead me down another rabbit trail. Then I can let that go and move into work. For example, when I'm distracted, I could spend some time writing about what I'd really prefer to be doing. That might be more satisfying than jotting one line in a task list. == Fatigue == Honestly I think half of this advice becomes unnecessary, or at least more effective, if you follow this [https://twitter.com/picardtips/status/700889294576099329 Picard management tip]: "When you've gotten enough sleep, an impossible task becomes an interesting challenge." Since I usually haven't, during the workday my mind is frequently in a desperate state of grasping for life and energy, and for me life and energy come more from non-work activities than from work. [https://m.signalvnoise.com/sleep-deprivation-is-not-a-badge-of-honor-f24fbff47a75#.fr9ml1h5p David Heinemeier Hansson knows what I'm talking about]. This desperation will come through a lot in the thoughts that follow, and it doesn't paint the most flattering picture of me. But I think there are helpful insights and techniques to be gained from studying my mind's dissatisfied and fatigue-addled state, so I present them here. If you get tired: * Stretch. * Stand up and walk around. If you get tired of working on the same thing for a long time, break up the time and alternate that work with other types of tasks, if possible. Dividing up tasks and recording them in a list really does help take off the strain. It keeps tedious work from feeling endless. Since I get so tired in the afternoon, at least when I've had too little sleep, I should try to do easier tasks then. When I'm really tired, I'm really distractable. I don't feel the importance of staying focused or the satisfaction I'll feel at the end of my work. My world is reduced to the moment and the fact that I want to be doing something else that will liven me up and not take so much effort. Maybe there's nothing wrong with a little break for that purpose, just not a long rabbit trail. Often when I'm very distractable, time and work feel endless, so work feels oppressive and time feels unimportant. So I can afford to waste time, and I ''should'' waste it to keep work from smothering me. That's why I want objectives for my work sessions--to give my work some definition--and I think listing my tasks more consistently would help with my sense of time. When I find that I'm tired, I need to pause and redouble my efforts on focusing. I'm noticing I can concentrate okay in the morning when I take the time to get focused, but by midday my focus has frayed. Work tires me out; I see the amount of time I still have to work; and potential distractions have seeped in simply from those few hours of thinking. It's worse when I'm tired, because at a certain point the distractions feel *way* more important than work and I just stop caring about diligence. Until it's the end of the day and I feel I have to work longer to be fair to my employer. So I need to find a way to keep working even in those conditions. == Motivation == I feel satisfied when I achieve goals, and I work more intently when I'm pursuing them, especially when the time frame is short or I just want to get past them, usually so I can pursue another goal afterward. So a good addition to my work preparation would be to list objectives for that day or work session and maybe their purposes. Backward planning would help here. Keep track of what motivates you. I find that creating things I can use to make my life better is one motivation. Helping people is another. Gratitude isn't really one, such as gratitude for having a job. I can imagine motivating scenarios for the work I'm doing if my determination is flagging. Determined work looks different from the inside than the outside, so I'm not sure imagining myself being industrious would really work. But sometimes I feel inspired when I hear about other people being industrious, so I can imagine that. I keep a list of these people so I can remind myself of them. The suggestion that I can be interested in my work when at first it doesn't appeal to me is motivating. I got this idea from Nick Fiore's flow exercise in ''The Now Habit''. The idea takes different forms, depending on the target for interest. I can be interested in the problem I'm solving, in the process of solving it, in the blocks I feel to working on it. I can be interested in the possibility of finding surprising interest in what I'm doing. And through mindfulness meditation, I've found that I really can find interest in the present moment. In fact, curiosity about the moment's minute subtleties is what I'm relying on to keep me focused on it. When I'm in a foggy, dazed state of mind, I often just follow whatever ideas enter my head instead of filtering them. Part of the problem is that often I'm not engaged with my work. I don't really care about it, and so I'm not deeply focused on it. Maybe I can use the techniques of [http://www.immanuelapproach.com/ Immanuel prayer] or hypnosis to enter into it before I start working. This is different from simply focusing in general. It's focusing on the particular subject matter of my work. So what would a guided descent into a topic look like? It would be a sequence of questions guided by the responses, and the questions would include these: * What are you experiencing right now about your work? * What tasks are you facing? * Which one would you like to start with? * Where are you on that task now? * What's involved in it? * What is it like to work on this kind of task? * What can it be like to work on it, given the right state of mind and methods? * What would make this task easier? * What will it be like to finish this task? * Is there a goal that depends on this task, or is there something you'd like to work on after it's done? * Is there anything outside of work that's preoccupying you? I haven't tried this yet. Remind yourself of how much better things will be when you finish the current task or project. That will help it not seem so endless. == Difficult work == When faced with a project you don't want to do, [[Procrastination|just get started]]. In doing this, it helps to have in mind some ways to make the job less daunting, boring, or otherwise unpleasant. These ways are skills, so it'll take practice to make them automatic. They are also tasks that can be put off, so you have to just get started on them too. The limits of my own mind are a chief demotivator for me, at least when doing knowledge work. So it helps to have external tools at the ready to extend its capabilities: * A physical notepad for free-form problem solving. * A task manager app for splitting into subtasks, tracking progress, and noting distractions for later attention. I use <a href="https://nirvanahq.com/">Nirvana</a>. * A wiki app for recording and searching free-form notes. I use <a href="https://evernote.com/">Evernote</a>. Whenever possible, survey your project's tasks, and put them in your task manager. You may have to do this multiple times during the project whenever new tasks become apparent or an existing tasks turns out to be complicated. Side note, I'm using the terms ''job'' and ''project'' synonymously. When you're starting a job or task and you feel stuck, not knowing what to do, sit with your eyes closed, and ask yourself a few questions: * What needs attention? * What is a current objective in this project? (What was I doing just now, or what am I doing next?) * What can I look at that will help me find these answers? When you have even a word, write it in one of your tools, probably the task manager. If that brings more info, keep writing. Otherwise, go back to closed-eyed sitting. Remember that "List tasks" is a task that can be listed! That will at least let you feel like you've accomplished something, however small, and that your project is a little more concrete, and those may encourage you enough for your ideas to flow a little faster. You can also list questions for the same effect. Plus they'll remind you later of what you still need to find out. Once you've brainstormed the latest tasks, clean up the list and put it in order. Look at the list. If there's something you can do now and you don't feel like listing more tasks, do the thing! Keep track of the degree to which different kinds of tasks are hard or absorbing for you. When you're looking at the task list and a task seems large, complicated, and daunting, note it as a task to split into subtasks. You can even list a task for splitting it. When you pause for a break, make it obvious where you left off. Make a note somewhere, or leave your work out in a way that it's clear what you were doing. If you come back and it's not obvious, sit and draw out from your mind what you need to do next. At the start of the work session, gather all the materials you think you'll need so you don't have to stop to gather them so much during the session. If it's hard to keep in mind everything you'll need, list them at the start of the session. If more materials are needed in the middle, gather them all at once rather than one at a time. If a task becomes more complicated, slow down and be patient. If you run into a hard task, figure out the very next step you need to take, and then just get started. If your setup or materials are hard to work with, modify them if possible. When my task list gets long and I don't want to keep reordering everything, I'm starring my current item to keep my place. It's okay to remake problem-solving diagrams that have become messy. In fact, I should probably expect to do that. When my mind is stuck not knowing what I need to do next, especially when I'm tired, I find that looking at relevant things to help me jog my thinking is important. Physical cues seem to be more helpful for me than mental cues, maybe partly because they're more immediately available. I sometimes have to drag up the mental cues along with the info they're supposed to be cuing. Of course, I also have to drag up which physical cues to consult, but in their case I only have to call to mind the identity and location of the cue and not all its details. When I have only mental info to draw on, recording my thoughts gives me physical cues to return to. I think one reason writing helps me feel better in general is that I'm gradually relieved of the burden of having to recall the info from only my mind. When thinking about where to find the info I'm looking for, it helps to think about where or how I wish I could find it so I can possibly reorganize the material. It also helps, of course, to think about how I'll search for it in the material as it is. When a task feels hard, I feel defeated before I even start. So I try to escape by distracting myself, and when I come back to the task, I feel even more defeated because I failed to stick with it. One way out of the initial defeat might be to ask myself what would count as a victory in this case. That is, what is the key obstacle to moving forward, and what would it look like to succeed? What is the general scenario on the other side of the obstacle? Even if I don't know the specifics yet (ignorance could be the obstacle), I usually have ''some'' idea of what a successful result would be. Visualizing that result can be motivating as well as giving you some kind of concrete goal. The next step is to look at the situation in front of you and then to plan the steps between the two scenarios. Ask yourself what feels hard about what you see. Then it might help get the work moving if you just try the first step toward a solution you think of. Later you can collect more ideas and conduct a more orderly process. If the first step you think of immediately fails, then think a little more and follow the next step you come up with. Sometimes it's hard to gain momentum when I'm dealing with a programming project with a lot of hard tasks in a row. It might help to journal about each hard task as it comes up. For me journaling is in some ways like collaborating is for other people. It helps me focus on my tasks and clarify my thoughts. The idea of a lot of these techniques is to make hard tasks easier and thus more inviting by creating stepping stones across them. I also want to experiment with more problem solving techniques, ways of easing my mind into a problem and smoothing the path to a solution, such as planning an algorithm in columns for the different types of info they need. == Distractions == Keep track of the degree to which different things distract you. Familiar instrumental music tends to be my least distracting background activity. If you get distracted, gently bring yourself back to your work, and reset your frame of mind, if needed. When considering what to do with a distraction, ask yourself if it will still be waiting for you later and if you'll already get some timely reminder of it, if it's time sensitive at all. If yes, then see if you can drop it and keep working. If you need a reminder, put it in your distractions list. Don't "just take care of it," because it'll take longer than you think or want. Be aware of when you're taking an action that you think will only take a minute but could lead to a much longer distraction, and decide before you take it not to continue on past the first step. When you're tempted to let your mind wander, remind yourself that even if you feel like you're being tortured by work, you'll still be happier if you focus. Craig Hassed notes, "You might feel tempted to answer that we are happiest when the mind is wandering to pleasant topics. In fact, according to a study from Harvard University, people report being happiest while their mind is not wandering from what they are doing" ("<a href="http://www.yvg.vic.edu.au/file.php?fileID=5502">The health benefits of meditation and being mindful</a>"). One reason I might feel more like following my distractions than working is that they're there, reminding me of how great they are. If I kept them at a distance by not making them so available, it might be easier to absorb myself in my work. One problem I have with distractions is when they arise in my mind and they're so compelling that I feel I have to follow them right then. It'll probably just happen a bit at first, but when you see it happening and you can get yourself to stop, get yourself back into a frame of mind for focusing on work. Some mental imagery about the situation might help. Stopping the pursuit of a distraction might look like slamming on the brakes on a large, speeding truck. Maybe it skids to a stop but flips over from its momentum. Returning to work might look like entering a thicket of brambles and pushing your way through. On the other side is a soothing bath of aloe vera gel. (These are the kinds of odd, overly dramatic images that pop into my head.) What can also help is getting back into a mind frame of entering distractions into a task list so you know you can follow them later. Distractions can be passive or active. Passive distractions arise from my environment and pull my attention towards them. Active distractions are ones I look for, such as suddenly wanting to chat with someone. Passive distractions are the main kind to record in my distractions list. When I'm actively distracted, it might be worthwhile to observe the situation to see why I might be motivated to distract myself. I suspect it's usually because I've run up against a hard task without noticing. If the opportunity to take advantage of the distraction really is temporary, see if you can let go of it. When I feel very distractible, maybe it would help to repeatedly push myself just a little. I'd tell myself I'll do just a little more before I follow the distraction. Try a [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3lPrRdaH5XQ conveyor belt image] for addressing persistent distractions. The idea is to imagine thoughts on a conveyor belt coming toward you, and when they reach you, you drop them into buckets based on their categories. The categories are things like, "later this evening thoughts" or "anxious thoughts." One helpful little technique for when I'm feeling mindlessly distractible is to start asking myself, whenever I think of something to do, whether this is work. If it's not, then no. This is similar to ADD Crusher's [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MCyWnsX4boU "Is this what I'm doing now?"] Try a more distraction-free work environment by simply keeping your browsers closed except for the moments you need them for work. Ideally I want to be able to resist distractions, but I think for mental training, it's more effective to remove them. I think mental training works differently from weight training, where resistance is what's necessary. In mental training you have to give your mind the space and context to learn different ways of working. You put yourself in an environment compatible with the new way of thinking and then let your mind learn what it's like and conform to it. The absence of the usual stimuli is sometimes itself a form of resistance. One type of distraction occurs when I turn away from a hard spot in my work to do something more interesting. Why should this be necessary though? Why do the mild despair and boredom at hitting a mental block mean I have to do something to keep myself entertained? It occurs to me that I can become okay with feeling dead if it means I stick to my work rather than veering completely away from it. I might stare blankly at the screen for a minute (or two, or five), but at least I would minimize the time my work wasn't progressing. One thing I hate about getting distracted, at least at work, is that I completely forget what I was doing before, so when I come back to my task, I have to rack my brain to remember what it was. I think that shows how disengaged I am from my work at those times. == Meditation == Take time to reset your mind after a break, especially lunch. When I meditate successfully, I feel like I'm entering a different world, a dark, cushiony tunnel. Sometimes I need help entering it, so I'm looking for things that can help. Maybe the specific suggestions I give myself would do it. I think calming music also helps. Probably other environmental factors such as light level, temperature, and resting surface, but I have control over those less often. But I don't want to go to sleep usually, because I'm trying to focus for work. So I have to find a balance between drifting off and staying alert. Visualizing a conducive context could help entering the focused world, such as being wrapped in a warm blanket or even something more imaginative, such as being in a flow of water yet being able to breathe. So could remembering the feeling of focus I'm aiming for. One question I have about mindfulness meditation (MM) is whether the goal is focusing on one stimulus or simply attending to the present. I find that my mind has room to wander if it doesn't have multiple anchors, so I like the idea of paying attention to whatever's happening through whichever senses. But I'm not sure if that fosters the kind of focus I want. Maybe a middle ground would work, focusing on all the stimuli coming from a narrow range of sources, such as the sensations within my body rather than sounds from my environment. What I'm aiming for is a single stream of activity, like riding through a landscape in a minecart in ''Minecraft''. Distractions such as monsters come by, but I'm zipping along so fast that they don't seem important enough to hold my attention. For a while this has been the script of my focus exercise for work. They summarize a lot of my reflections on the subject: <blockquote> Focus with five deep breaths. Now ... If I focus instead of wandering, I'll be happy. I'll be like the industrious people I admire. When I finish this work, I'll feel relieved, happy, and satisfied. I'll be a source of relief to my coworkers. When a task gets harder, I can slow down and be curious about it. I can draw from my mind and find outside cues. I can work through it in my task list. I can diagram it on my notepad. When a distraction comes up, I can record it for later in my task manager. When a distraction is a fleeting opportunity, I can question it and maybe let it go. When I look for a distraction, I can let it go and address the underlying problem. Now ... List the day's or session's objectives and their purposes with backwards planning. List preliminary tasks. And gather all the materials you'll need. </blockquote> I put it in a text-to-speech program and output an audio file, which ideally I'll listen to most mornings and sometimes at other times during the workday. Something I keep losing sight of is that my focusing exercise isn't an impenetrable shield against distraction, at least at this point. If I turn on distraction generators like YouTube (listening to the videos while I work), my mind will make use of them. I need to keep in mind that a large part of the purpose of the exercise is to help me feel okay about creating a large distraction-free zone of time in which to work. Then the other part is to help me sweep away the remaining distractions. The website Gnostic Teachings gives a helpful technique in their [http://gnosticteachings.org/courses/gnostic-meditation/111-mental-discipline.html Mental Discipline lecture], mentally narrating your actions. <blockquote> You need to be more mindful during the day, you need to pay attention to what you are doing in every moment and do one thing at a time. And from that naturally your Meditation will deepen, your concentration will deepen. In the beginning, you can utilize the mind itself in this effort; if the mind will not be quiet on its own, make it focus on what you are doing by identifying your actions in thought. If you are washing the dishes, think, "I am doing the dishes, I am washing a fork." This can help you move toward doing things without thought. Eventually, you wash without thought, yet with perfect awareness. No thought. Just mindfulness. That power moves you deeper, that practice moves you deeper. </blockquote> I've tried using it to help me concentrate on complex tasks so I don't lose the thread of what I'm doing, as I do constantly when I'm not engaged with it. It does help. As usual, however, my practice petered out after a day or two. == Music == Something I'm trying is listening to minimalist music while working. Some kinds of music can lead to rabbit trails (because I want to research something about them), ambient music is calming but not engaging enough, a lot of music just bores me, but most minimalism I've heard is active enough to keep part of my brain occupied but not distracting enough to steal my attention. That's my hypothesis anyway. I think minimalism works for me because there's not much happening, but it happens a lot, so my brain has time to study it. It does explicitly what my mind does implicitly when it's trying to understand something: It retreads the same ground over and over, examining the pieces and their relationships. Minimalist music does seem to help. It gives me that zoney feeling, like when I'm daydreaming, except that I'm getting things done. Here's the Spotify playlist I created, [https://open.spotify.com/user/thinkulum/playlist/3BIcWQv3SdMngfikxyDEWB Minimalism for Focus]. Note that I will change it over time. == Choice of work == Reading all this, you may wonder why I don't just get a different job that's easier or that I enjoy more. I have a multipart answer to this: # For various reasons, I'm not ready to leave yet. # The kind of work I care about will always involve some of these difficulties, and I'm not willing to give it up for the sake of ease. So a better solution is to learn to focus, and I think of my current job as a training ground. But if you have trouble with your work, if those reasons don't apply to you, and if you have a chance to take an easier, more enjoyable job that will support you well enough and so on, then by all means take it. == Related blog entries == * [http://www.thinkulum.net/blog/category/topics/focus/ Category: Focus] [[Category:Productivity]] [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Developing]] bfdbe6b2c7925c5201623f30eb92d855f3c98972 14 87 206 2016-03-26T15:12:40Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the category. wikitext text/x-wiki [[Category:Genres]] 75fe0104216c967febe971952d7599328af69021 0 70 207 188 2016-04-21T01:18:38Z Andy Culbertson 1 Fixed a typo. wikitext text/x-wiki These are my comments on the Common Core Math Progressions document [http://achievethecore.org/file/1172 Counting & Cardinality and Operations & Algebraic Thinking: Grades K-5] (PDF). == Counting and Cardinality == There's a lot of overlap between this section and what I was going to say, but each of us said things the other didn't. If I wanted to define math concepts in terms of their physical meaning, I'd need to separate them from the teaching techniques that are meant to aid the mind in handling the operations (managing the memory load, etc.). On the opposite end, I'd like to try to understand what these concepts mean on the most abstract level. That would let me say with certainty what the concepts mean so I can be sure I'm relating them correctly. But I don't know if it's possible to get away from the models and physical representations. Can the mind really think in pure abstractions? Does every model for a math concept (eg, the number line) distort it in some way? Unlike my other sources, this doc explains how comparison relates to counting. == Operations and Algebraic Thinking == === Overview of Grades K–2 === Table 1 was confusing to me for some reason, or at least it took me longer than I expected to read through it and translate the words to the equations. In some cases I didn't know what the difference was between the situations. They made some fine distinctions. But maybe it's clearer to me now. Still, it's worth analyzing the differences between these situations. One question I have with these situations is when you'd ever not know the unknown. That should be part of any word problem if you want the student to be more engaged with it. === Kindergarten === "Mathematize" - Yes, everything has a quantitative aspect. I imagine putting on glasses with a filter that highlights the mathematical features of an object or situation. === Grade 1 === "Put together ... Addend Unknown" - The situations reveal different aspects of the nature of addition/subtraction. "algebraic perspective" - I thought this was out of place at first because I didn't learn algebra till junior high, but surely younger kids can understand it. "Linking equations" - I want to catalog these representations and think about what I can learn from them about problem solving in general. New to me (NTM): "where the total is" - This is already very useful to me. "decomposing one addend" - I really like the idea, but it starts to get hard to remember all the numbers. These conceptual math procedures can still be done rotely, so you have to connect the concepts to the different procedures. I suppose the evidence of conceptual thinking comes out in solving new problems and in explaining your reasons for selecting a procedure. === Grade 2 === With two-step problems, math is starting to feel hard, if I'm doing it in my head. Too many numbers to remember. But part of problem solving is simplifying the problem, breaking it up, or transforming it in some other way so it's more manageable, so maybe that's the case here. === Summary of K–2 Operations and Algebraic Thinking === "within 100" - I guess I'll have to wait till the curriculum to find out about this, but it seems like this would suggest learning some other algorithms. It seems strange that the progressions would go into such detail and then skip over this part. Actually I think it's in NBT. "all sums of two-digit numbers from memory" - Isn't that thousands of facts? === Grade 3 === "no general strategies" - Explore what this means exactly. The distinction between equal groups and arrays seems very fine. The 5+n chart is confusing. === Grade 4 === I've noticed that problem with "more than" language in multiplication comparisons. NTM: Differences in remainder problems. NTM: Looking for pair reversals when factoring. Maybe I learned that. Milgram points out that CC doesn't cover prime factorization. I've seen people insert it a couple of different places. In his TEDx talk at USU (https://tedx.usu.edu/portfolio-items/david-brown/) David Brown points out that you don't necessarily know how a pattern will continue, so a better test question is to explain how each of several next numbers would continue it. I like this idea and want to be on the lookout for this kind of reasoning about how math works and what it's about, which is at a deeper level than even some of these CC documents. === Grade 5 === p. 32 - Students "write expressions to express a calculation." They also examine the relationships between numerical patterns they make up. I'd like to explore the idea of all the mathematical operations as explorations of the relationships among numbers. === Connections to NF and NBT in Grades 3 through 5 === Why do we group only these four operations into arithmetic? === Where the Operations and Algebraic Thinking Progression is heading === p. 34 - NTM: "Understand solving an equation or inequality as a process of answering a question: which values from a specified set, if any, make the equation or inequality true?" {6.EE.5} pp. 34-35 - NTM: Situation equation vs solution equation. == Appendix. Methods used for solving single-digit addition and subtraction problems == === Level 1. Direct Modeling by Counting All or Taking Away. === === Level 2. Counting On. === This taking away method is like the counting up method for giving change. p. 36 - Why is counting down "difficult and error-prone"? When I start to feel bored or lost as I'm reading, it helps to remind myself of the basic nature of what I'm studying. I like to think of math (at least at this level) as the relationships between numbers on the number line as revealed by our operations on them. === Level 3. Convert to an Easier Equivalent Problem. === What makes subtracting finding an unknown addend? I know the answer is obvious at one level, but I want to think more about it. What makes transformations between representations possible? [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Comments]] [[Category:Complete]] 74eb6e64d5d2e950a9cb3782ee57dbed59710665 245 207 2016-06-27T06:23:28Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added commenting. wikitext text/x-wiki These are my comments on the Common Core Math Progressions document [http://achievethecore.org/file/1172 Counting & Cardinality and Operations & Algebraic Thinking: Grades K-5] (PDF). == Counting and Cardinality == There's a lot of overlap between this section and what I was going to say, but each of us said things the other didn't. If I wanted to define math concepts in terms of their physical meaning, I'd need to separate them from the teaching techniques that are meant to aid the mind in handling the operations (managing the memory load, etc.). On the opposite end, I'd like to try to understand what these concepts mean on the most abstract level. That would let me say with certainty what the concepts mean so I can be sure I'm relating them correctly. But I don't know if it's possible to get away from the models and physical representations. Can the mind really think in pure abstractions? Does every model for a math concept (eg, the number line) distort it in some way? Unlike my other sources, this doc explains how comparison relates to counting. == Operations and Algebraic Thinking == === Overview of Grades K–2 === Table 1 was confusing to me for some reason, or at least it took me longer than I expected to read through it and translate the words to the equations. In some cases I didn't know what the difference was between the situations. They made some fine distinctions. But maybe it's clearer to me now. Still, it's worth analyzing the differences between these situations. One question I have with these situations is when you'd ever not know the unknown. That should be part of any word problem if you want the student to be more engaged with it. === Kindergarten === "Mathematize" - Yes, everything has a quantitative aspect. I imagine putting on glasses with a filter that highlights the mathematical features of an object or situation. === Grade 1 === "Put together ... Addend Unknown" - The situations reveal different aspects of the nature of addition/subtraction. "algebraic perspective" - I thought this was out of place at first because I didn't learn algebra till junior high, but surely younger kids can understand it. "Linking equations" - I want to catalog these representations and think about what I can learn from them about problem solving in general. New to me (NTM): "where the total is" - This is already very useful to me. "decomposing one addend" - I really like the idea, but it starts to get hard to remember all the numbers. These conceptual math procedures can still be done rotely, so you have to connect the concepts to the different procedures. I suppose the evidence of conceptual thinking comes out in solving new problems and in explaining your reasons for selecting a procedure. === Grade 2 === With two-step problems, math is starting to feel hard, if I'm doing it in my head. Too many numbers to remember. But part of problem solving is simplifying the problem, breaking it up, or transforming it in some other way so it's more manageable, so maybe that's the case here. === Summary of K–2 Operations and Algebraic Thinking === "within 100" - I guess I'll have to wait till the curriculum to find out about this, but it seems like this would suggest learning some other algorithms. It seems strange that the progressions would go into such detail and then skip over this part. Actually I think it's in NBT. "all sums of two-digit numbers from memory" - Isn't that thousands of facts? === Grade 3 === "no general strategies" - Explore what this means exactly. The distinction between equal groups and arrays seems very fine. The 5+n chart is confusing. === Grade 4 === I've noticed that problem with "more than" language in multiplication comparisons. NTM: Differences in remainder problems. NTM: Looking for pair reversals when factoring. Maybe I learned that. Milgram points out that CC doesn't cover prime factorization. I've seen people insert it a couple of different places. In his TEDx talk at USU (https://tedx.usu.edu/portfolio-items/david-brown/) David Brown points out that you don't necessarily know how a pattern will continue, so a better test question is to explain how each of several next numbers would continue it. I like this idea and want to be on the lookout for this kind of reasoning about how math works and what it's about, which is at a deeper level than even some of these CC documents. === Grade 5 === p. 32 - Students "write expressions to express a calculation." They also examine the relationships between numerical patterns they make up. I'd like to explore the idea of all the mathematical operations as explorations of the relationships among numbers. === Connections to NF and NBT in Grades 3 through 5 === Why do we group only these four operations into arithmetic? === Where the Operations and Algebraic Thinking Progression is heading === p. 34 - NTM: "Understand solving an equation or inequality as a process of answering a question: which values from a specified set, if any, make the equation or inequality true?" {6.EE.5} pp. 34-35 - NTM: Situation equation vs solution equation. == Appendix. Methods used for solving single-digit addition and subtraction problems == === Level 1. Direct Modeling by Counting All or Taking Away. === === Level 2. Counting On. === This taking away method is like the counting up method for giving change. p. 36 - Why is counting down "difficult and error-prone"? When I start to feel bored or lost as I'm reading, it helps to remind myself of the basic nature of what I'm studying. I like to think of math (at least at this level) as the relationships between numbers on the number line as revealed by our operations on them. === Level 3. Convert to an Easier Equivalent Problem. === What makes subtracting finding an unknown addend? I know the answer is obvious at one level, but I want to think more about it. What makes transformations between representations possible? <disqus/> [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Comments]] [[Category:Complete]] d718146740b12b693348ca989f4e5261b243d694 0 71 208 189 2016-04-21T01:21:20Z Andy Culbertson 1 Replaced the article with the right one. wikitext text/x-wiki These are my comments on the Common Core Math Progressions document [http://achievethecore.org/file/1171 Number & Operations in Base Ten: Grades K-5] (PDF). == Overview == "Intertwined" - Yes, that was what was so annoying about trying to group it with number sense and even measurement before getting to arithmetic. It's a hard concept to explain without bringing in those operations. "Base-ten units" - I was using "unit" the way they're using "one," but I can agree to their usage. "number as composed" - What does composing and decomposing base-ten units tell us? Why do we spend so much time on it? Reducing to one-digit calculations is one important consequence that the progression covers. It is a new perspective to think of the standard algorithm that way. I think to convince people Common Core is a good idea, you have to be detailed and specific about the benefits of the new methods in addition to explaining how the methods work. What problems do students need to solve that the standard algorithms can't accomplish? What mistakes do students make with the standard algorithms? == Kindergarten == "essentially arbitrary marks" - Aha! Take that, Jeremy. == Grade 1 == "two-digit subtraction with and without decomposing" - What does this mean? How does it prevent the mistake of subtracting the smaller digit? == Grade 2 == It would be good to see a chart of the multi-digit operation algorithms used before the standard algorithms to make it easy to study the problem solving options for this stage. I think composing and decomposing units could still seem like a trick to get the digits to turn out right. Maybe what I want is a way to see that this is all equivalent to working with ones. These documents get hard to read, and I think it's because details are left for me to fill in. I think this is common in math texts, so I should just get used to it. But I do wonder what the right combination of explanation, equations, diagrams, and so on is that would make math discussions fairly effortless (for me) to follow. Right now I know I'm more excited about the idea of math than about learning math itself, because I've hardly done any of it yet. I also know that there's a drudgerous, discipline period of any subject you're studying after the romantic, honeymoon period (http://community.mis.temple.edu/stevenljohnson/2013/02/07/whiteheads-3-stages-of-learning-romance-discipline-and-fruition/). It probably corresponds to the conscious incompetence phase of skill development. I know math will be no different. But that's something that's explicit in the Common Core, the practice of persevering through solving problems. == Grade 4 == Starting fractions with 1/10 and 1/100--good idea! So is associating them with money. "'oneths' place" - This is an example of the fact that many features of math (such as the decimal) have very specific meanings and purposes that aren't obvious at first and can easily be missed or confused with other possibilities, which can lead to mistakes. That's why I'm using conceptual math for this relearning project. It also illustrates the usefulness of asking "why," "why not," and "what if" for getting at these reasons and meanings. New to me (NTM): "area models" - This idea was introduced before grade 4, but even though I knew the formula for area, before this project I hadn't thought of using area as a general model for multiplication and certainly not as a way of illustrating the properties of multiplication. This is a good example of the many connections among mathematical ideas. Finding these is part of the fun of math, in my opinion. "recording the carries below" - This is even more compact than the standard method. It illustrates that the conceptual math people really do think through the methods they teach. They pay attention to things like efficiency and clarity, how those values can conflict, and the conceptual and procedural mistakes learners make that need to be corrected or that can be avoided. The place-value symmetry around the ones place and decimal point is another example. Parents don't typically think of all this. And this illustrates that specialists have a deeper and more extensive understanding of their domain than nonspecialists, which often leads them to surprising results that nonspecialists don't understand. If the nonspecialists don't think of the field as a deep one that can hold such surprises, they might think the specialists' conclusions make no sense and unnecessarily complicate things. "shifting the result to the left" - I read somewhere that you shouldn't teach the trick of adding zeros to multiply by multiples of ten. I was puzzled by why this would be a problem until the article made the point that it leads to the mistake of adding zeros to the right of decimals. My first reaction was to dismiss this concern because to me, the trick of adding zeros includes nuances like that. I already understand the principles involved. But yes, if you're teaching it to people who don't know the concepts yet, you can't just tell them to add zeros to the right. It's better to speak in terms of shifting, which matches the idea of place value and results in the effect of adding zeros in the relevant cases but also takes the decimal cases into account. "Products of 5 and even numbers" - This example brings up several issues for me: "violate the patterns" - This confusion could be interpreted a few ways. Maybe the students have simply thought they'd identified a pattern, and now they have other cases to account for. That's normal math activity. But maybe they've established an intuition about zeros that's wrong, and 5 is surprising them, and maybe they think the answer's wrong. When this happens, I always want to explore the implications of the intuition: if there are any cases where the intuition works, what would be the implications in a universe in which it was somehow correct, what's the confusion that leads to the intuition, what incorrect answers we'd get if we followed the intuition, what's the correction to the intuition. Or maybe the students think the rule of adding zeros is just one of those magical rules in math that no one can explain, and 5 is just a magical exception to it. Magical thinking in math violates its whole spirit. As far as I can tell, the idea of math is that it's completely logical, aside from the human factors that go into discovering the logic. One of the most valuable things I've learned so far is that everything we do in math has been worked out in detail by someone, and so yes, we do know how it works; and with patience, research, and careful thought, I can find out all the logical steps and concepts that make it work. I was surprised that the authors associated all the products that have "extra" zeros with 5. Are there really no ways to get a multiple of 10 that don't involve 5? My preliminary examples suggest not. As I go along, I want to try to inform the math tricks I came up with as I grew up, like the one about multiplying an even number by 5 by dividing by 2 and tacking on a zero. Or an odd by dividing one less by 2 and tacking on a 5. NTM: I'd never thought of the standard multiplication algorithm as being an application of the distributive property. Those division methods are a little different from the long division I learned, so I'm not sure of the nuances. That'll be something to pay more attention to as I'm studying the curriculum. Division is an operation I'm less clear about on its meaning. It would take some time to interpret long division in terms of place value. I imagine it'd be that way for many people. It seems to be one of the harder standard algorithms for people to grasp and remember. Maybe they'd welcome another method in that case. This progression isn't giving me hope that there's something easier though, but maybe there's a clearer explanation of the usual methods. == Grade 5 == NTM: "Recording division after an underestimate" - Interesting! I like how a slight adjustment to the standard algorithm can be used for this other purpose to get at the answer from a somewhat different angle. It seems elegant. "placement of the decimal point" - I'll have to wait till the fractions progression to really get this paragraph. But it's interesting that fractions are given as only one way to interpret these decimals. Of course, not every decimal can be represented as a fraction. This isn't attached to anything specific in the text, but I've been thinking one way to represent my takeaways from the material would be to condense the concepts into diagrams that show their relationships, such as showing the multiplicative and exponential relationships in place-value. Since I'm not having to build up the concepts myself now, I can afford to put them together in other interesting ways. === Excursus === And now I've gotten completely sidetracked by Keith Devlin's articles on multiplication: * http://www.maa.org/external_archive/devlin/devlin_06_08.html * http://www.maa.org/external_archive/devlin/devlin_0708_08.html * http://www.maa.org/external_archive/devlin/devlin_09_08.html * http://www.maa.org/external_archive/devlin/devlin_01_11.html He's pleading with teachers not to teach multiplication as repeated addition, because it creates problems when they introduce negative numbers, fractions, and calculus. He doesn't tell them how to teach it, since he's a mathematician rather than a K-12 math educator, but he says however they do it shouldn't contradict the modern understanding of multiplication, which turns out to be from abstract algebra, so that's a good reason for me to learn it. He also says it's pointless to ask what multiplication is. The only way to deal with it is to axiomatically describe its properties. He mentions scaling, but he says this is only an application of multiplication rather than the abstract thing of multiplication itself. In the final article, though, he does say his mental concept of multiplication is centered on scaling. In any case, he and I seem to have different ideas of what the question "What is it?" means. To me listing its properties answers the question, I think, depending on the properties. But I do have a problem with the way he talks about it. He says, "Unfortunately, trying to find an answer holds back mastery of mathematics, which largely depends on getting beyond the concrete and into the realm of the abstract - on recognizing that the 'What is it?' question is simply not appropriate for the basic objects and operations of mathematics. 'It' is what 'it' is. What is important is what 'it' does." What I want to know is whether multiplication has a single definition that can predict its effects on different kinds of numbers. If not, why do we use one term for these different operations? But apparently it does have one. "In particular, there is just one kind of number, real numbers, one addition operation, one multiplication operation, and one exponentiation operator (where the exponent may itself be any real number). You get everything else by restricting to particular subsets of numbers." He also gives this intriguing quote from ''Adding It Up: Helping Children Learn Mathematics'', which is available as a free PDF from the National Academies Press: "The number systems that have emerged over the centuries can be seen as being built on one another, with each new system subsuming an old one. This remarkable consistency helps unify arithmetic. In school, however, each number system is introduced with distinct symbolic notations: negation signs, fractions, decimal points, radical signs, and so on. These multiple representations can obscure the fact that the numbers used in grades pre-K through 8 all reside in a very coherent and unified mathematical structure - the number line." I'd been thinking the number line was a good general representation of numbers, but I don't know how to generalize confidently about math unless someone who knows a lot more math tells me. It's also interesting to see that point about the unity of arithmetic. Something to look forward to learning about. And yes, I've also been looking forward to making sense of all the notation. Anyway, Devlin's endorsement of that book makes me want to read it. I like articles like this series by Devlin because they connect higher level math with people who only understand and deal with the lower level. We need lots of that kind of bridge content. I think that's a goal of the Numberphile channel on YouTube. Also the discussion on the post he links to looks fascinating: http://denisegaskins.com/2008/07/01/if-it-aint-repeated-addition/. One of the commenters thinks multiplication encompasses several models, including repeated addition, and this commenter seems fairly thoughtful. So maybe I can't just take Devlin's word for everything even though he's a mathematician. One thing is clear: Multiplication isn't as simple as I thought it was. At the abstract level, why do we have a multiplication operation that's defined the way it is? I gather we could define any operation we wanted with any properties. === Back to the progression === "how many tenths are in 7" - This is a helpful way to think of division by a fraction/decimal. Ah, 5.NF.5 has students interpreting multiplication as scaling. == Extending beyond Grade 5 == NTM: It's interesting to split up two-digit multiplication like a polynomial. I, of course, had never thought to do that because I don't remember anything about polynomials. [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Comments]] [[Category:Complete]] c7b19c4025c3ea199f545f67ce8438e1e89a1287 246 208 2016-06-27T06:23:58Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added commenting. wikitext text/x-wiki These are my comments on the Common Core Math Progressions document [http://achievethecore.org/file/1171 Number & Operations in Base Ten: Grades K-5] (PDF). == Overview == "Intertwined" - Yes, that was what was so annoying about trying to group it with number sense and even measurement before getting to arithmetic. It's a hard concept to explain without bringing in those operations. "Base-ten units" - I was using "unit" the way they're using "one," but I can agree to their usage. "number as composed" - What does composing and decomposing base-ten units tell us? Why do we spend so much time on it? Reducing to one-digit calculations is one important consequence that the progression covers. It is a new perspective to think of the standard algorithm that way. I think to convince people Common Core is a good idea, you have to be detailed and specific about the benefits of the new methods in addition to explaining how the methods work. What problems do students need to solve that the standard algorithms can't accomplish? What mistakes do students make with the standard algorithms? == Kindergarten == "essentially arbitrary marks" - Aha! Take that, Jeremy. == Grade 1 == "two-digit subtraction with and without decomposing" - What does this mean? How does it prevent the mistake of subtracting the smaller digit? == Grade 2 == It would be good to see a chart of the multi-digit operation algorithms used before the standard algorithms to make it easy to study the problem solving options for this stage. I think composing and decomposing units could still seem like a trick to get the digits to turn out right. Maybe what I want is a way to see that this is all equivalent to working with ones. These documents get hard to read, and I think it's because details are left for me to fill in. I think this is common in math texts, so I should just get used to it. But I do wonder what the right combination of explanation, equations, diagrams, and so on is that would make math discussions fairly effortless (for me) to follow. Right now I know I'm more excited about the idea of math than about learning math itself, because I've hardly done any of it yet. I also know that there's a drudgerous, discipline period of any subject you're studying after the romantic, honeymoon period (http://community.mis.temple.edu/stevenljohnson/2013/02/07/whiteheads-3-stages-of-learning-romance-discipline-and-fruition/). It probably corresponds to the conscious incompetence phase of skill development. I know math will be no different. But that's something that's explicit in the Common Core, the practice of persevering through solving problems. == Grade 4 == Starting fractions with 1/10 and 1/100--good idea! So is associating them with money. "'oneths' place" - This is an example of the fact that many features of math (such as the decimal) have very specific meanings and purposes that aren't obvious at first and can easily be missed or confused with other possibilities, which can lead to mistakes. That's why I'm using conceptual math for this relearning project. It also illustrates the usefulness of asking "why," "why not," and "what if" for getting at these reasons and meanings. New to me (NTM): "area models" - This idea was introduced before grade 4, but even though I knew the formula for area, before this project I hadn't thought of using area as a general model for multiplication and certainly not as a way of illustrating the properties of multiplication. This is a good example of the many connections among mathematical ideas. Finding these is part of the fun of math, in my opinion. "recording the carries below" - This is even more compact than the standard method. It illustrates that the conceptual math people really do think through the methods they teach. They pay attention to things like efficiency and clarity, how those values can conflict, and the conceptual and procedural mistakes learners make that need to be corrected or that can be avoided. The place-value symmetry around the ones place and decimal point is another example. Parents don't typically think of all this. And this illustrates that specialists have a deeper and more extensive understanding of their domain than nonspecialists, which often leads them to surprising results that nonspecialists don't understand. If the nonspecialists don't think of the field as a deep one that can hold such surprises, they might think the specialists' conclusions make no sense and unnecessarily complicate things. "shifting the result to the left" - I read somewhere that you shouldn't teach the trick of adding zeros to multiply by multiples of ten. I was puzzled by why this would be a problem until the article made the point that it leads to the mistake of adding zeros to the right of decimals. My first reaction was to dismiss this concern because to me, the trick of adding zeros includes nuances like that. I already understand the principles involved. But yes, if you're teaching it to people who don't know the concepts yet, you can't just tell them to add zeros to the right. It's better to speak in terms of shifting, which matches the idea of place value and results in the effect of adding zeros in the relevant cases but also takes the decimal cases into account. "Products of 5 and even numbers" - This example brings up several issues for me: "violate the patterns" - This confusion could be interpreted a few ways. Maybe the students have simply thought they'd identified a pattern, and now they have other cases to account for. That's normal math activity. But maybe they've established an intuition about zeros that's wrong, and 5 is surprising them, and maybe they think the answer's wrong. When this happens, I always want to explore the implications of the intuition: if there are any cases where the intuition works, what would be the implications in a universe in which it was somehow correct, what's the confusion that leads to the intuition, what incorrect answers we'd get if we followed the intuition, what's the correction to the intuition. Or maybe the students think the rule of adding zeros is just one of those magical rules in math that no one can explain, and 5 is just a magical exception to it. Magical thinking in math violates its whole spirit. As far as I can tell, the idea of math is that it's completely logical, aside from the human factors that go into discovering the logic. One of the most valuable things I've learned so far is that everything we do in math has been worked out in detail by someone, and so yes, we do know how it works; and with patience, research, and careful thought, I can find out all the logical steps and concepts that make it work. I was surprised that the authors associated all the products that have "extra" zeros with 5. Are there really no ways to get a multiple of 10 that don't involve 5? My preliminary examples suggest not. As I go along, I want to try to inform the math tricks I came up with as I grew up, like the one about multiplying an even number by 5 by dividing by 2 and tacking on a zero. Or an odd by dividing one less by 2 and tacking on a 5. NTM: I'd never thought of the standard multiplication algorithm as being an application of the distributive property. Those division methods are a little different from the long division I learned, so I'm not sure of the nuances. That'll be something to pay more attention to as I'm studying the curriculum. Division is an operation I'm less clear about on its meaning. It would take some time to interpret long division in terms of place value. I imagine it'd be that way for many people. It seems to be one of the harder standard algorithms for people to grasp and remember. Maybe they'd welcome another method in that case. This progression isn't giving me hope that there's something easier though, but maybe there's a clearer explanation of the usual methods. == Grade 5 == NTM: "Recording division after an underestimate" - Interesting! I like how a slight adjustment to the standard algorithm can be used for this other purpose to get at the answer from a somewhat different angle. It seems elegant. "placement of the decimal point" - I'll have to wait till the fractions progression to really get this paragraph. But it's interesting that fractions are given as only one way to interpret these decimals. Of course, not every decimal can be represented as a fraction. This isn't attached to anything specific in the text, but I've been thinking one way to represent my takeaways from the material would be to condense the concepts into diagrams that show their relationships, such as showing the multiplicative and exponential relationships in place-value. Since I'm not having to build up the concepts myself now, I can afford to put them together in other interesting ways. === Excursus === And now I've gotten completely sidetracked by Keith Devlin's articles on multiplication: * http://www.maa.org/external_archive/devlin/devlin_06_08.html * http://www.maa.org/external_archive/devlin/devlin_0708_08.html * http://www.maa.org/external_archive/devlin/devlin_09_08.html * http://www.maa.org/external_archive/devlin/devlin_01_11.html He's pleading with teachers not to teach multiplication as repeated addition, because it creates problems when they introduce negative numbers, fractions, and calculus. He doesn't tell them how to teach it, since he's a mathematician rather than a K-12 math educator, but he says however they do it shouldn't contradict the modern understanding of multiplication, which turns out to be from abstract algebra, so that's a good reason for me to learn it. He also says it's pointless to ask what multiplication is. The only way to deal with it is to axiomatically describe its properties. He mentions scaling, but he says this is only an application of multiplication rather than the abstract thing of multiplication itself. In the final article, though, he does say his mental concept of multiplication is centered on scaling. In any case, he and I seem to have different ideas of what the question "What is it?" means. To me listing its properties answers the question, I think, depending on the properties. But I do have a problem with the way he talks about it. He says, "Unfortunately, trying to find an answer holds back mastery of mathematics, which largely depends on getting beyond the concrete and into the realm of the abstract - on recognizing that the 'What is it?' question is simply not appropriate for the basic objects and operations of mathematics. 'It' is what 'it' is. What is important is what 'it' does." What I want to know is whether multiplication has a single definition that can predict its effects on different kinds of numbers. If not, why do we use one term for these different operations? But apparently it does have one. "In particular, there is just one kind of number, real numbers, one addition operation, one multiplication operation, and one exponentiation operator (where the exponent may itself be any real number). You get everything else by restricting to particular subsets of numbers." He also gives this intriguing quote from ''Adding It Up: Helping Children Learn Mathematics'', which is available as a free PDF from the National Academies Press: "The number systems that have emerged over the centuries can be seen as being built on one another, with each new system subsuming an old one. This remarkable consistency helps unify arithmetic. In school, however, each number system is introduced with distinct symbolic notations: negation signs, fractions, decimal points, radical signs, and so on. These multiple representations can obscure the fact that the numbers used in grades pre-K through 8 all reside in a very coherent and unified mathematical structure - the number line." I'd been thinking the number line was a good general representation of numbers, but I don't know how to generalize confidently about math unless someone who knows a lot more math tells me. It's also interesting to see that point about the unity of arithmetic. Something to look forward to learning about. And yes, I've also been looking forward to making sense of all the notation. Anyway, Devlin's endorsement of that book makes me want to read it. I like articles like this series by Devlin because they connect higher level math with people who only understand and deal with the lower level. We need lots of that kind of bridge content. I think that's a goal of the Numberphile channel on YouTube. Also the discussion on the post he links to looks fascinating: http://denisegaskins.com/2008/07/01/if-it-aint-repeated-addition/. One of the commenters thinks multiplication encompasses several models, including repeated addition, and this commenter seems fairly thoughtful. So maybe I can't just take Devlin's word for everything even though he's a mathematician. One thing is clear: Multiplication isn't as simple as I thought it was. At the abstract level, why do we have a multiplication operation that's defined the way it is? I gather we could define any operation we wanted with any properties. === Back to the progression === "how many tenths are in 7" - This is a helpful way to think of division by a fraction/decimal. Ah, 5.NF.5 has students interpreting multiplication as scaling. == Extending beyond Grade 5 == NTM: It's interesting to split up two-digit multiplication like a polynomial. I, of course, had never thought to do that because I don't remember anything about polynomials. <disqus/> [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Comments]] [[Category:Complete]] 81b47e9d3b5cf2396bd209767610d96bf53f9ea4 0 73 209 191 2016-04-21T01:37:27Z Andy Culbertson 1 Fixed typos. wikitext text/x-wiki These are my comments on the Common Core Math Progressions document [http://achievethecore.org/file/1169 Measurement & Data (measurement part): Grades K-5] (PDF). == Overview == Ah, they agree with me on the centrality of measurement. These math educators always contrast measurement and counting, but I want to highlight their similarities. They both use units, for example. The Standards don't distinguish between mass and weight. Shame, shame! "direct comparison" - My earlier sources annoyingly didn't explain that direct comparison was meant to happen without measurement as a step on the way to measurement, so I was having trouble fitting it into my logical map of measurement concepts. The list of measurable attributes in this section reminds me of Thad Roberts' TEDx talk where he reduced all the units to five basic ones: length, mass, time, charge, and temperature (http://einsteinsintuition.com/what-is-qst/constants-of-nature/). One of the recurring questions of my life: Why are there multiple measurable attributes that an object can have? Why isn't everything just length or something? "comparing it to the amount" - This corresponds to my idea that measurement is a ratio. It also hints at the idea that at a certain point, the magnitude of a unit has to be established by direct experience if we're going to make any sense of it. A numeric measurement doesn't mean much on its own. "object is subdivided" - It's interesting to contrast this with division. "parallels the number concepts" - Good point comparing the metric system to place value. "Scientists measure" - Fair enough. They don't mind using length as a synonym for distance, and they explicitly define it so it can be. They even describe volume as entailing three lengths simultaneously. They agree with me that length is a core concept and for the same kinds of reasons I was giving. Area - This is where we get into things I hadn't thought about yet. == Kindergarten == How do we know conservation is true? In any case, it has nuances. And I think the concept is somewhat different between math and science. == Grade 1 == Seriation - A good opportunity to teach sorting algorithms. :) "no gaps or overlaps" - I have some thoughts on this, which I call coverage, in my measurement notes. inequalities - Impressive. Must've been a gifted student. :P paper-folding - Interesting about congruent parts. It can teach other math concepts too! Though maybe not in grade 1. "one-dimensional unit structure" - Yes, many measurements are conversions to length. == Grade 2 == "begin counting" - Off by 1! But yes, even rulers have semiotics. I vaguely recall being confused about the start-or-covered question in some counting situations with some tool or other. Actually redstone power in Minecraft is one. "units of different sizes" - This reminds me of the scene in Spirited Away where the girl had to hold her breath as she was crossing the bridge. The commentary said this was to illustrate the childhood experience of having to follow the seemingly arbitrary rules adults establish. Hence, I note that when kids try to guess the rules, they get it wrong. accumulation - Interesting, and that wasn't in my earlier sources or thinking. zero-point - Measurement is relative to a reference point. "length-unit size" - Yes, in counting, the unit size is one object. This is true for ordinal numbers too. "inverse relationship" - This would add a level of unpredictability that would make me anxious to find out if there was a way to predict the measurement given the unit size. What button is it pushing for me? regular vs jumbo paperclips - Another example of how math concepts can be mixed and matched to reveal more relationships and avenues to knowledge. So what is it about units that's being reapplied, and how? I feel like notating the concepts with some kind of symbolic shorthand would help with the analysis. So "the larger the unit, the fewer number of units in a given measurement" means something like, "if unit[a] > unit[b], num[a] < num[b]." Then "if object A is 10 regular paperclips long and object B is 10 jumbo paperclips long, the number of units is the same, but the units have different sizes, so the lengths of A and B are different." This means "If num[a] = num[b] and unit[a] < unit[b], then len[a] < len[b]." So we're using transitivity. Hmm, sort of. Anyway, it's good to keep in mind the phrase, "So with that, we can ..." and look to see where we can apply pieces of the concepts we've learned. "benchmark lengths" - Find lists of these. Maybe EngageNY will have enough. == Grade 3 == multiplying side lengths = counting tiles - Yes, and why they're the same as scaling. "areas are preserved under rotation" - This is true physically, at least with solids, but why is it always true mathematically? Maybe it helps to think of numbers as rigid like solids. They always take up the same (quantitative) space. independence of area and perimeter - How does that work? With rectangles it's because the sides of the square units can be part of the edge or interior, depending on their arrangement. perimeter formula verbal summaries - It would be interesting to spell out the steps in translating the verbal summaries into the formulas and vice versa. == Grade 4 == "emphasizes the step" - I hadn't thought of using particular formulas as memory aids. Formulas can have other kinds of advantages, such as illustrating the distributive property or reducing the number of calculations (see earlier). "How long is the garden?" - Sometimes I read word problems and wonder, "Why would that be unknown?" One set of cases would be if you were gathering the data from different sources or occasions. One piece could've been collected for one purpose and another for another, and now you have enough information to learn more by calculating instead of measuring. Coming up with situation equations involves knowing which operations are appropriate for the numeric relationships within the situation. What tells us that, for example, perimeter is additive? "concepts of angle" - This is similar to what I'd been thinking about angle but hadn't written yet. I like the "change in direction" language. I think I was tying angle to the difference between circles and shapes with vertices, which I thought of in terms of the discrete-continuous distinction. Circles (or ellipses) are made of a line that changes direction continuously, whereas vertex shapes (is there a name for this category?) are made of a line that changes direction discretely. I'm sure there's a more mathematically correct way to say that. I was contrasting angle with distance. Angle is a type of distance but a rotational one rather than linear. Explore the nature of this distinction. The different ways of describing angles reminds me that I've seen different ways to define a circle. Explore the relationships among these definitions. Why do we use 360 degrees? Why are 90 degree angles special, and why are they called right? They might be special because they're half a straight angle, which is just a line. I was thinking it was because they're symmetrical when you rotate them or some such thing. I'm looking forward to geometry, by the way. There's something about space that's so interesting and inviting. Plus I like visual things. What's a relational way to define angle? Rotation sounds operational. Maybe the difference between two directions. That still seems to have rotation in the background, since you could try to measure the difference linearly, but maybe there's a relational way to define rotation. "angles in a variety of situations" - Ah, yes, angle is an abstraction of these kinds of situations. How would a blind person learn geometry? angle of turtle rotation vs angle formed - What? Guess I'd have to see it. Why a turtle? Maybe because its legs form crosshairs and its head tells you which direction it'll be moving. What makes me want to skip over the examples on p. 25? I'm going to try not to skip exercises and to ask that question a lot when I'm going through the actual curriculum. In this case, and I suspect in many, it's the mental load of remembering numbers and relationships. Being able to write things down would make it easier. I can with the pencil tool in my PDF software. Another thing that bothers me about math problems is sorting out the path to the solution when you have a lot of pieces to coordinate, like in this example. Again, writing might help. == Grade 5 == "Convert like measurement units" - How do fractions and decimals relate? I know the procedures. I just want to trace what happens, because now that I think about it, it seems strange to me. How does division turn a fraction into a decimal? Kumi problem - The diagram reveals something I wouldn't have thought of, that half of what remains after subtracting 1/5 is 2/5, so to find the value of 1/5, just divide by 2. Now that I say that, it's interesting to me that one number can represent another number. What's happening there? decompose right rectangular prism - For the three axes I was just imagining someone bending over at a right angle with their arms outstretched, or maybe held to the sides and bent outward at the elbows. All that partitioning is awfully organized. What would measurement be like if we were partitioning into irregular, organic shapes? Why do we need regular intervals for measurement? It's obvious that we do, but I want to see it expressed in case I learn anything. I just want to know why we privilege square-related shapes in geometric measurement. But maybe there are other types of measurement that use other shapes, such as angles, which use circles. See? I noticed a relationship. packing and filling - Packing depends on the fact that volume is additive. I have http://www.twitch.tv/bobross playing in the background, sometimes looking and laughing at the chat. Then I return to this somber math reading. I wonder what makes a math joke. There are puns, but I wonder what other kind of math humor is possible. This could be important for education. == Where the Geometric Measurement Progression is heading == The geometry progression does seem kind of slow. [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Comments]] [[Category:Complete]] 880d3dacb46f51a6089e78c959695eb7c4f90e1a 248 209 2016-06-27T06:24:54Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added commenting. wikitext text/x-wiki These are my comments on the Common Core Math Progressions document [http://achievethecore.org/file/1169 Measurement & Data (measurement part): Grades K-5] (PDF). == Overview == Ah, they agree with me on the centrality of measurement. These math educators always contrast measurement and counting, but I want to highlight their similarities. They both use units, for example. The Standards don't distinguish between mass and weight. Shame, shame! "direct comparison" - My earlier sources annoyingly didn't explain that direct comparison was meant to happen without measurement as a step on the way to measurement, so I was having trouble fitting it into my logical map of measurement concepts. The list of measurable attributes in this section reminds me of Thad Roberts' TEDx talk where he reduced all the units to five basic ones: length, mass, time, charge, and temperature (http://einsteinsintuition.com/what-is-qst/constants-of-nature/). One of the recurring questions of my life: Why are there multiple measurable attributes that an object can have? Why isn't everything just length or something? "comparing it to the amount" - This corresponds to my idea that measurement is a ratio. It also hints at the idea that at a certain point, the magnitude of a unit has to be established by direct experience if we're going to make any sense of it. A numeric measurement doesn't mean much on its own. "object is subdivided" - It's interesting to contrast this with division. "parallels the number concepts" - Good point comparing the metric system to place value. "Scientists measure" - Fair enough. They don't mind using length as a synonym for distance, and they explicitly define it so it can be. They even describe volume as entailing three lengths simultaneously. They agree with me that length is a core concept and for the same kinds of reasons I was giving. Area - This is where we get into things I hadn't thought about yet. == Kindergarten == How do we know conservation is true? In any case, it has nuances. And I think the concept is somewhat different between math and science. == Grade 1 == Seriation - A good opportunity to teach sorting algorithms. :) "no gaps or overlaps" - I have some thoughts on this, which I call coverage, in my measurement notes. inequalities - Impressive. Must've been a gifted student. :P paper-folding - Interesting about congruent parts. It can teach other math concepts too! Though maybe not in grade 1. "one-dimensional unit structure" - Yes, many measurements are conversions to length. == Grade 2 == "begin counting" - Off by 1! But yes, even rulers have semiotics. I vaguely recall being confused about the start-or-covered question in some counting situations with some tool or other. Actually redstone power in Minecraft is one. "units of different sizes" - This reminds me of the scene in Spirited Away where the girl had to hold her breath as she was crossing the bridge. The commentary said this was to illustrate the childhood experience of having to follow the seemingly arbitrary rules adults establish. Hence, I note that when kids try to guess the rules, they get it wrong. accumulation - Interesting, and that wasn't in my earlier sources or thinking. zero-point - Measurement is relative to a reference point. "length-unit size" - Yes, in counting, the unit size is one object. This is true for ordinal numbers too. "inverse relationship" - This would add a level of unpredictability that would make me anxious to find out if there was a way to predict the measurement given the unit size. What button is it pushing for me? regular vs jumbo paperclips - Another example of how math concepts can be mixed and matched to reveal more relationships and avenues to knowledge. So what is it about units that's being reapplied, and how? I feel like notating the concepts with some kind of symbolic shorthand would help with the analysis. So "the larger the unit, the fewer number of units in a given measurement" means something like, "if unit[a] > unit[b], num[a] < num[b]." Then "if object A is 10 regular paperclips long and object B is 10 jumbo paperclips long, the number of units is the same, but the units have different sizes, so the lengths of A and B are different." This means "If num[a] = num[b] and unit[a] < unit[b], then len[a] < len[b]." So we're using transitivity. Hmm, sort of. Anyway, it's good to keep in mind the phrase, "So with that, we can ..." and look to see where we can apply pieces of the concepts we've learned. "benchmark lengths" - Find lists of these. Maybe EngageNY will have enough. == Grade 3 == multiplying side lengths = counting tiles - Yes, and why they're the same as scaling. "areas are preserved under rotation" - This is true physically, at least with solids, but why is it always true mathematically? Maybe it helps to think of numbers as rigid like solids. They always take up the same (quantitative) space. independence of area and perimeter - How does that work? With rectangles it's because the sides of the square units can be part of the edge or interior, depending on their arrangement. perimeter formula verbal summaries - It would be interesting to spell out the steps in translating the verbal summaries into the formulas and vice versa. == Grade 4 == "emphasizes the step" - I hadn't thought of using particular formulas as memory aids. Formulas can have other kinds of advantages, such as illustrating the distributive property or reducing the number of calculations (see earlier). "How long is the garden?" - Sometimes I read word problems and wonder, "Why would that be unknown?" One set of cases would be if you were gathering the data from different sources or occasions. One piece could've been collected for one purpose and another for another, and now you have enough information to learn more by calculating instead of measuring. Coming up with situation equations involves knowing which operations are appropriate for the numeric relationships within the situation. What tells us that, for example, perimeter is additive? "concepts of angle" - This is similar to what I'd been thinking about angle but hadn't written yet. I like the "change in direction" language. I think I was tying angle to the difference between circles and shapes with vertices, which I thought of in terms of the discrete-continuous distinction. Circles (or ellipses) are made of a line that changes direction continuously, whereas vertex shapes (is there a name for this category?) are made of a line that changes direction discretely. I'm sure there's a more mathematically correct way to say that. I was contrasting angle with distance. Angle is a type of distance but a rotational one rather than linear. Explore the nature of this distinction. The different ways of describing angles reminds me that I've seen different ways to define a circle. Explore the relationships among these definitions. Why do we use 360 degrees? Why are 90 degree angles special, and why are they called right? They might be special because they're half a straight angle, which is just a line. I was thinking it was because they're symmetrical when you rotate them or some such thing. I'm looking forward to geometry, by the way. There's something about space that's so interesting and inviting. Plus I like visual things. What's a relational way to define angle? Rotation sounds operational. Maybe the difference between two directions. That still seems to have rotation in the background, since you could try to measure the difference linearly, but maybe there's a relational way to define rotation. "angles in a variety of situations" - Ah, yes, angle is an abstraction of these kinds of situations. How would a blind person learn geometry? angle of turtle rotation vs angle formed - What? Guess I'd have to see it. Why a turtle? Maybe because its legs form crosshairs and its head tells you which direction it'll be moving. What makes me want to skip over the examples on p. 25? I'm going to try not to skip exercises and to ask that question a lot when I'm going through the actual curriculum. In this case, and I suspect in many, it's the mental load of remembering numbers and relationships. Being able to write things down would make it easier. I can with the pencil tool in my PDF software. Another thing that bothers me about math problems is sorting out the path to the solution when you have a lot of pieces to coordinate, like in this example. Again, writing might help. == Grade 5 == "Convert like measurement units" - How do fractions and decimals relate? I know the procedures. I just want to trace what happens, because now that I think about it, it seems strange to me. How does division turn a fraction into a decimal? Kumi problem - The diagram reveals something I wouldn't have thought of, that half of what remains after subtracting 1/5 is 2/5, so to find the value of 1/5, just divide by 2. Now that I say that, it's interesting to me that one number can represent another number. What's happening there? decompose right rectangular prism - For the three axes I was just imagining someone bending over at a right angle with their arms outstretched, or maybe held to the sides and bent outward at the elbows. All that partitioning is awfully organized. What would measurement be like if we were partitioning into irregular, organic shapes? Why do we need regular intervals for measurement? It's obvious that we do, but I want to see it expressed in case I learn anything. I just want to know why we privilege square-related shapes in geometric measurement. But maybe there are other types of measurement that use other shapes, such as angles, which use circles. See? I noticed a relationship. packing and filling - Packing depends on the fact that volume is additive. I have http://www.twitch.tv/bobross playing in the background, sometimes looking and laughing at the chat. Then I return to this somber math reading. I wonder what makes a math joke. There are puns, but I wonder what other kind of math humor is possible. This could be important for education. == Where the Geometric Measurement Progression is heading == The geometry progression does seem kind of slow. <disqus/> [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Comments]] [[Category:Complete]] 717cc20a06cb000ec6e3346039efef821e3909f2 0 54 210 185 2016-04-30T06:57:18Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the EngageNY section and Pre-K Module 1. wikitext text/x-wiki == [[/Introduction/]] == == Preliminaries == * [[/Fundamentals/]] * [[/Number Sense/]] == [[/Progressions/|Common Core Math Progressions]] == * [[/Progressions/Preface/]] * [[/Progressions/K-5 Counting and Cardinality, Operations and Algebraic Thinking/]] * [[/Progressions/K-5 Number and Operations in Base Ten/]] * [[/Progressions/K-5 Data/]] * [[/Progressions/K-5 Measurement/]] * [[/Progressions/K-6 Geometry/]] * [[/Progressions/3-5 Fractions/]] * [[/Progressions/6-7 Ratios and Proportional Relationships/]] * [[/Progressions/6-8 Expressions and Equations/]] * [[/Progressions/6-8 Statistics and Probability/]] * [[/Progressions/6-8 The Number System and High School Number/]] * [[/Progressions/High School Functions/]] * [[/Progressions/High School Algebra/]] * [[/Progressions/High School Statistics and Probability/]] * [[/Progressions/High School Modeling/]] == Common Core State Standards == * [[/Mathematical Practice/]] == [[/Pre-algebra/]] == * [[/Measurement/]] == EngageNY == === Pre-Kindergarten === * [[/EngageNY/PK/Module 1: Counting to 5/]] == [[/References/]] == [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Mathematics]] [[Category:Developing]] 3540646605a6407a9e85bd43ec16dabc0856756f 216 210 2016-05-25T03:19:11Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added EngageNY Pre-K Modules 2-5. wikitext text/x-wiki == [[/Introduction/]] == == Preliminaries == * [[/Fundamentals/]] * [[/Number Sense/]] == [[/Progressions/|Common Core Math Progressions]] == * [[/Progressions/Preface/]] * [[/Progressions/K-5 Counting and Cardinality, Operations and Algebraic Thinking/]] * [[/Progressions/K-5 Number and Operations in Base Ten/]] * [[/Progressions/K-5 Data/]] * [[/Progressions/K-5 Measurement/]] * [[/Progressions/K-6 Geometry/]] * [[/Progressions/3-5 Fractions/]] * [[/Progressions/6-7 Ratios and Proportional Relationships/]] * [[/Progressions/6-8 Expressions and Equations/]] * [[/Progressions/6-8 Statistics and Probability/]] * [[/Progressions/6-8 The Number System and High School Number/]] * [[/Progressions/High School Functions/]] * [[/Progressions/High School Algebra/]] * [[/Progressions/High School Statistics and Probability/]] * [[/Progressions/High School Modeling/]] == Common Core State Standards == * [[/Mathematical Practice/]] == [[/Pre-algebra/]] == * [[/Measurement/]] == EngageNY == === Pre-Kindergarten === * [[/EngageNY/GPK/Module 1: Counting to 5/]] * [[/EngageNY/GPK/Module 2: Shapes/]] * [[/EngageNY/GPK/Module 3: Counting to 10/]] * [[/EngageNY/GPK/Module 4: Comparison of Length, Weight, Capacity, and Numbers to 5/]] * [[/EngageNY/GPK/Module 5: Addition and Subtraction Stories and Counting to 20/]] == [[/References/]] == [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Mathematics]] [[Category:Developing]] 55d23b8f791b6e41183a67b2abdd9738c8ce1838 221 216 2016-05-25T04:11:27Z Andy Culbertson 1 Changed the spelling of Pre-Kindergarten to match the EngageNY style. wikitext text/x-wiki == [[/Introduction/]] == == Preliminaries == * [[/Fundamentals/]] * [[/Number Sense/]] == [[/Progressions/|Common Core Math Progressions]] == * [[/Progressions/Preface/]] * [[/Progressions/K-5 Counting and Cardinality, Operations and Algebraic Thinking/]] * [[/Progressions/K-5 Number and Operations in Base Ten/]] * [[/Progressions/K-5 Data/]] * [[/Progressions/K-5 Measurement/]] * [[/Progressions/K-6 Geometry/]] * [[/Progressions/3-5 Fractions/]] * [[/Progressions/6-7 Ratios and Proportional Relationships/]] * [[/Progressions/6-8 Expressions and Equations/]] * [[/Progressions/6-8 Statistics and Probability/]] * [[/Progressions/6-8 The Number System and High School Number/]] * [[/Progressions/High School Functions/]] * [[/Progressions/High School Algebra/]] * [[/Progressions/High School Statistics and Probability/]] * [[/Progressions/High School Modeling/]] == Common Core State Standards == * [[/Mathematical Practice/]] == [[/Pre-algebra/]] == * [[/Measurement/]] == EngageNY == === Prekindergarten === * [[/EngageNY/GPK/Module 1: Counting to 5/]] * [[/EngageNY/GPK/Module 2: Shapes/]] * [[/EngageNY/GPK/Module 3: Counting to 10/]] * [[/EngageNY/GPK/Module 4: Comparison of Length, Weight, Capacity, and Numbers to 5/]] * [[/EngageNY/GPK/Module 5: Addition and Subtraction Stories and Counting to 20/]] == [[/References/]] == [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Mathematics]] [[Category:Developing]] dc308efb1467d650edd0126ac8a0219f9d3ba42e 224 221 2016-06-05T16:08:26Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added EngageNY K Module 1. wikitext text/x-wiki == [[/Introduction/]] == == Preliminaries == * [[/Fundamentals/]] * [[/Number Sense/]] == [[/Progressions/|Common Core Math Progressions]] == * [[/Progressions/Preface/]] * [[/Progressions/K-5 Counting and Cardinality, Operations and Algebraic Thinking/]] * [[/Progressions/K-5 Number and Operations in Base Ten/]] * [[/Progressions/K-5 Data/]] * [[/Progressions/K-5 Measurement/]] * [[/Progressions/K-6 Geometry/]] * [[/Progressions/3-5 Fractions/]] * [[/Progressions/6-7 Ratios and Proportional Relationships/]] * [[/Progressions/6-8 Expressions and Equations/]] * [[/Progressions/6-8 Statistics and Probability/]] * [[/Progressions/6-8 The Number System and High School Number/]] * [[/Progressions/High School Functions/]] * [[/Progressions/High School Algebra/]] * [[/Progressions/High School Statistics and Probability/]] * [[/Progressions/High School Modeling/]] == Common Core State Standards == * [[/Mathematical Practice/]] == [[/Pre-algebra/]] == * [[/Measurement/]] == EngageNY == === Prekindergarten === * [[/EngageNY/GPK/Module 1: Counting to 5/]] * [[/EngageNY/GPK/Module 2: Shapes/]] * [[/EngageNY/GPK/Module 3: Counting to 10/]] * [[/EngageNY/GPK/Module 4: Comparison of Length, Weight, Capacity, and Numbers to 5/]] * [[/EngageNY/GPK/Module 5: Addition and Subtraction Stories and Counting to 20/]] === Kindergarten === * [[/EngageNY/GK/Module 1: Numbers to 10]] == [[/References/]] == [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Mathematics]] [[Category:Developing]] 77292084fc577927eaf11d1eb2b50f9de1070587 225 224 2016-06-05T16:46:33Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added a missing slash from the K Module 1 link. wikitext text/x-wiki == [[/Introduction/]] == == Preliminaries == * [[/Fundamentals/]] * [[/Number Sense/]] == [[/Progressions/|Common Core Math Progressions]] == * [[/Progressions/Preface/]] * [[/Progressions/K-5 Counting and Cardinality, Operations and Algebraic Thinking/]] * [[/Progressions/K-5 Number and Operations in Base Ten/]] * [[/Progressions/K-5 Data/]] * [[/Progressions/K-5 Measurement/]] * [[/Progressions/K-6 Geometry/]] * [[/Progressions/3-5 Fractions/]] * [[/Progressions/6-7 Ratios and Proportional Relationships/]] * [[/Progressions/6-8 Expressions and Equations/]] * [[/Progressions/6-8 Statistics and Probability/]] * [[/Progressions/6-8 The Number System and High School Number/]] * [[/Progressions/High School Functions/]] * [[/Progressions/High School Algebra/]] * [[/Progressions/High School Statistics and Probability/]] * [[/Progressions/High School Modeling/]] == Common Core State Standards == * [[/Mathematical Practice/]] == [[/Pre-algebra/]] == * [[/Measurement/]] == EngageNY == === Prekindergarten === * [[/EngageNY/GPK/Module 1: Counting to 5/]] * [[/EngageNY/GPK/Module 2: Shapes/]] * [[/EngageNY/GPK/Module 3: Counting to 10/]] * [[/EngageNY/GPK/Module 4: Comparison of Length, Weight, Capacity, and Numbers to 5/]] * [[/EngageNY/GPK/Module 5: Addition and Subtraction Stories and Counting to 20/]] === Kindergarten === * [[/EngageNY/GK/Module 1: Numbers to 10/]] == [[/References/]] == [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Mathematics]] [[Category:Developing]] 6330845486e86f18007a7bc976149498df5eaec2 229 225 2016-06-12T13:27:47Z Andy Culbertson 1 Removed the EngageNY K Module 1 link and linked the K heading instead. wikitext text/x-wiki == [[/Introduction/]] == == Preliminaries == * [[/Fundamentals/]] * [[/Number Sense/]] == [[/Progressions/|Common Core Math Progressions]] == * [[/Progressions/Preface/]] * [[/Progressions/K-5 Counting and Cardinality, Operations and Algebraic Thinking/]] * [[/Progressions/K-5 Number and Operations in Base Ten/]] * [[/Progressions/K-5 Data/]] * [[/Progressions/K-5 Measurement/]] * [[/Progressions/K-6 Geometry/]] * [[/Progressions/3-5 Fractions/]] * [[/Progressions/6-7 Ratios and Proportional Relationships/]] * [[/Progressions/6-8 Expressions and Equations/]] * [[/Progressions/6-8 Statistics and Probability/]] * [[/Progressions/6-8 The Number System and High School Number/]] * [[/Progressions/High School Functions/]] * [[/Progressions/High School Algebra/]] * [[/Progressions/High School Statistics and Probability/]] * [[/Progressions/High School Modeling/]] == Common Core State Standards == * [[/Mathematical Practice/]] == [[/Pre-algebra/]] == * [[/Measurement/]] == EngageNY == === Prekindergarten === * [[/EngageNY/GPK/Module 1: Counting to 5/]] * [[/EngageNY/GPK/Module 2: Shapes/]] * [[/EngageNY/GPK/Module 3: Counting to 10/]] * [[/EngageNY/GPK/Module 4: Comparison of Length, Weight, Capacity, and Numbers to 5/]] * [[/EngageNY/GPK/Module 5: Addition and Subtraction Stories and Counting to 20/]] === [[/EngageNY/GK/|Kindergarten]] === == [[/References/]] == [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Mathematics]] [[Category:Developing]] ac77a1cc052e39e287ee507d8bdfd40d959b79cb 0 88 211 2016-04-30T06:59:54Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the article. wikitext text/x-wiki I'm expecting to go through pre-K in a hurry, but I'll take some time to think through things more carefully at the beginning to make sure I don't neglect lines of thought I'd regret missing. == Overview == The topics in the number core (rote counting, one-to-one correspondence, etc.) match the kinds of issues raised for this age group in my other sources (Chapin and Johnson, etc.). It's interesting that even though counting is the first major goal, the learning actually begins with pattern recognition in terms of comparing and grouping objects by their attributes. This does seem like a fundamental skill. Recognizing attributes prepares students for counting, measurement, and geometry. I believe the immediate point for these lessons is that matching allows you to recognize a collection of objects to be counted. It's also interesting that the curriculum doesn't follow the standards in order. It starts with #2 in Measurement and Data. But that's a feature of CC. It gives a paradigm for teaching math and a set of benchmarks for measuring student progress, but it otherwise leaves the details of implementation up to the teachers. Learning to count on your fingers using a piano template is the best part of the whole curriculum. Next they need to develop CC standards for music that require everyone to learn the instrument. Okay, joking, half. Of course, the other reason it's important is that it gets students ready for the number line, which just shows how carefully these curriculum developers have thought through everything, which is one reason I love the CC. Topics E and F are already preparing the kids for arithmetic. The "1 more" pattern reminds me to include my earlier thoughts on counting somewhere, such as "the pattern embedded in the counting sequence," as they put it. The CC standards start with Kindergarten, so the PK ones came from somewhere else. It would be nice to have a plaintext list of the PK standards, and all the rest, so I or someone could use them more flexibly, say in CSV format. I imagine that exists somewhere. Okay, after searching, I found [http://schools.nyc.gov/NR/rdonlyres/C0971909-165F-46F5-B209-F3425A90C5E8/0/p_12_common_core_learning_standards_mathematics_final.pdf this], [https://www.ixl.com/standards/new-york/math/pre-k this], and [https://www.ixl.com/standards/new-york/math/pre-k this]. == Topic A: Matching Objects == It would be nice to analyze the standards by the concepts they contain and the relationships between those concepts as well as the kinds of tasks. It might help to translate the standards into some kind of formal language, such as a programming language. It's tempting to copy these coherence links into a spreadsheet for diagramming purposes. I'm curious if their links are different from Jason Zimba's. What does it mean for an object to have an attribute? What does it mean that multiple different attributes exist and than an object can have more than one? === Lesson 1: Match 2 objects that are exactly the same === ==== Fluency Practice ==== This would take way too much time if I did it for every lesson, but if I were going to analyze the fluency practice, it would go something like this: This exercise illustrates the abstractness of numbers by associating them with multiple objects (fingers, claps, people). The connections are somewhat implicit. The teacher doesn't say, "We're counting fingers." The students are supposed to intuit that holding up a finger means it's being associated with the number. ==== Concept Development ==== I like CC's emphasis on vocabulary. I always try to nail down terms and use them somewhat consistently. It helps keep communication clear, and it contributes to a feeling that I'm doing things right. If I comment much on the PK lessons, it'll probably be on combinations of lessons, since each one covers so little ground. For example, I'd group the grouping lessons and discuss their connections and distinctions. Why would I pay any attention to the math concepts and skills preschoolers have to learn? Even though adults don't normally have to think consciously about them, sometimes unusual situations come up that require some conscious consideration about these basic concepts and skills. For example, let's say you're counting drops of water for some reason, and some of them combine while you're counting. You suddenly have to think a bit about conservation: The amount of water is the same, but the number of drops has changed. What are you going to consider a drop? How will you know you've counted every drop only once? These kinds of basic issues especially come up in programming, because you're having to think about unconscious, intuitive thought processes and spell them out in detailed, logical, repeatable steps so the computer can reliably reproduce them. This is certainly true in the field of AI. For example, if a program is counting moving objects, how will it keep track of each one to make sure it gets counted but only once? But I'm not creating computer algorithms for all these procedures right now, so for this project I'm only making a note of the issues that occur to me as I'm reading. Matching is easy to think about. When I was reading the Progressions, I found that I didn't get out of elementary school before starting to strain my brain, at least with mental math involving word problems. It'd be good to pay attention to the point at which math becomes an unnatural way of thinking for me. General questions I would ask for each lesson if I were analyzing everything: * What is the meaning or nature of the task of the lesson or topic? For matching I'd talk about things like the nature of objects having the same attribute and the workings of human perception and categorization. * What is involved in the objective possibility of the task? What's involved in the human activity? In this case, what is it about objects that allows them to be grouped? What capabilities and actions do humans need in order to do the grouping? * How does this lesson relate to the lessons it prepares for? * Why are mathematicians interested in this concept, and why do we select it for teaching? This is a question that came up a few times during the Progressions, and it reminds me I want to reread my Progressions notes and list my other recurring questions. Analyzing things to death is fun, but for this project the important question is, what am I looking for from the lessons in this curriculum that would help me achieve my goals? My tentative answer is that I want to know all the math concepts and skills I need, and I want mental aids for understanding them deeply enough to apply them to problems flexibly. An added bonus would be to contribute to people's thinking about math as a result of my ruminations while learning. So generally I'm listing concepts, skills, and mental aids. Even if I don't analyze them now, the lists will make it easier to think about them later. ==== Student Debrief ==== Math misconceptions help me think about the concepts. I run across discussions of them here and there, some of them more organized and complete than others. I'll probably link to some of the better ones somewhere in this project at some point, probably on the intro page. It's too bad they don't talk about specific mistakes (so far) in the curriculum, since they have the teachers listen for them to correct them. === Lesson 2: Match 2 objects that are the same, but… === === Lesson 3: Match 2 objects that are the same, but… === Lesson 3 is the same as Lesson 2 but uses different words. === Lesson 4: Match 2 objects that are used together. === Interesting. This Lesson expands the idea of association beyond visual attributes. == Topic D: Matching 1 Numeral with up to 3 Objects == At about this point I settled on a rhythm for reading these early-grade lessons. I'm reading the module and topic overviews, the note paragraphs from the lessons, and the questions in the student debriefs. I'm also skimming the assessments. == End-of-Module Assessment == It's interesting that even at this point in the curriculum the students are solving for unknowns, though the material doesn't call it that. That's one reason I'm reading the student debriefs. The questions there approach the lesson's concepts from different angles to make sure the students can think flexibly about them. For example, you could state the idea of the Topic A, Lesson 1 as "(1) Objects A and B (2) are (3) exactly the same (4) if they are the same shape, size, and color." The student debrief asks the students to solve for each part of that statement as an unknown: (1) specific objects that match ("Do you see any things in our classroom that match?"), (2) whether two objects match ("Are these 2 students exactly the same?"), (3) the vocabulary of matching ("These counters are _________."), and (4) the conditions for matching ("How did you choose things that were exactly the same?"). Since matching and counting are things I already know how to do, there isn't much to learn, so it's hard not to see this material as a big wall of text. It's helpful to have a framework to fit the content into so it means something to me. There's something of a framework in the Module 1 overview (the number core: rote counting, one-to-one correspondence, cardinality, and written numerals), but it's a little clearer in the Counting and Cardinality Progression, and it's even clearer in Hatfield et al, or at least spelled out in more detail. Counting is a surprisingly complicated activity. You have to know the sequence of counting numbers and the pattern that each number is one more than the previous one. You have to match each number with each object you're counting without missing or double-counting any objects, and you have to know that the last number you say is the quantity of objects in the collection. Then if you're going to write the number down, you have to know the numeral that corresponds to that number name. And if it's over 9, you have to know the base 10 system. Kids aren't born knowing any of this, and it takes lots of careful instruction and practice to learn. [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Comments]] [[Category:Complete]] b3f607bdec49e4dbb143e585d51bc586f4a2db72 213 211 2016-05-25T03:10:37Z Andy Culbertson 1 Andy Culbertson moved page [[Math Relearning/EngageNY/PK/Module 1: Counting to 5]] to [[Math Relearning/EngageNY/GPK/Module 1: Counting to 5]]: Aligning the grade abbreviation with the EngageNY abbreviations, which are a little more readable wikitext text/x-wiki I'm expecting to go through pre-K in a hurry, but I'll take some time to think through things more carefully at the beginning to make sure I don't neglect lines of thought I'd regret missing. == Overview == The topics in the number core (rote counting, one-to-one correspondence, etc.) match the kinds of issues raised for this age group in my other sources (Chapin and Johnson, etc.). It's interesting that even though counting is the first major goal, the learning actually begins with pattern recognition in terms of comparing and grouping objects by their attributes. This does seem like a fundamental skill. Recognizing attributes prepares students for counting, measurement, and geometry. I believe the immediate point for these lessons is that matching allows you to recognize a collection of objects to be counted. It's also interesting that the curriculum doesn't follow the standards in order. It starts with #2 in Measurement and Data. But that's a feature of CC. It gives a paradigm for teaching math and a set of benchmarks for measuring student progress, but it otherwise leaves the details of implementation up to the teachers. Learning to count on your fingers using a piano template is the best part of the whole curriculum. Next they need to develop CC standards for music that require everyone to learn the instrument. Okay, joking, half. Of course, the other reason it's important is that it gets students ready for the number line, which just shows how carefully these curriculum developers have thought through everything, which is one reason I love the CC. Topics E and F are already preparing the kids for arithmetic. The "1 more" pattern reminds me to include my earlier thoughts on counting somewhere, such as "the pattern embedded in the counting sequence," as they put it. The CC standards start with Kindergarten, so the PK ones came from somewhere else. It would be nice to have a plaintext list of the PK standards, and all the rest, so I or someone could use them more flexibly, say in CSV format. I imagine that exists somewhere. Okay, after searching, I found [http://schools.nyc.gov/NR/rdonlyres/C0971909-165F-46F5-B209-F3425A90C5E8/0/p_12_common_core_learning_standards_mathematics_final.pdf this], [https://www.ixl.com/standards/new-york/math/pre-k this], and [https://www.ixl.com/standards/new-york/math/pre-k this]. == Topic A: Matching Objects == It would be nice to analyze the standards by the concepts they contain and the relationships between those concepts as well as the kinds of tasks. It might help to translate the standards into some kind of formal language, such as a programming language. It's tempting to copy these coherence links into a spreadsheet for diagramming purposes. I'm curious if their links are different from Jason Zimba's. What does it mean for an object to have an attribute? What does it mean that multiple different attributes exist and than an object can have more than one? === Lesson 1: Match 2 objects that are exactly the same === ==== Fluency Practice ==== This would take way too much time if I did it for every lesson, but if I were going to analyze the fluency practice, it would go something like this: This exercise illustrates the abstractness of numbers by associating them with multiple objects (fingers, claps, people). The connections are somewhat implicit. The teacher doesn't say, "We're counting fingers." The students are supposed to intuit that holding up a finger means it's being associated with the number. ==== Concept Development ==== I like CC's emphasis on vocabulary. I always try to nail down terms and use them somewhat consistently. It helps keep communication clear, and it contributes to a feeling that I'm doing things right. If I comment much on the PK lessons, it'll probably be on combinations of lessons, since each one covers so little ground. For example, I'd group the grouping lessons and discuss their connections and distinctions. Why would I pay any attention to the math concepts and skills preschoolers have to learn? Even though adults don't normally have to think consciously about them, sometimes unusual situations come up that require some conscious consideration about these basic concepts and skills. For example, let's say you're counting drops of water for some reason, and some of them combine while you're counting. You suddenly have to think a bit about conservation: The amount of water is the same, but the number of drops has changed. What are you going to consider a drop? How will you know you've counted every drop only once? These kinds of basic issues especially come up in programming, because you're having to think about unconscious, intuitive thought processes and spell them out in detailed, logical, repeatable steps so the computer can reliably reproduce them. This is certainly true in the field of AI. For example, if a program is counting moving objects, how will it keep track of each one to make sure it gets counted but only once? But I'm not creating computer algorithms for all these procedures right now, so for this project I'm only making a note of the issues that occur to me as I'm reading. Matching is easy to think about. When I was reading the Progressions, I found that I didn't get out of elementary school before starting to strain my brain, at least with mental math involving word problems. It'd be good to pay attention to the point at which math becomes an unnatural way of thinking for me. General questions I would ask for each lesson if I were analyzing everything: * What is the meaning or nature of the task of the lesson or topic? For matching I'd talk about things like the nature of objects having the same attribute and the workings of human perception and categorization. * What is involved in the objective possibility of the task? What's involved in the human activity? In this case, what is it about objects that allows them to be grouped? What capabilities and actions do humans need in order to do the grouping? * How does this lesson relate to the lessons it prepares for? * Why are mathematicians interested in this concept, and why do we select it for teaching? This is a question that came up a few times during the Progressions, and it reminds me I want to reread my Progressions notes and list my other recurring questions. Analyzing things to death is fun, but for this project the important question is, what am I looking for from the lessons in this curriculum that would help me achieve my goals? My tentative answer is that I want to know all the math concepts and skills I need, and I want mental aids for understanding them deeply enough to apply them to problems flexibly. An added bonus would be to contribute to people's thinking about math as a result of my ruminations while learning. So generally I'm listing concepts, skills, and mental aids. Even if I don't analyze them now, the lists will make it easier to think about them later. ==== Student Debrief ==== Math misconceptions help me think about the concepts. I run across discussions of them here and there, some of them more organized and complete than others. I'll probably link to some of the better ones somewhere in this project at some point, probably on the intro page. It's too bad they don't talk about specific mistakes (so far) in the curriculum, since they have the teachers listen for them to correct them. === Lesson 2: Match 2 objects that are the same, but… === === Lesson 3: Match 2 objects that are the same, but… === Lesson 3 is the same as Lesson 2 but uses different words. === Lesson 4: Match 2 objects that are used together. === Interesting. This Lesson expands the idea of association beyond visual attributes. == Topic D: Matching 1 Numeral with up to 3 Objects == At about this point I settled on a rhythm for reading these early-grade lessons. I'm reading the module and topic overviews, the note paragraphs from the lessons, and the questions in the student debriefs. I'm also skimming the assessments. == End-of-Module Assessment == It's interesting that even at this point in the curriculum the students are solving for unknowns, though the material doesn't call it that. That's one reason I'm reading the student debriefs. The questions there approach the lesson's concepts from different angles to make sure the students can think flexibly about them. For example, you could state the idea of the Topic A, Lesson 1 as "(1) Objects A and B (2) are (3) exactly the same (4) if they are the same shape, size, and color." The student debrief asks the students to solve for each part of that statement as an unknown: (1) specific objects that match ("Do you see any things in our classroom that match?"), (2) whether two objects match ("Are these 2 students exactly the same?"), (3) the vocabulary of matching ("These counters are _________."), and (4) the conditions for matching ("How did you choose things that were exactly the same?"). Since matching and counting are things I already know how to do, there isn't much to learn, so it's hard not to see this material as a big wall of text. It's helpful to have a framework to fit the content into so it means something to me. There's something of a framework in the Module 1 overview (the number core: rote counting, one-to-one correspondence, cardinality, and written numerals), but it's a little clearer in the Counting and Cardinality Progression, and it's even clearer in Hatfield et al, or at least spelled out in more detail. Counting is a surprisingly complicated activity. You have to know the sequence of counting numbers and the pattern that each number is one more than the previous one. You have to match each number with each object you're counting without missing or double-counting any objects, and you have to know that the last number you say is the quantity of objects in the collection. Then if you're going to write the number down, you have to know the numeral that corresponds to that number name. And if it's over 9, you have to know the base 10 system. Kids aren't born knowing any of this, and it takes lots of careful instruction and practice to learn. [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Comments]] [[Category:Complete]] b3f607bdec49e4dbb143e585d51bc586f4a2db72 215 213 2016-05-25T03:18:15Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added a link to the module. wikitext text/x-wiki These are my comments on EngageNY's [https://www.engageny.org/resource/prekindergarten-mathematics-module-1 Prekindergarten Module 1]. I'm expecting to go through pre-K in a hurry, but I'll take some time to think through things more carefully at the beginning to make sure I don't neglect lines of thought I'd regret missing. == Overview == The topics in the number core (rote counting, one-to-one correspondence, etc.) match the kinds of issues raised for this age group in my other sources (Chapin and Johnson, etc.). It's interesting that even though counting is the first major goal, the learning actually begins with pattern recognition in terms of comparing and grouping objects by their attributes. This does seem like a fundamental skill. Recognizing attributes prepares students for counting, measurement, and geometry. I believe the immediate point for these lessons is that matching allows you to recognize a collection of objects to be counted. It's also interesting that the curriculum doesn't follow the standards in order. It starts with #2 in Measurement and Data. But that's a feature of CC. It gives a paradigm for teaching math and a set of benchmarks for measuring student progress, but it otherwise leaves the details of implementation up to the teachers. Learning to count on your fingers using a piano template is the best part of the whole curriculum. Next they need to develop CC standards for music that require everyone to learn the instrument. Okay, joking, half. Of course, the other reason it's important is that it gets students ready for the number line, which just shows how carefully these curriculum developers have thought through everything, which is one reason I love the CC. Topics E and F are already preparing the kids for arithmetic. The "1 more" pattern reminds me to include my earlier thoughts on counting somewhere, such as "the pattern embedded in the counting sequence," as they put it. The CC standards start with Kindergarten, so the PK ones came from somewhere else. It would be nice to have a plaintext list of the PK standards, and all the rest, so I or someone could use them more flexibly, say in CSV format. I imagine that exists somewhere. Okay, after searching, I found [http://schools.nyc.gov/NR/rdonlyres/C0971909-165F-46F5-B209-F3425A90C5E8/0/p_12_common_core_learning_standards_mathematics_final.pdf this], [https://www.ixl.com/standards/new-york/math/pre-k this], and [https://www.ixl.com/standards/new-york/math/pre-k this]. == Topic A: Matching Objects == It would be nice to analyze the standards by the concepts they contain and the relationships between those concepts as well as the kinds of tasks. It might help to translate the standards into some kind of formal language, such as a programming language. It's tempting to copy these coherence links into a spreadsheet for diagramming purposes. I'm curious if their links are different from Jason Zimba's. What does it mean for an object to have an attribute? What does it mean that multiple different attributes exist and than an object can have more than one? === Lesson 1: Match 2 objects that are exactly the same === ==== Fluency Practice ==== This would take way too much time if I did it for every lesson, but if I were going to analyze the fluency practice, it would go something like this: This exercise illustrates the abstractness of numbers by associating them with multiple objects (fingers, claps, people). The connections are somewhat implicit. The teacher doesn't say, "We're counting fingers." The students are supposed to intuit that holding up a finger means it's being associated with the number. ==== Concept Development ==== I like CC's emphasis on vocabulary. I always try to nail down terms and use them somewhat consistently. It helps keep communication clear, and it contributes to a feeling that I'm doing things right. If I comment much on the PK lessons, it'll probably be on combinations of lessons, since each one covers so little ground. For example, I'd group the grouping lessons and discuss their connections and distinctions. Why would I pay any attention to the math concepts and skills preschoolers have to learn? Even though adults don't normally have to think consciously about them, sometimes unusual situations come up that require some conscious consideration about these basic concepts and skills. For example, let's say you're counting drops of water for some reason, and some of them combine while you're counting. You suddenly have to think a bit about conservation: The amount of water is the same, but the number of drops has changed. What are you going to consider a drop? How will you know you've counted every drop only once? These kinds of basic issues especially come up in programming, because you're having to think about unconscious, intuitive thought processes and spell them out in detailed, logical, repeatable steps so the computer can reliably reproduce them. This is certainly true in the field of AI. For example, if a program is counting moving objects, how will it keep track of each one to make sure it gets counted but only once? But I'm not creating computer algorithms for all these procedures right now, so for this project I'm only making a note of the issues that occur to me as I'm reading. Matching is easy to think about. When I was reading the Progressions, I found that I didn't get out of elementary school before starting to strain my brain, at least with mental math involving word problems. It'd be good to pay attention to the point at which math becomes an unnatural way of thinking for me. General questions I would ask for each lesson if I were analyzing everything: * What is the meaning or nature of the task of the lesson or topic? For matching I'd talk about things like the nature of objects having the same attribute and the workings of human perception and categorization. * What is involved in the objective possibility of the task? What's involved in the human activity? In this case, what is it about objects that allows them to be grouped? What capabilities and actions do humans need in order to do the grouping? * How does this lesson relate to the lessons it prepares for? * Why are mathematicians interested in this concept, and why do we select it for teaching? This is a question that came up a few times during the Progressions, and it reminds me I want to reread my Progressions notes and list my other recurring questions. Analyzing things to death is fun, but for this project the important question is, what am I looking for from the lessons in this curriculum that would help me achieve my goals? My tentative answer is that I want to know all the math concepts and skills I need, and I want mental aids for understanding them deeply enough to apply them to problems flexibly. An added bonus would be to contribute to people's thinking about math as a result of my ruminations while learning. So generally I'm listing concepts, skills, and mental aids. Even if I don't analyze them now, the lists will make it easier to think about them later. ==== Student Debrief ==== Math misconceptions help me think about the concepts. I run across discussions of them here and there, some of them more organized and complete than others. I'll probably link to some of the better ones somewhere in this project at some point, probably on the intro page. It's too bad they don't talk about specific mistakes (so far) in the curriculum, since they have the teachers listen for them to correct them. === Lesson 2: Match 2 objects that are the same, but… === === Lesson 3: Match 2 objects that are the same, but… === Lesson 3 is the same as Lesson 2 but uses different words. === Lesson 4: Match 2 objects that are used together. === Interesting. This Lesson expands the idea of association beyond visual attributes. == Topic D: Matching 1 Numeral with up to 3 Objects == At about this point I settled on a rhythm for reading these early-grade lessons. I'm reading the module and topic overviews, the note paragraphs from the lessons, and the questions in the student debriefs. I'm also skimming the assessments. == End-of-Module Assessment == It's interesting that even at this point in the curriculum the students are solving for unknowns, though the material doesn't call it that. That's one reason I'm reading the student debriefs. The questions there approach the lesson's concepts from different angles to make sure the students can think flexibly about them. For example, you could state the idea of the Topic A, Lesson 1 as "(1) Objects A and B (2) are (3) exactly the same (4) if they are the same shape, size, and color." The student debrief asks the students to solve for each part of that statement as an unknown: (1) specific objects that match ("Do you see any things in our classroom that match?"), (2) whether two objects match ("Are these 2 students exactly the same?"), (3) the vocabulary of matching ("These counters are _________."), and (4) the conditions for matching ("How did you choose things that were exactly the same?"). Since matching and counting are things I already know how to do, there isn't much to learn, so it's hard not to see this material as a big wall of text. It's helpful to have a framework to fit the content into so it means something to me. There's something of a framework in the Module 1 overview (the number core: rote counting, one-to-one correspondence, cardinality, and written numerals), but it's a little clearer in the Counting and Cardinality Progression, and it's even clearer in Hatfield et al, or at least spelled out in more detail. Counting is a surprisingly complicated activity. You have to know the sequence of counting numbers and the pattern that each number is one more than the previous one. You have to match each number with each object you're counting without missing or double-counting any objects, and you have to know that the last number you say is the quantity of objects in the collection. Then if you're going to write the number down, you have to know the numeral that corresponds to that number name. And if it's over 9, you have to know the base 10 system. Kids aren't born knowing any of this, and it takes lots of careful instruction and practice to learn. [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Comments]] [[Category:Complete]] 941f986b9d83df052314b00319405167aa1cc38f 222 215 2016-05-30T22:25:58Z Andy Culbertson 1 Fixed a link and added PDF flags to links. wikitext text/x-wiki These are my comments on EngageNY's [https://www.engageny.org/resource/prekindergarten-mathematics-module-1 Prekindergarten Module 1]. I'm expecting to go through pre-K in a hurry, but I'll take some time to think through things more carefully at the beginning to make sure I don't neglect lines of thought I'd regret missing. == Overview == The topics in the number core (rote counting, one-to-one correspondence, etc.) match the kinds of issues raised for this age group in my other sources (Chapin and Johnson, etc.). It's interesting that even though counting is the first major goal, the learning actually begins with pattern recognition in terms of comparing and grouping objects by their attributes. This does seem like a fundamental skill. Recognizing attributes prepares students for counting, measurement, and geometry. I believe the immediate point for these lessons is that matching allows you to recognize a collection of objects to be counted. It's also interesting that the curriculum doesn't follow the standards in order. It starts with #2 in Measurement and Data. But that's a feature of CC. It gives a paradigm for teaching math and a set of benchmarks for measuring student progress, but it otherwise leaves the details of implementation up to the teachers. Learning to count on your fingers using a piano template is the best part of the whole curriculum. Next they need to develop CC standards for music that require everyone to learn the instrument. Okay, joking, half. Of course, the other reason it's important is that it gets students ready for the number line, which just shows how carefully these curriculum developers have thought through everything, which is one reason I love the CC. Topics E and F are already preparing the kids for arithmetic. The "1 more" pattern reminds me to include my earlier thoughts on counting somewhere, such as "the pattern embedded in the counting sequence," as they put it. The CC standards start with Kindergarten, so the PK ones came from somewhere else. It would be nice to have a plaintext list of the PK standards, and all the rest, so I or someone could use them more flexibly, say in CSV format. I imagine that exists somewhere. Okay, after searching, I found [http://schools.nyc.gov/NR/rdonlyres/C0971909-165F-46F5-B209-F3425A90C5E8/0/p_12_common_core_learning_standards_mathematics_final.pdf this] (PDF), [https://www.ixl.com/standards/new-york/math/pre-k this], and [http://www.p12.nysed.gov/earlylearning/standards/documents/PrekindergartentoKindergartenStandardsAlignmentMath.pdf this] (PDF). == Topic A: Matching Objects == It would be nice to analyze the standards by the concepts they contain and the relationships between those concepts as well as the kinds of tasks. It might help to translate the standards into some kind of formal language, such as a programming language. It's tempting to copy these coherence links into a spreadsheet for diagramming purposes. I'm curious if their links are different from Jason Zimba's. What does it mean for an object to have an attribute? What does it mean that multiple different attributes exist and than an object can have more than one? === Lesson 1: Match 2 objects that are exactly the same === ==== Fluency Practice ==== This would take way too much time if I did it for every lesson, but if I were going to analyze the fluency practice, it would go something like this: This exercise illustrates the abstractness of numbers by associating them with multiple objects (fingers, claps, people). The connections are somewhat implicit. The teacher doesn't say, "We're counting fingers." The students are supposed to intuit that holding up a finger means it's being associated with the number. ==== Concept Development ==== I like CC's emphasis on vocabulary. I always try to nail down terms and use them somewhat consistently. It helps keep communication clear, and it contributes to a feeling that I'm doing things right. If I comment much on the PK lessons, it'll probably be on combinations of lessons, since each one covers so little ground. For example, I'd group the grouping lessons and discuss their connections and distinctions. Why would I pay any attention to the math concepts and skills preschoolers have to learn? Even though adults don't normally have to think consciously about them, sometimes unusual situations come up that require some conscious consideration about these basic concepts and skills. For example, let's say you're counting drops of water for some reason, and some of them combine while you're counting. You suddenly have to think a bit about conservation: The amount of water is the same, but the number of drops has changed. What are you going to consider a drop? How will you know you've counted every drop only once? These kinds of basic issues especially come up in programming, because you're having to think about unconscious, intuitive thought processes and spell them out in detailed, logical, repeatable steps so the computer can reliably reproduce them. This is certainly true in the field of AI. For example, if a program is counting moving objects, how will it keep track of each one to make sure it gets counted but only once? But I'm not creating computer algorithms for all these procedures right now, so for this project I'm only making a note of the issues that occur to me as I'm reading. Matching is easy to think about. When I was reading the Progressions, I found that I didn't get out of elementary school before starting to strain my brain, at least with mental math involving word problems. It'd be good to pay attention to the point at which math becomes an unnatural way of thinking for me. General questions I would ask for each lesson if I were analyzing everything: * What is the meaning or nature of the task of the lesson or topic? For matching I'd talk about things like the nature of objects having the same attribute and the workings of human perception and categorization. * What is involved in the objective possibility of the task? What's involved in the human activity? In this case, what is it about objects that allows them to be grouped? What capabilities and actions do humans need in order to do the grouping? * How does this lesson relate to the lessons it prepares for? * Why are mathematicians interested in this concept, and why do we select it for teaching? This is a question that came up a few times during the Progressions, and it reminds me I want to reread my Progressions notes and list my other recurring questions. Analyzing things to death is fun, but for this project the important question is, what am I looking for from the lessons in this curriculum that would help me achieve my goals? My tentative answer is that I want to know all the math concepts and skills I need, and I want mental aids for understanding them deeply enough to apply them to problems flexibly. An added bonus would be to contribute to people's thinking about math as a result of my ruminations while learning. So generally I'm listing concepts, skills, and mental aids. Even if I don't analyze them now, the lists will make it easier to think about them later. ==== Student Debrief ==== Math misconceptions help me think about the concepts. I run across discussions of them here and there, some of them more organized and complete than others. I'll probably link to some of the better ones somewhere in this project at some point, probably on the intro page. It's too bad they don't talk about specific mistakes (so far) in the curriculum, since they have the teachers listen for them to correct them. === Lesson 2: Match 2 objects that are the same, but… === === Lesson 3: Match 2 objects that are the same, but… === Lesson 3 is the same as Lesson 2 but uses different words. === Lesson 4: Match 2 objects that are used together. === Interesting. This Lesson expands the idea of association beyond visual attributes. == Topic D: Matching 1 Numeral with up to 3 Objects == At about this point I settled on a rhythm for reading these early-grade lessons. I'm reading the module and topic overviews, the note paragraphs from the lessons, and the questions in the student debriefs. I'm also skimming the assessments. == End-of-Module Assessment == It's interesting that even at this point in the curriculum the students are solving for unknowns, though the material doesn't call it that. That's one reason I'm reading the student debriefs. The questions there approach the lesson's concepts from different angles to make sure the students can think flexibly about them. For example, you could state the idea of the Topic A, Lesson 1 as "(1) Objects A and B (2) are (3) exactly the same (4) if they are the same shape, size, and color." The student debrief asks the students to solve for each part of that statement as an unknown: (1) specific objects that match ("Do you see any things in our classroom that match?"), (2) whether two objects match ("Are these 2 students exactly the same?"), (3) the vocabulary of matching ("These counters are _________."), and (4) the conditions for matching ("How did you choose things that were exactly the same?"). Since matching and counting are things I already know how to do, there isn't much to learn, so it's hard not to see this material as a big wall of text. It's helpful to have a framework to fit the content into so it means something to me. There's something of a framework in the Module 1 overview (the number core: rote counting, one-to-one correspondence, cardinality, and written numerals), but it's a little clearer in the Counting and Cardinality Progression, and it's even clearer in Hatfield et al, or at least spelled out in more detail. Counting is a surprisingly complicated activity. You have to know the sequence of counting numbers and the pattern that each number is one more than the previous one. You have to match each number with each object you're counting without missing or double-counting any objects, and you have to know that the last number you say is the quantity of objects in the collection. Then if you're going to write the number down, you have to know the numeral that corresponds to that number name. And if it's over 9, you have to know the base 10 system. Kids aren't born knowing any of this, and it takes lots of careful instruction and practice to learn. [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Comments]] [[Category:Complete]] e787646824d18b745021335e87c5ec4f290016e5 223 222 2016-06-05T16:04:22Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the propositional concepts list and their explanation paragraph. wikitext text/x-wiki These are my comments on EngageNY's [https://www.engageny.org/resource/prekindergarten-mathematics-module-1 Prekindergarten Module 1]. I'm expecting to go through pre-K in a hurry, but I'll take some time to think through things more carefully at the beginning to make sure I don't neglect lines of thought I'd regret missing. == Overview == To help me wrap my mind around all the prose, I'll list the central points I gather from the material for each module, mainly from the module overview. I'll also list concepts from recent modules that are being applied in the current one. These lists will help me get a sense for the progression of concepts in the curriculum. In fact, to save time, for some modules the lists might be the extent of my comments, since grasping the progression is one of my few major goals. The standards mainly give skills and sometimes include concepts to understand, but in these lists I want to focus on the concepts. I don't want to take the time to make the statements rigidly formal at this point, but they'll be a bit more formal than descriptions in the curriculum. I'll call these statements propositional concepts to contrast them with nominal concepts, would would be nouns, such as attribute or counting. You'd find nominal concepts in a concept map or ontology. Speaking of ontologies, I've found a few for math I want to examine. New propositional concepts from this module: * Objects have attributes. * Objects can be compared according to the values of their attributes. * Objects can be matched by their attributes. * Objects can match at different degrees of similarity: exactly the same or the same in some attributes but different in others. * Objects can be grouped together based on their matching attributes. * The quantity of items in a group can be identified by a number. * The quantity of items in a group can be discovered by counting. * Number conservation: The quantity of items in a group remains the same when their spatial arrangement changes. * Two groups can have the same quantity of items even if they contain different types of items. * Rote counting: In the standard sequence for counting, each number is one greater than the previous number and one less than the following number. * One-to-one-correspondence: In counting a collection, each object is paired with one number using the standard sequence. * Cardinality: In counting a collection, the last number paired indicates the quantity in the collection. * Decomposition: Numbers have smaller numbers embedded in them. * Successively removing one from a collection is equivalent to a series of quantities that move backwards through the counting sequence. The topics in the number core (rote counting, one-to-one correspondence, etc.) match the kinds of issues raised for this age group in my other sources (Chapin and Johnson, etc.). It's interesting that even though counting is the first major goal, the learning actually begins with pattern recognition in terms of comparing and grouping objects by their attributes. This does seem like a fundamental skill. Recognizing attributes prepares students for counting, measurement, and geometry. I believe the immediate point for these lessons is that matching allows you to recognize a collection of objects to be counted. It's also interesting that the curriculum doesn't follow the standards in order. It starts with #2 in Measurement and Data. But that's a feature of CC. It gives a paradigm for teaching math and a set of benchmarks for measuring student progress, but it otherwise leaves the details of implementation up to the teachers. Learning to count on your fingers using a piano template is the best part of the whole curriculum. Next they need to develop CC standards for music that require everyone to learn the instrument. Okay, joking, half. Of course, the other reason it's important is that it gets students ready for the number line, which just shows how carefully these curriculum developers have thought through everything, which is one reason I love the CC. Topics E and F are already preparing the kids for arithmetic. The "1 more" pattern reminds me to include my earlier thoughts on counting somewhere, such as "the pattern embedded in the counting sequence," as they put it. The CC standards start with Kindergarten, so the PK ones came from somewhere else. It would be nice to have a plaintext list of the PK standards, and all the rest, so I or someone could use them more flexibly, say in CSV format. I imagine that exists somewhere. Okay, after searching, I found [http://schools.nyc.gov/NR/rdonlyres/C0971909-165F-46F5-B209-F3425A90C5E8/0/p_12_common_core_learning_standards_mathematics_final.pdf this] (PDF), [https://www.ixl.com/standards/new-york/math/pre-k this], and [http://www.p12.nysed.gov/earlylearning/standards/documents/PrekindergartentoKindergartenStandardsAlignmentMath.pdf this] (PDF). == Topic A: Matching Objects == It would be nice to analyze the standards by the concepts they contain and the relationships between those concepts as well as the kinds of tasks. It might help to translate the standards into some kind of formal language, such as a programming language. It's tempting to copy these coherence links into a spreadsheet for diagramming purposes. I'm curious if their links are different from Jason Zimba's. What does it mean for an object to have an attribute? What does it mean that multiple different attributes exist and than an object can have more than one? === Lesson 1: Match 2 objects that are exactly the same === ==== Fluency Practice ==== This would take way too much time if I did it for every lesson, but if I were going to analyze the fluency practice, it would go something like this: This exercise illustrates the abstractness of numbers by associating them with multiple objects (fingers, claps, people). The connections are somewhat implicit. The teacher doesn't say, "We're counting fingers." The students are supposed to intuit that holding up a finger means it's being associated with the number. ==== Concept Development ==== I like CC's emphasis on vocabulary. I always try to nail down terms and use them somewhat consistently. It helps keep communication clear, and it contributes to a feeling that I'm doing things right. If I comment much on the PK lessons, it'll probably be on combinations of lessons, since each one covers so little ground. For example, I'd group the grouping lessons and discuss their connections and distinctions. Why would I pay any attention to the math concepts and skills preschoolers have to learn? Even though adults don't normally have to think consciously about them, sometimes unusual situations come up that require some conscious consideration about these basic concepts and skills. For example, let's say you're counting drops of water for some reason, and some of them combine while you're counting. You suddenly have to think a bit about conservation: The amount of water is the same, but the number of drops has changed. What are you going to consider a drop? How will you know you've counted every drop only once? These kinds of basic issues especially come up in programming, because you're having to think about unconscious, intuitive thought processes and spell them out in detailed, logical, repeatable steps so the computer can reliably reproduce them. This is certainly true in the field of AI. For example, if a program is counting moving objects, how will it keep track of each one to make sure it gets counted but only once? But I'm not creating computer algorithms for all these procedures right now, so for this project I'm only making a note of the issues that occur to me as I'm reading. Matching is easy to think about. When I was reading the Progressions, I found that I didn't get out of elementary school before starting to strain my brain, at least with mental math involving word problems. It'd be good to pay attention to the point at which math becomes an unnatural way of thinking for me. General questions I would ask for each lesson if I were analyzing everything: * What is the meaning or nature of the task of the lesson or topic? For matching I'd talk about things like the nature of objects having the same attribute and the workings of human perception and categorization. * What is involved in the objective possibility of the task? What's involved in the human activity? In this case, what is it about objects that allows them to be grouped? What capabilities and actions do humans need in order to do the grouping? * How does this lesson relate to the lessons it prepares for? * Why are mathematicians interested in this concept, and why do we select it for teaching? This is a question that came up a few times during the Progressions, and it reminds me I want to reread my Progressions notes and list my other recurring questions. Analyzing things to death is fun, but for this project the important question is, what am I looking for from the lessons in this curriculum that would help me achieve my goals? My tentative answer is that I want to know all the math concepts and skills I need, and I want mental aids for understanding them deeply enough to apply them to problems flexibly. An added bonus would be to contribute to people's thinking about math as a result of my ruminations while learning. So generally I'm listing concepts, skills, and mental aids. Even if I don't analyze them now, the lists will make it easier to think about them later. ==== Student Debrief ==== Math misconceptions help me think about the concepts. I run across discussions of them here and there, some of them more organized and complete than others. I'll probably link to some of the better ones somewhere in this project at some point, probably on the intro page. It's too bad they don't talk about specific mistakes (so far) in the curriculum, since they have the teachers listen for them to correct them. === Lesson 2: Match 2 objects that are the same, but… === === Lesson 3: Match 2 objects that are the same, but… === Lesson 3 is the same as Lesson 2 but uses different words. === Lesson 4: Match 2 objects that are used together. === Interesting. This Lesson expands the idea of association beyond visual attributes. == Topic D: Matching 1 Numeral with up to 3 Objects == At about this point I settled on a rhythm for reading these early-grade lessons. I'm reading the module and topic overviews, the note paragraphs from the lessons, and the questions in the student debriefs. I'm also skimming the assessments. == End-of-Module Assessment == It's interesting that even at this point in the curriculum the students are solving for unknowns, though the material doesn't call it that. That's one reason I'm reading the student debriefs. The questions there approach the lesson's concepts from different angles to make sure the students can think flexibly about them. For example, you could state the idea of the Topic A, Lesson 1 as "(1) Objects A and B (2) are (3) exactly the same (4) if they are the same shape, size, and color." The student debrief asks the students to solve for each part of that statement as an unknown: (1) specific objects that match ("Do you see any things in our classroom that match?"), (2) whether two objects match ("Are these 2 students exactly the same?"), (3) the vocabulary of matching ("These counters are _________."), and (4) the conditions for matching ("How did you choose things that were exactly the same?"). Since matching and counting are things I already know how to do, there isn't much to learn, so it's hard not to see this material as a big wall of text. It's helpful to have a framework to fit the content into so it means something to me. There's something of a framework in the Module 1 overview (the number core: rote counting, one-to-one correspondence, cardinality, and written numerals), but it's a little clearer in the Counting and Cardinality Progression, and it's even clearer in Hatfield et al, or at least spelled out in more detail. Counting is a surprisingly complicated activity. You have to know the sequence of counting numbers and the pattern that each number is one more than the previous one. You have to match each number with each object you're counting without missing or double-counting any objects, and you have to know that the last number you say is the quantity of objects in the collection. Then if you're going to write the number down, you have to know the numeral that corresponds to that number name. And if it's over 9, you have to know the base 10 system. Kids aren't born knowing any of this, and it takes lots of careful instruction and practice to learn. [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Comments]] [[Category:Complete]] aa1be97fbfb0c2bb570b7a16ba1c1c161b6edc03 0 57 212 184 2016-04-30T07:53:45Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added a list of developmental math textbooks. wikitext text/x-wiki == Introduction == This project is an exploration of mathematics from the perspective of someone who has learned some, forgotten most, and wants to learn more. I'm starting from the most basic concepts of pre-algebra, and I'm hoping to work through the Common Core State Standards and then to cover some advanced areas that are related to my other projects. I won't set out a more detailed roadmap until I get closer to those waypoints. Common Core is controversial, and I probably won't comment on the debate, at least not for a while. I'm mainly interested in Common Core as an organizational scheme for an incremental approach to learning conceptual math. And I am fully on board with conceptual math, at least for adult learners. My major assumption in this project is that mathematical concepts relate to each other and to the world, and that knowing these relationships can help us understand, remember, and use these concepts. It can also help us appreciate them as objects of beauty, which can itself help us remember them. I'm not a mathematician, and I'm not writing a textbook, even though I call the sections chapters. These are just my notes and reflections on aspects of math that I think will help me understand it. I'm hoping they'll help other people as well or that they'll at least be interesting. I'll also link to other resources that seem helpful. Think of this project as a commentary on other people's math education materials. == Resources == What are these math education materials? Here are the main online sources I'm using. My main print sources are in [[Math_Relearning/References|References]], marked in bold. * [http://www.corestandards.org/Math/ Common Core Mathematics Standards] - The standards themselves. They're organized by grade level for K-8, then by conceptual category in high school. The standards within each grade are organized by domain. * [http://achievethecore.org/page/254/progressions-documents-for-the-common-core-state-standards-for-mathematics-detail-pg Progressions - Achieve the Core] - These trace the development of each domain and conceptual category across the grade levels. I'm reading them to get an overview and to connect ideas that will be somewhat separated when I go through them by grade. * [http://www.engageny.org/common-core-curriculum EngageNY Common Core Curriculum] - A complete P-12 curriculum under a Creative Commons license, which means all the content is free. I expect this to be my main source through precalculus. It's thousands of pages though, so I'll only be reading parts of it. I don't know if I'll get around to using these, but here are some other resources that might help you in a project like this one. * [http://community.ksde.org/Default.aspx?tabid=5646 KATM Flip Books] - For teachers, a fairly detailed summary of the instruction for each grade level. * [http://www.cgcs.org/page/244 Parent Roadmaps to the Common Core Standards: Mathematics - Council of the Great City Schools] - For parents, another summary of each grade's instruction, less detailed. * [https://homeworkhelpdesk.org/ The Homework Help Desk] - Explanations of the more confusing parts of Common Core's math methods. * [https://ccssmath.org/ CCSS Math] - Links to instructional videos, activities, and lesson plans for each standard. It collects these resources from several sources. * [http://www.commoncoreconversation.com/math-resources.html Math Resources - Common Core Conversation] - Links to a lot of math websites. If you aren't as absurd as I am and you want to cover all this ground in slightly less time, you could try some textbooks for adults. Here are the ones I've found that I liked, in order of decreasing hand-holding. * [https://open.umn.edu/opentextbooks/BookDetail.aspx?bookId=241 Prealgebra - OpenStax College] - PDF, web; Creative Commons license * [http://nrocnetwork.org/dm-opentext Developmental Math Open Textbooks - NROC] - pre-algebra, beginning and intermediate algebra, trigonometry; PDF, Word; Creative Commons license * [http://mathrev.redwoods.edu/PreAlgText/ Prealgebra - College of the Redwoods] - PDF; Creative Commons license * [http://www.amazon.com/Pre-Algebra-Essentials-Dummies-Mark-Zegarelli/dp/0470618388 Pre-Algebra Essentials for Dummies] - print; very short == What is mathematics? == Because of the different ways we use the term, there's a certain ambiguity in the question of what mathematics is. Am I asking about the academic activity of discovering mathematical concepts? the body of mathematical knowledge we've amassed? the abstract, timeless mathematical realities our knowledge is describing? the mathematical language we use to represent and communicate about those realities? I think to a certain degree the ambiguity can hang there without causing much trouble, but primarily I mean the activity of mathematical discovery. Like many people, I started out thinking of math as the study of numbers and the formulas for working with them. But there was one wrinkle in this assumption--geometry. Why was geometry a part of math? Shapes aren't numbers. Did somebody make a mistake? Poking around on Wikipedia made me aware that math is about much more than number. Numbers are the arithmetic, number theory, and maybe algebra part of math, and they are only one type of mathematical object. Math also covers space (geometry), change (calculus), and structure, whatever that is.<ref>''Wikipedia'', s.v. “Mathematics,” last modified July 14, 2014, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mathematics; ''Wikipedia'', s.v. “Areas of mathematics,” last modified June 18, 2014, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Areas_of_mathematics</ref> Expanding the scope of my understanding of math is good, but simply listing its concerns doesn't entirely help me. I look for coherence in my definitions, so I want to know what it is these areas have in common that draws mathematicians' interest and what distinguishes them from topics outside mathematics. Since space is involved, I'm especially unclear about the boundary between math and physics. These are issues I'll address as I learn. Category theory seems like a promising avenue for exploring the idea of mathematical objects, so I'm hoping to explore that area at some point.<ref>''Wikipedia'', s.v. “Mathematical object,” last modified March 14, 2014, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mathematical_object</ref> Mathematicians sometimes characterize their field as the science of patterns. I'm not sure what to make of that yet, but it also sounds promising. I can see mathematicians studying patterns and looking for them, and I can imagine there are non-obvious patterns lying behind other mathematical concepts. But I'd like more clarity on what kinds of patterns interest mathematicians, what features of patterns they like to study, and how. I'm pretty sure, for example, they wouldn't publish papers on the emotional effects of color choices in flower-themed wallpaper patterns. Mathematical patterns seem to be related to logic. For now I'll define math as doing mathematical things with mathematical objects, and as I learn I'll refine my definition. As possibly part of that definition, I'll also keep an eye out for how math's concepts can be characterized as patterns. But for all that, math does seem preoccupied with numbers. No matter what area I'm glancing at, there's something numeric involved. As I've done my initial thinking about math, I've come up with a speculation I'd like to investigate as I learn, that math is concerned with quantity and the concepts that branch out from it in particular ways. I'll call it the Quantity Relatedness Conjecture (QRC). == Related blog posts == * [http://www.thinkulum.net/blog/category/topics/math-relearning/ Category: Math relearning] == Footnotes == <references/> [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Developing]] 1dc42e6d365fb1dba1f3032f0a10f3db35428727 238 212 2016-06-27T05:16:01Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added commenting. wikitext text/x-wiki == Introduction == This project is an exploration of mathematics from the perspective of someone who has learned some, forgotten most, and wants to learn more. I'm starting from the most basic concepts of pre-algebra, and I'm hoping to work through the Common Core State Standards and then to cover some advanced areas that are related to my other projects. I won't set out a more detailed roadmap until I get closer to those waypoints. Common Core is controversial, and I probably won't comment on the debate, at least not for a while. I'm mainly interested in Common Core as an organizational scheme for an incremental approach to learning conceptual math. And I am fully on board with conceptual math, at least for adult learners. My major assumption in this project is that mathematical concepts relate to each other and to the world, and that knowing these relationships can help us understand, remember, and use these concepts. It can also help us appreciate them as objects of beauty, which can itself help us remember them. I'm not a mathematician, and I'm not writing a textbook, even though I call the sections chapters. These are just my notes and reflections on aspects of math that I think will help me understand it. I'm hoping they'll help other people as well or that they'll at least be interesting. I'll also link to other resources that seem helpful. Think of this project as a commentary on other people's math education materials. == Resources == What are these math education materials? Here are the main online sources I'm using. My main print sources are in [[Math_Relearning/References|References]], marked in bold. * [http://www.corestandards.org/Math/ Common Core Mathematics Standards] - The standards themselves. They're organized by grade level for K-8, then by conceptual category in high school. The standards within each grade are organized by domain. * [http://achievethecore.org/page/254/progressions-documents-for-the-common-core-state-standards-for-mathematics-detail-pg Progressions - Achieve the Core] - These trace the development of each domain and conceptual category across the grade levels. I'm reading them to get an overview and to connect ideas that will be somewhat separated when I go through them by grade. * [http://www.engageny.org/common-core-curriculum EngageNY Common Core Curriculum] - A complete P-12 curriculum under a Creative Commons license, which means all the content is free. I expect this to be my main source through precalculus. It's thousands of pages though, so I'll only be reading parts of it. I don't know if I'll get around to using these, but here are some other resources that might help you in a project like this one. * [http://community.ksde.org/Default.aspx?tabid=5646 KATM Flip Books] - For teachers, a fairly detailed summary of the instruction for each grade level. * [http://www.cgcs.org/page/244 Parent Roadmaps to the Common Core Standards: Mathematics - Council of the Great City Schools] - For parents, another summary of each grade's instruction, less detailed. * [https://homeworkhelpdesk.org/ The Homework Help Desk] - Explanations of the more confusing parts of Common Core's math methods. * [https://ccssmath.org/ CCSS Math] - Links to instructional videos, activities, and lesson plans for each standard. It collects these resources from several sources. * [http://www.commoncoreconversation.com/math-resources.html Math Resources - Common Core Conversation] - Links to a lot of math websites. If you aren't as absurd as I am and you want to cover all this ground in slightly less time, you could try some textbooks for adults. Here are the ones I've found that I liked, in order of decreasing hand-holding. * [https://open.umn.edu/opentextbooks/BookDetail.aspx?bookId=241 Prealgebra - OpenStax College] - PDF, web; Creative Commons license * [http://nrocnetwork.org/dm-opentext Developmental Math Open Textbooks - NROC] - pre-algebra, beginning and intermediate algebra, trigonometry; PDF, Word; Creative Commons license * [http://mathrev.redwoods.edu/PreAlgText/ Prealgebra - College of the Redwoods] - PDF; Creative Commons license * [http://www.amazon.com/Pre-Algebra-Essentials-Dummies-Mark-Zegarelli/dp/0470618388 Pre-Algebra Essentials for Dummies] - print; very short == What is mathematics? == Because of the different ways we use the term, there's a certain ambiguity in the question of what mathematics is. Am I asking about the academic activity of discovering mathematical concepts? the body of mathematical knowledge we've amassed? the abstract, timeless mathematical realities our knowledge is describing? the mathematical language we use to represent and communicate about those realities? I think to a certain degree the ambiguity can hang there without causing much trouble, but primarily I mean the activity of mathematical discovery. Like many people, I started out thinking of math as the study of numbers and the formulas for working with them. But there was one wrinkle in this assumption--geometry. Why was geometry a part of math? Shapes aren't numbers. Did somebody make a mistake? Poking around on Wikipedia made me aware that math is about much more than number. Numbers are the arithmetic, number theory, and maybe algebra part of math, and they are only one type of mathematical object. Math also covers space (geometry), change (calculus), and structure, whatever that is.<ref>''Wikipedia'', s.v. “Mathematics,” last modified July 14, 2014, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mathematics; ''Wikipedia'', s.v. “Areas of mathematics,” last modified June 18, 2014, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Areas_of_mathematics</ref> Expanding the scope of my understanding of math is good, but simply listing its concerns doesn't entirely help me. I look for coherence in my definitions, so I want to know what it is these areas have in common that draws mathematicians' interest and what distinguishes them from topics outside mathematics. Since space is involved, I'm especially unclear about the boundary between math and physics. These are issues I'll address as I learn. Category theory seems like a promising avenue for exploring the idea of mathematical objects, so I'm hoping to explore that area at some point.<ref>''Wikipedia'', s.v. “Mathematical object,” last modified March 14, 2014, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mathematical_object</ref> Mathematicians sometimes characterize their field as the science of patterns. I'm not sure what to make of that yet, but it also sounds promising. I can see mathematicians studying patterns and looking for them, and I can imagine there are non-obvious patterns lying behind other mathematical concepts. But I'd like more clarity on what kinds of patterns interest mathematicians, what features of patterns they like to study, and how. I'm pretty sure, for example, they wouldn't publish papers on the emotional effects of color choices in flower-themed wallpaper patterns. Mathematical patterns seem to be related to logic. For now I'll define math as doing mathematical things with mathematical objects, and as I learn I'll refine my definition. As possibly part of that definition, I'll also keep an eye out for how math's concepts can be characterized as patterns. But for all that, math does seem preoccupied with numbers. No matter what area I'm glancing at, there's something numeric involved. As I've done my initial thinking about math, I've come up with a speculation I'd like to investigate as I learn, that math is concerned with quantity and the concepts that branch out from it in particular ways. I'll call it the Quantity Relatedness Conjecture (QRC). == Related blog posts == * [http://www.thinkulum.net/blog/category/topics/math-relearning/ Category: Math relearning] == Footnotes == <references/> <disqus/> [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Developing]] 669b1193dd6f3dcec2a9b1f928b1a17bba9d49cd 0 89 214 2016-05-25T03:10:37Z Andy Culbertson 1 Andy Culbertson moved page [[Math Relearning/EngageNY/PK/Module 1: Counting to 5]] to [[Math Relearning/EngageNY/GPK/Module 1: Counting to 5]]: Aligning the grade abbreviation with the EngageNY abbreviations, which are a little more readable wikitext text/x-wiki #REDIRECT [[Math Relearning/EngageNY/GPK/Module 1: Counting to 5]] ea69db6ed0b49e6f0637f1f7b2f0b49ca10c21e0 0 90 217 2016-05-25T04:07:02Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the article. wikitext text/x-wiki These are my comments on EngageNY's [https://www.engageny.org/resource/prekindergarten-mathematics-module-2 Prekindergarten Module 2]. == Overview == New propositional concepts from this module: * Objects have shape as one of their attributes. * Shapes consist of their outlines and not their interiors. * Shapes have attributes, such as their number of sides and corners. * Shapes can be classified and named by their numbers of sides and corners and by the straightness or roundness of their lines. * Objects have positions in relation to each other that can be described using terms such as above, behind, below, and between. * Three-dimensional shapes have two-dimensional faces of particular shapes. * Three-dimensional objects have functional properties particular to their shapes, such as the ability to stack, roll, or slide. * When a quantity is separated into groups, each group is smaller than the original quantity. * Real-world objects have shapes that can be identified with mathematical shapes. * Objects in the real world can be modeled by simpler objects that represent them. I might not include term definitions in these lists of propositional concepts, since they're defined in the curriculum material. Connections to earlier concepts: * Shapes can be matched and sorted into groups by their attributes. * Certain attributes of a shape can be counted, such as its sides and corners. * Shapes in a group can be counted. Before deciding on Common Core to learn math, my approach to geometry was going to be somewhat different. I was going to start with measurement, which would include counting, and I would've used measurement to introduce the concept of length, which would introduce the notion of continuous quantities. Counting would introduce the idea of discrete quantities. After measurement I'd have covered geometry and introduced the idea of a shape by describing an angle as a line with a discrete change in direction and a curve as a line with a continuous change in direction. Then I'd have described common shapes, and that's as far as I got. Common Core takes a more holistic approach and starts with the knowledge students already have, guiding them to analyze that knowledge so they begin learning the formal properties of familiar shapes. "the whole triangle consists only of its outline" - I've wondered that. This curriculum is achieving my purpose for it, filling in gaps in my knowledge. == Topic A: Two-Dimensional Shapes == === Lesson 1: Find and describe circles, rectangles, squares, and triangles using informal language without naming === We learned how to sort and count everyday objects in Module 1. Now we're sorting mathematical objects--shapes--and doing it by counting their features--their sides and corners. I notice the teacher does the sorting at first, which ends up prioritizing the number of sides and corners as a criterion. Is there any mathematical reason to sort shapes by some other attribute? == Topic B: Constructing Two-Dimensional Shapes == === Lesson 7: Construct a rectangle and a square === "Which balls are bigger, when we made two balls or when we made four balls?" - Ah, slipping in a little 2.MD.2. Smaller units means more units in the measurement. == Topic C: Three-Dimensional Shapes == Whoa, 3D shapes already in preschool, slow down! Okay, not really. But a third dimension does add potentially a lot of complexity. For example, consider 3D ambigrams. There's one on the cover of the book ''Gödel, Escher, Bach''. Each block is shaped so that it looks like a different letter from the angle of each axis, as shown by the shadows on the walls and floor. It takes some time for me to picture the shape of a block in my mind so that it forms each specific shadow from each angle. Fortunately, we're only working with familiar shapes in preschool, so the students won't have to construct brand new shapes in their minds. In my pre-Common Core contemplations, I hadn't thought about how to approach 3D shapes, so this is new to me. Somehow their very physical, experimental approach to it is striking to me, even though they've been taking that approach for everything else. The kids learn about the shapes by using them and watching the results, especially by noticing their behavior while building with them, observing their fitness for different building purposes (e.g., flat faces are good for stacking; pointed ones aren't). The stamp activity is another good one, helping the kids isolate the shapes' features by observing their "footprints." === Lesson 11: Identify, analyze, sort, compare, and build with solid shapes === The curriculum takes the physical behavior of shapes seriously enough to devote a lesson to it, as if it were a class in engineering, though transformations analogous to rolling and sliding are part of geometry. === Lesson 12: Position solid shapes to create a model of a familiar place === This modeling exercise fits into K.G.5, so I don't know why the authors didn't list a corresponding pre-K standard. [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Comments]] [[Category:Complete]] b2282cc359afcbd5b14aabaf53b3ad74c6307284 0 91 218 2016-05-25T04:07:49Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the article. wikitext text/x-wiki These are my comments on EngageNY's [https://www.engageny.org/resource/prekindergarten-mathematics-module-3 Prekindergarten Module 3]. == Overview == This module is mostly an application of Module 1 to a wider range of numbers, so there aren't many new concepts. New propositional concepts from this module: * The concept of "none" is symbolized by the numeral 0. Connections to earlier concepts: * In the standard sequence for counting, each number is one greater than the previous number and one less than the following number. Numbers have smaller numbers embedded in them. So any counting number can be decomposed into two parts. It's helpful to view a counting number as a combination of the previous number in the counting sequence and 1 more. It's helpful to view a counting number between 5 and 10 as 5 and a certain number more. People can subitize (recognize without counting) quantities of 2 or 3. I think this is why the curriculum emphasizes the relationship of other numbers to 5: 5 is both a factor of 10, which is the central number in our place-value system, and a combination of two numbers we can subitize. But the students also learn how to decompose numbers into other pairs that don't involve 5, such as in the Concept Development of Lesson 26, where they identify all the number pairs that make up 9, including 9 and 0. It would be good to experiment with ways of quickly counting larger groups of objects when they're in convenient arrangements. This module does some of this. Ten-frames are one example. They'll show up in Kindergarten. The dot arrangements on dice are another, though that only goes up to 6, unless you combine dice, which takes you up to at least 12. Then there are ingredient arrangements on crafting tables in ''Minecraft'', which take you to 9. You could also use the corners of geometric figures. I don't know how high you could comfortably take that. I'd probably recognize up to 9 because of the Enneagram, though looking at Lesson 27, I see it's harder without the interior lines. With more complicated shapes like the pentagram (for 10), which let you visually group the items, you could go higher. === Topic A: ''How Many'' Questions with up to 7 Objects === ==== Overview ==== Lesson 5 introduces the array visual model, which "is an arrangement of a set of objects organized into equal groups in rows and columns. Arrays help make counting easy. Counting by equal groups is more efficient than counting objects one by one." {''How to Implement'' 28} I want to keep track of models like this, since I'm paying attention to mental aids for doing math, but I don't know how exactly I want to record them. I could put them in the propositional concepts lists, but I'm not sure they belong there. Plus they're already defined in the material, though there's a benefit in restating the definition in the context in which the model's used. [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Comments]] [[Category:Complete]] 6cc9ae95018564634513d263ee8c9eba0b0b5ffb 0 92 219 2016-05-25T04:08:27Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the article. wikitext text/x-wiki These are my comments on EngageNY's [https://www.engageny.org/resource/prekindergarten-mathematics-module-4 Prekindergarten Module 4]. == Overview == New propositional concepts from this module: * Objects have attributes that are measurable, such as length, weight, and capacity. * Objects can be compared to each other on the basis of a measurable attribute using certain terms related to that attribute. * When comparing lengths, one endpoint of each object must be aligned with the other. * A balance scale can be used to compare weights. * With respect to an attribute, one object can be more than, less than, or about the same as another object. * Events such as counting happen in a sequence in time, which gives them an order. * The first event, which starts the sequence, and the last event, which ends the sequence, can be especially important, such as when keeping track of which objects in a group have been counted. * The order of objects can also refer to their spatial arrangement, such as when they're in a line and facing a particular direction. * The same object can occupy different positions in different counting sequences. * The quantity of objects in a group remains the same even if the order in which they're counted changes. * Objects in two groups can be matched to determine if one group contains more objects than the other, which can be specified with the phrases "fewer than," "more than," and "the same as." * Numbers can be compared even when they don't refer to quantities of objects, and in this case the terms are "less than" and "greater than." * In certain cases, a group has enough objects if it has at least as many (exactly enough or enough with extras) as another group whose objects need to be matched with those of the first group. * If a group doesn't have enough objects, it can have enough if more objects are brought into it. I'm going to skip the connections with earlier concepts for now. == Topic A: Comparison of Length == === Lesson 3: Compare length using ''longer than'', ''shorter than'', and ''about the same as'' with a stick of linking cubes === I don't know if I should keep track of techniques like the "Say Ten Way," where the teen numbers are stated by saying "ten" and the number added to ten (ten 1, ten 2, etc.). [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Comments]] [[Category:Complete]] f2037946bc3c85d3cce3cc49de11217e29798208 0 93 220 2016-05-25T04:09:15Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the article. wikitext text/x-wiki These are my comments on EngageNY's [https://www.engageny.org/resource/prekindergarten-mathematics-module-5 Prekindergarten Module 5]. == Overview == New propositional concepts from this module: * Addition situations include (1) adding to an existing set ("add to with result unknown") and (2) composing a whole out of parts ("put together with total unknown"). * Subtraction situations include removing things from an existing set ("take from with result unknown"). * Story problems can be represented visually on a spectrum from concrete (acting out, manipulating objects, representational drawing) to abstract (fingers, cubes, abstract drawings). * Story problems should be decontextualized to work out the problem (representing the problem abstractly) and then recontextualized when giving the answer (stating the answer in terms of its units and their situation). * Addition and subtraction situations can be expressed as number sentences, such as "3 plus 1 equals 4." * One type of structure in math is a pattern. * Two types of patterns are repeating and growth patterns. * Growth patterns can be based on different numbers, such as growing a quantity by 1 or by 2. I'd like to explore the concepts of addition and subtraction further, but I might wait on it, since this module doesn't go into it in much depth. I don't think it even presents subtraction as the opposite of addition. I've read warnings against having students decode word problems rotely by matching operations to English phrases, which, yes, would be a problem if the students didn't learn to understand what the word problems mean. But I don't think my source gave an alternative method, so I wonder how they'd recommend recognizing and analyzing an addition story and how they'd have students distinguish it from, for example, a multiplication story. In any case, at the pre-K level EngageNY gives the students phrases to recognize. These kinds of language issues are important, but I don't know if they belong in the propositional concept lists. == Topic B: Contextualizing Addition Stories to Solve == === Lesson 6: Act out ''add to with result unknown'' story problems to solve === I expected to see some strategy for adding, such as counting on, but the lesson seems to expect the children to just know the answer or else to find their own strategies. The fluency exercises haven't been practicing addition facts, just counting. == Topic F: Duplicating and Extending Patterns == === Overview === New vocab word: repetend, the repeating part of a pattern. I thought it was a typo at first. I like finding out technical terms like this one. [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Comments]] [[Category:Complete]] b33e85c10e433551873a276484f72221017f9b9c 0 94 226 2016-06-05T16:48:28Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the article. wikitext text/x-wiki These are my comments on EngageNY's [https://www.engageny.org/resource/kindergarten-mathematics-module-1 Kindergarten Module 1]. == Overview == I expect Kindergarten to be largely the same as pre-K, just moving a bit faster. This is because New York's pre-K standards are practically the same as the K standards. At this point I'd like to note that the lesson objectives of this curriculum basically form a second set of standards. I might be even more interested in these than in the Common Core standards because, since they're meant for actual teaching, they're more granular, and they're specifically ordered to unfold the concepts logically. But the lesson objectives aren't enough by themselves to give me the sense that I'm grasping everything. I want something I can read that will make me feel like every statement flows logically into the next. For that I need concepts and not just lists of tasks. When I think about formalizing math concepts, these concept types seem important: objects, properties (of objects), relationships (among objects; relationships include things like equations), tasks (specific results to achieve using relationships), algorithms (procedures for carrying out tasks), capabilities (types of situations that particular relationships and tasks can address), applications (specific real-world situations to be solved with math). These form components of a system for doing math. I think I'm enough of a visual learner that diagrams really would help me grasp this stuff. Right now the curriculum material feels like a wall of text. I'm thinking of extracting the relevant graphics from the lesson files and putting them in a new document listing the concepts. I also think it would help me remember the concepts and piece them together if I had a name for each one. That would take a lot of work on top of all the work of discerning and spelling out the concepts, but it might be worthwhile. Taking notes that simply copy from the source material feels like a waste of time, but it's helpful to have a streamlined set of information to examine and review, so maybe it is worth the time. New propositional concepts from this module: * A collection of objects can have attributes that allow it to be grouped with other collections, such as the quantity of objects they contain. [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Comments]] [[Category:Developing]] d8618575b009666415c6d0b29e3e0003293a88b0 227 226 2016-06-12T13:26:08Z Andy Culbertson 1 Andy Culbertson moved page [[Math Relearning/EngageNY/GK/Module 1: Numbers to 10]] to [[Math Relearning/EngageNY/GK]]: Covering the whole grade in one article. wikitext text/x-wiki These are my comments on EngageNY's [https://www.engageny.org/resource/kindergarten-mathematics-module-1 Kindergarten Module 1]. == Overview == I expect Kindergarten to be largely the same as pre-K, just moving a bit faster. This is because New York's pre-K standards are practically the same as the K standards. At this point I'd like to note that the lesson objectives of this curriculum basically form a second set of standards. I might be even more interested in these than in the Common Core standards because, since they're meant for actual teaching, they're more granular, and they're specifically ordered to unfold the concepts logically. But the lesson objectives aren't enough by themselves to give me the sense that I'm grasping everything. I want something I can read that will make me feel like every statement flows logically into the next. For that I need concepts and not just lists of tasks. When I think about formalizing math concepts, these concept types seem important: objects, properties (of objects), relationships (among objects; relationships include things like equations), tasks (specific results to achieve using relationships), algorithms (procedures for carrying out tasks), capabilities (types of situations that particular relationships and tasks can address), applications (specific real-world situations to be solved with math). These form components of a system for doing math. I think I'm enough of a visual learner that diagrams really would help me grasp this stuff. Right now the curriculum material feels like a wall of text. I'm thinking of extracting the relevant graphics from the lesson files and putting them in a new document listing the concepts. I also think it would help me remember the concepts and piece them together if I had a name for each one. That would take a lot of work on top of all the work of discerning and spelling out the concepts, but it might be worthwhile. Taking notes that simply copy from the source material feels like a waste of time, but it's helpful to have a streamlined set of information to examine and review, so maybe it is worth the time. New propositional concepts from this module: * A collection of objects can have attributes that allow it to be grouped with other collections, such as the quantity of objects they contain. [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Comments]] [[Category:Developing]] d8618575b009666415c6d0b29e3e0003293a88b0 230 227 2016-06-12T13:29:42Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added more comments. Updated earlier comments to reflect the state of my comments. wikitext text/x-wiki These are my comments on EngageNY's [https://www.engageny.org/resource/kindergarten-mathematics Kindergarten modules]. Kindergarten is largely the same as pre-K, just moving a bit faster. This is because New York's pre-K standards are practically the same as the K standards. This actually makes it harder for me to work with in a short time frame because I don't want to replicate my efforts with pre-K, but I don't want to take too much time to sort out what's unique about Kindergarten. These comments will mostly document my false starts and other ideas I had but postponed. At this point I'd like to note that the lesson objectives of this curriculum basically form a second set of standards. I might be even more interested in these than in the Common Core standards because, since they're meant for actual teaching, they're more granular, and they're specifically ordered to unfold the concepts logically. But the lesson objectives aren't enough by themselves to give me the sense that I'm grasping everything. I want something I can read that will make me feel like every statement flows logically into the next. For that I need concepts and not just lists of tasks. When I think about formalizing math concepts, these concept types seem important: objects, properties (of objects), relationships (among objects; relationships include things like equations), tasks (specific results to achieve using relationships), algorithms (procedures for carrying out tasks), capabilities (types of situations that particular relationships and tasks can address), applications (specific real-world situations to be solved with math). These form components of a system for doing math. I think I'm enough of a visual learner that diagrams really would help me grasp this stuff. Right now the curriculum material feels like a wall of text. I'm thinking of extracting the relevant graphics from the lesson files and putting them in a new document listing the concepts. I also think it would help me remember the concepts and piece them together if I had a name for each one. That would take a lot of work on top of all the work of discerning and spelling out the concepts, but it might be worthwhile. Taking notes that simply copy from the source material feels like a waste of time, but it's helpful to have a streamlined set of information to examine and review, so maybe it is worth the time. New propositional concepts from Module 1: * A collection of objects can have attributes that allow it to be grouped with other collections, such as the quantity of objects they contain. I'll dispense with the new propositional concepts for the rest of Kindergarten for now. It takes a little too much time to separate the new ones from the ones covered in pre-K. I might come back to it later. One characteristic of this curriculum that makes the pre-K/K comparison harder is the ways the lesson objectives are worded and the tasks and concepts woven together as the lessons progress. To be honest it looks more like a tangle to me. I thought a more worthwhile use of my limited time on the material would be to tease the threads apart somewhat and separate them into more distinct strands, but that also ended up being too much work. Each lesson objective has this general structure, possibly with some elements left out: Perform action A on object B within parameters C for purpose D. Several actions can be chained or simply collected within one lesson. If I had lots more time, I might come up with a normalized version of these objectives that followed a small set of grammatical patterns and used a more controlled vocabulary. It would make the objectives and their progression a little easier to think about, but really it's overkill for what I need. I did make a list of verbs, nouns, and modifiers the objectives used to see what basic tasks and objects the grade covered, and then I started writing a simplified set of tasks for it, but then I realized I was basically reproducing the Common Core standards, so I scrapped that idea. Instead I'll just review the standards. I'll also review the sections of the Progressions that cover Kindergarten, and I'll do that for each later grade as I get to it. They seem to discuss most of the conceptual material I want to explore. [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Comments]] [[Category:Developing]] 8cc9074735f7ead9954cc9a16fb7116f040bb5c6 237 230 2016-06-21T08:55:32Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the exercises. wikitext text/x-wiki These are my comments on EngageNY's [https://www.engageny.org/resource/kindergarten-mathematics Kindergarten modules]. == General == Kindergarten is largely the same as pre-K, just moving a bit faster. This is because New York's pre-K standards are practically the same as the K standards. This actually makes it harder for me to work with in a short time frame because I don't want to replicate my efforts with pre-K, but I don't want to take too much time to sort out what's unique about Kindergarten. These comments will mostly document my false starts and other ideas I had but postponed. At this point I'd like to note that the lesson objectives of this curriculum basically form a second set of standards. I might be even more interested in these than in the Common Core standards because, since they're meant for actual teaching, they're more granular, and they're specifically ordered to unfold the concepts logically. But the lesson objectives aren't enough by themselves to give me the sense that I'm grasping everything. I want something I can read that will make me feel like every statement flows logically into the next. For that I need concepts and not just lists of tasks. When I think about formalizing math concepts, these concept types seem important: objects, properties (of objects), relationships (among objects; relationships include things like equations), tasks (specific results to achieve using relationships), algorithms (procedures for carrying out tasks), capabilities (types of situations that particular relationships and tasks can address), applications (specific real-world situations to be solved with math). These form components of a system for doing math. I think I'm enough of a visual learner that diagrams really would help me grasp this stuff. Right now the curriculum material feels like a wall of text. I'm thinking of extracting the relevant graphics from the lesson files and putting them in a new document listing the concepts. I also think it would help me remember the concepts and piece them together if I had a name for each one. That would take a lot of work on top of all the work of discerning and spelling out the concepts, but it might be worthwhile. Taking notes that simply copy from the source material feels like a waste of time, but it's helpful to have a streamlined set of information to examine and review, so maybe it is worth the time. New propositional concepts from Module 1: * A collection of objects can have attributes that allow it to be grouped with other collections, such as the quantity of objects they contain. I'll dispense with the new propositional concepts for the rest of Kindergarten for now. It takes a little too much time to separate the new ones from the ones covered in pre-K. I might come back to it later. One characteristic of this curriculum that makes the pre-K/K comparison harder is the ways the lesson objectives are worded and the tasks and concepts woven together as the lessons progress. To be honest it looks more like a tangle to me. I thought a more worthwhile use of my limited time on the material would be to tease the threads apart somewhat and separate them into more distinct strands, but that also ended up being too much work. Each lesson objective has this general structure, possibly with some elements left out: Perform action A on object B within parameters C for purpose D. Several actions can be chained or simply collected within one lesson. If I had lots more time, I might come up with a normalized version of these objectives that followed a small set of grammatical patterns and used a more controlled vocabulary. It would make the objectives and their progression a little easier to think about, but really it's overkill for what I need. I did make a list of verbs, nouns, and modifiers the objectives used to see what basic tasks and objects the grade covered, and then I started writing a simplified set of tasks for it, but then I realized I was basically reproducing the Common Core standards, so I scrapped that idea. Instead I'll just review the standards. I'll also review the sections of the Progressions that cover Kindergarten, and I'll do that for each later grade as I get to it. They seem to discuss most of the conceptual material I want to explore. == Exercises == I'm comfortable with most of the Kindergarten tasks, of course, but there are a few I'd like to spend some time on. === Object counting === I'd like to get better at counting objects quickly in my head. I've experimented with a couple of approaches. ==== Graph paper dot configurations ==== [[File:Dot-configurations.jpg|200px|thumb|right|Drawings of dot configurations for subitizing]] The first was to begin drawing configurations of dots on graph paper. The idea was to learn to recognize the configurations when I saw them within scattered configurations so the objects would be easier to group. Then counting becomes a matter of adding the quantities in the groups. In my drawings I started with 1 dot and increased by one each set, following a couple of rules for each configuration: # Each dot is adjacent to another dot, either orthogonally or diagonally. # 90-degree rotations of a configuration are not allowed, though one 45-degree rotation is allowed. I've uploaded the (haphazard, possibly inconsistent) results, which you can download using the thumbnail on this page. I got through pretty much all the 4-dot configurations and a little way into 5 dots. I thought about writing a program to generate the configurations, but I didn't want to spend that much time on them. It became obvious that there were far too many configurations to memorize, but it was interesting to observe patterns among them. For example, I found I could create configurations in an orderly manner by starting with a line of dots and then moving each end one space at a time. You can see that in the 5-dot set. I also noticed that part of seeing a configuration was mentally associating its parts in particular relationships or seeing the dots as having specific roles, which I think amounts to the same thing. This means I can think of certain 4-dot configurations in relation to similar 5-dot configurations, which might help me with my persistent confusion between 4- and 5-object groups. So if there are 3 dots in a line and 1 below the middle dot (configuration 24 on my page of drawings), I could certainly think of that as 3 + 1 or as a squished box (configuration 27), which directly give me a count of 4; but if one of those conceptualizations doesn't occur to me, I can notice that there aren't 2 dots in the bottom row, which I'm used to associating with 5 (configuration 43). Or I can think of it as the X pattern of 5 on a die (configuration 33) with one of the corner dots missing. ==== Dice on paper ==== [[File:Dice-counting.jpg|200px|thumb|right|An example dice throw for rapid counting practice]] Since there were too many configurations to memorize, not even counting the ones that didn't fit nicely on a small grid, I decided to create scattered configurations by dropping actual objects and to observe patterns in counting that emerged as I practiced. I decided on dice, since I have enough of them for groups of at least 10. I placed a letter-size sheet of paper on my surface and determined which dice to count by including only the ones that landed fully on the paper (see the example image). What I noticed about counting these truly scattered configurations is that groups of 3 were good to look for. Sometimes I'd notice 4, 5, or 2, but 3 gives me a good basis for noticing larger groups, up to at least 6 (easy because it's two groups of 3). === Addition and subtraction === My mind gets a little stuck on certain arithmetic facts, and it takes me a second to remember them, which is irritating when I'm doing mental math. I think I just need practice. So based on the addition and subtraction situations in [http://achievethecore.org/file/1172 Counting & Cardinality and Operations & Algebraic Thinking: Grades K-5] (PDF), I made a tab-separated file to import into the flashcard app I use on my phone, [http://orangeorapple.com/Flashcards/ Flashcards Deluxe]. You can download the file [[Media:Number_Decompositions_6-19.txt|here]]. The general range of numbers I'm decomposing in these equations is 1-20, since that's the focus in Kindergarten and it's the basis for all other addition--you're either working within 10 or across at least one 10 grouping. But I limited my actual range of totals to 6-19 because I don't think I have trouble decomposing 1-5 or 20. I've only barely started studying them, but one thing I've noticed is that for some reason I have trouble when the unknown is 11. === Tangrams === I didn't see much in Kindergarten geometry I needed to practice, but I thought it'd be interesting to explore shape compositions, so I bought a used [https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/983/tangoes Tangoes] set to solve [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tangram tangram] puzzles. EngageNY suggests using tangrams to challenge above-grade-level students (Module 6, Lesson 7), so I feel pretty special. [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Comments]] [[Category:Developing]] 23fda6d07ddf0c23926faec6195e2f7785647612 0 95 228 2016-06-12T13:26:08Z Andy Culbertson 1 Andy Culbertson moved page [[Math Relearning/EngageNY/GK/Module 1: Numbers to 10]] to [[Math Relearning/EngageNY/GK]]: Covering the whole grade in one article. wikitext text/x-wiki #REDIRECT [[Math Relearning/EngageNY/GK]] 25094b0a0104bf1e2e01a352636b40514cce6d0c 0 63 231 165 2016-06-13T16:55:46Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the Dyatlov Pass incident. wikitext text/x-wiki These are strange events, people, places, objects, and ideas that especially interest me. I don't necessarily ''like'' them (some of them are about murder, for example), and I'm skeptical of a lot of them, but I'm interested in my reactions to them and in the issues they involve. This list is for historical and fringe science weirdness. Philosophical and religious weirdness and strange fiction will go in other lists. == Finding weird cases == There's no shortage of places on the Internet to find weird things. Here are a few I like. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Mysteries Category:Mysteries - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Fringe_theory Category:Fringe theory - Wikipedia] * [http://www.dmoz.org/Society/Paranormal/ Paranormal - DMOZ] * [http://www.dmoz.org/Science/Anomalies_and_Alternative_Science/ Anomalies and Alternative Science - DMOZ] * [http://www.dmoz.org/Society/Issues/Conspiracy/ Conspiracy - DMOZ] * [http://www.stufftheydontwantyoutoknow.com/ Stuff They Don't Want You to Know] * [http://paranormal.about.com/ Paranormal Phenomena - About.com] * [http://ufos.about.com/ UFOs and Aliens - About.com] * [http://www.reddit.com/r/UnresolvedMysteries/ Unresolved Mysteries - Reddit] * [http://boards.4chan.org/x/ /x/ (Paranormal) - 4chan] ** [http://www.dailydot.com/lifestyle/4chan-x-paranormal-board-creepy-pronunciation-book-mysteries/ Meet 4chan's /x/philes, investigators of the Internet's strangest mysteries] - The article that led me to the board. * [https://www.youtube.com/user/StrangeMysteries Strange Mysteries - YouTube] == Mysterious people == === Deaths === ==== The Taman Shud Case ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taman_Shud_Case Taman Shud Case - Wikipedia] ==== The Lead Masks Case ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lead_Masks_Case Lead Masks Case - Wikipedia] ==== Elisa Lam ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_of_Elisa_Lam Death of Elisa Lam - Wikipedia] ==== The Ourang Medan ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ourang_Medan Ourang Medan - Wikipedia] ==== Isdal Woman ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isdal_Woman Isdal Woman - Wikipedia] ==== The Dyatlov Pass Incident ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dyatlov_Pass_incident Dyatlov Pass incident - Wikipedia] === Disappearances === ==== The Bermuda Triangle ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bermuda_Triangle Bermuda Triangle - Wikipedia] * [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nnLaDvxgmwg 5 Terrifying & Mysterious Bermuda Triangle Stories - Top5s - YouTube] * [http://www.electronicfog.com/ Bruce Gernon's electronic fog theory] ==== Frederick Valentich ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disappearance_of_Frederick_Valentich Disappearance of Frederick Valentich - Wikipedia] === Unknown identities === ==== Benjaman Kyle ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benjaman_Kyle Benjaman Kyle - Wikipedia] === Time travelers === ==== John Titor ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Titor John Titor - Wikipedia] == Mysterious artifacts == === Toynbee tiles === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toynbee_tiles Toynbee tiles - Wikipedia] === Georgia Guidestones === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georgia_Guidestones Georgia Guidestones - Wikipedia] === Bouvet Island lifeboat === * [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1heSaBKgaeg Abandoned Boat Baffles Scientists for 70 Years - Strange Mysteries - YouTube] * [https://allkindsofhistory.wordpress.com/2011/02/13/an-abandoned-lifeboat-at-worlds-end/ An abandoned lifeboat at world's end - A Blast from the Past] == Mysterious places == === Oak Island === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oak_Island Oak Island - Wikipedia] == Codes and puzzles == === The Voynich manuscript === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voynich_manuscript Voynich manuscript - Wikipedia] === Kryptos === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kryptos Kryptos - Wikipedia] === Numbers stations === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Numbers_station Numbers station - Wikipedia] === Reddit codes === * [http://www.reddit.com/r/Solving_A858/ Solving A858 - Reddit] * [http://www.reddit.com/r/Solving_Reddit_Codes Solving Reddit Codes - Reddit] === Cicada 3301 === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cicada_3301 Cicada 3301 - Wikipedia] * [http://www.fastcompany.com/3025785/meet-the-man-who-solved-the-mysterious-cicada-3301-puzzle Meet The Man Who Solved The Mysterious Cicada 3301 Puzzle - Fast Company] == Crime == === The Dark Web === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dark_Web Dark Web - Wikipedia] * [http://www.wired.com/2015/06/dark-web-know-myth/ The Dark Web as You Know It Is a Myth - Wired] == Alternative science == === Physics === ==== The Reciprocal System of Theory ==== * [http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Reciprocal_Theory Reciprocal Theory - RationalWiki] === Cosmology === ==== The Flat Earth ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modern_flat_Earth_societies Modern flat Earth societies - Wikipedia] * [https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLltxIX4B8_URNUzDE2sXctnUAEXgEDDGn Flat Earth Clues (playlist) - Mark Sargent - YouTube] === Cryptozoology === ==== Cryptids ==== ===== The Bridgewater Triangle ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bridgewater_Triangle Bridgewater Triangle - Wikipedia] * [http://spookysouthcoast.com/ Spooky Southcoast] - A paranormal radio show located near the Bridgewater Triangle. Each year they have an episode about it. ===== Living dinosaurs ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Living_dinosaur Living dinosaur - Wikipedia] ===== The Jersey Devil ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jersey_Devil Jersey Devil - Wikipedia] ===== Skinwalker Ranch ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skinwalker_Ranch Skinwalker Ranch - Wikipedia] ===== The Mothman ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mothman Mothman - Wikipedia] ===== The Loch Ness Monster ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loch_Ness_Monster Loch Ness Monster - Wikipedia] ===== Bigfoot ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patterson–Gimlin_film Patterson–Gimlin film - Wikipedia] - I don't care much about Bigfoot in general, but this film is intriguing. ==== Cryptid researchers ==== ===== Loren Coleman ===== * [http://cryptomundo.com/lorencoleman/ Bio of Loren Coleman - Cryptomundo] === Psychology === ==== ESP ==== ===== Diane Hennacy Powell ===== * [http://dianehennacypowell.com/consciousness/telepathy-project/ The Telepathy Project - Diane Hennacy Powell] ===== Rupert Sheldrake ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rupert_Sheldrake Rupert Sheldrake - Wikipedia] ==== The pineal gland ==== * [http://www.stufftheydontwantyoutoknow.com/podcasts/pineal-gland-eye/ The Pineal Gland: A Third Eye? - Stuff They Don't Want You to Know Podcast] * [http://www.vice.com/read/dmt-you-cannot-imagine-a-stranger-drug-or-a-stranger-experience-365 DMT: You Cannot Imagine a Stranger Drug or a Stranger Experience - Vice] - I don't condone the illegal use of hallucinogens and have no plans to try them, but this research is interesting. == Conspiracies == === The New World Order === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_World_Order_(conspiracy_theory) New World Order (conspiracy theory) - Wikipedia] === The shadow government === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shadow_government_(conspiracy) Shadow government (conspiracy) - Wikipedia] === The JFK assassination === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assassination_of_John_F._Kennedy Assassination of John F. Kennedy - Wikipedia] == UFOs and aliens == === UFO sightings === ==== The Phoenix Lights ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phoenix_Lights Phoenix Lights - Wikipedia] ==== The 2006 O'Hare International Airport UFO sighting ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2006_O%27Hare_International_Airport_UFO_sighting 2006 O'Hare International Airport UFO sighting - Wikipedia] === UFO researchers === ==== Jacques Vallée ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacques_Vallée Jacques Vallée - Wikipedia] ==== Hugh Ross ==== * [http://www.toledoblade.com/Religion/2003/01/04/Astronomer-links-UFOs-to-occultism.html Astronomer links UFOs to occultism - Toledo Blade] ==== Steven Greer ==== * [http://www.disclosureproject.org/ The Disclosure Project] === Alien races === ==== The Dutch ==== It is widely known that the Netherlands is on another planet and that the country's border is a portal to that planet. The Dutch, contrary to popular belief, are not humans who colonized this alien planet long ago but are aliens who visit Earth whenever they travel to other countries. * [http://ask.fm/Togedi3/answer/127837053174 Do you deny that you Dutch are aliens? - Togedi3 - Ask.fm] == Spirit beings == === Ghosts === ==== Country House Restaurant in Clarendon Hills ==== A local haunting. Chicagoland doesn't seem to have many. * [http://www.burgerone.com/clarendon/ghost-story.html Ghost Story - Clarendon Hills Country House] ==== Cecilia Carrasco ==== * [https://uk.news.yahoo.com/paranormal-push--woman-claims-she-was-shoved-by-a-ghost-132640541.html Paranormal push? Watch moment woman claims she was shoved by a GHOST - Yahoo! News UK] == Related blog posts == * [http://www.thinkulum.net/blog/2015/06/25/weird-things-are-fun/ 2015/06/25: Weird things are fun] [[Category:Weirdness]] 0e5c476e498eab58f006d11b4b5d54c01ca380e7 232 231 2016-06-13T17:01:10Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added Bachelor's Grove Cemetery. wikitext text/x-wiki These are strange events, people, places, objects, and ideas that especially interest me. I don't necessarily ''like'' them (some of them are about murder, for example), and I'm skeptical of a lot of them, but I'm interested in my reactions to them and in the issues they involve. This list is for historical and fringe science weirdness. Philosophical and religious weirdness and strange fiction will go in other lists. == Finding weird cases == There's no shortage of places on the Internet to find weird things. Here are a few I like. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Mysteries Category:Mysteries - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Fringe_theory Category:Fringe theory - Wikipedia] * [http://www.dmoz.org/Society/Paranormal/ Paranormal - DMOZ] * [http://www.dmoz.org/Science/Anomalies_and_Alternative_Science/ Anomalies and Alternative Science - DMOZ] * [http://www.dmoz.org/Society/Issues/Conspiracy/ Conspiracy - DMOZ] * [http://www.stufftheydontwantyoutoknow.com/ Stuff They Don't Want You to Know] * [http://paranormal.about.com/ Paranormal Phenomena - About.com] * [http://ufos.about.com/ UFOs and Aliens - About.com] * [http://www.reddit.com/r/UnresolvedMysteries/ Unresolved Mysteries - Reddit] * [http://boards.4chan.org/x/ /x/ (Paranormal) - 4chan] ** [http://www.dailydot.com/lifestyle/4chan-x-paranormal-board-creepy-pronunciation-book-mysteries/ Meet 4chan's /x/philes, investigators of the Internet's strangest mysteries] - The article that led me to the board. * [https://www.youtube.com/user/StrangeMysteries Strange Mysteries - YouTube] == Mysterious people == === Deaths === ==== The Taman Shud Case ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taman_Shud_Case Taman Shud Case - Wikipedia] ==== The Lead Masks Case ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lead_Masks_Case Lead Masks Case - Wikipedia] ==== Elisa Lam ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_of_Elisa_Lam Death of Elisa Lam - Wikipedia] ==== The Ourang Medan ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ourang_Medan Ourang Medan - Wikipedia] ==== Isdal Woman ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isdal_Woman Isdal Woman - Wikipedia] ==== The Dyatlov Pass Incident ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dyatlov_Pass_incident Dyatlov Pass incident - Wikipedia] === Disappearances === ==== The Bermuda Triangle ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bermuda_Triangle Bermuda Triangle - Wikipedia] * [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nnLaDvxgmwg 5 Terrifying & Mysterious Bermuda Triangle Stories - Top5s - YouTube] * [http://www.electronicfog.com/ Bruce Gernon's electronic fog theory] ==== Frederick Valentich ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disappearance_of_Frederick_Valentich Disappearance of Frederick Valentich - Wikipedia] === Unknown identities === ==== Benjaman Kyle ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benjaman_Kyle Benjaman Kyle - Wikipedia] === Time travelers === ==== John Titor ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Titor John Titor - Wikipedia] == Mysterious artifacts == === Toynbee tiles === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toynbee_tiles Toynbee tiles - Wikipedia] === Georgia Guidestones === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georgia_Guidestones Georgia Guidestones - Wikipedia] === Bouvet Island lifeboat === * [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1heSaBKgaeg Abandoned Boat Baffles Scientists for 70 Years - Strange Mysteries - YouTube] * [https://allkindsofhistory.wordpress.com/2011/02/13/an-abandoned-lifeboat-at-worlds-end/ An abandoned lifeboat at world's end - A Blast from the Past] == Mysterious places == === Oak Island === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oak_Island Oak Island - Wikipedia] == Codes and puzzles == === The Voynich manuscript === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voynich_manuscript Voynich manuscript - Wikipedia] === Kryptos === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kryptos Kryptos - Wikipedia] === Numbers stations === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Numbers_station Numbers station - Wikipedia] === Reddit codes === * [http://www.reddit.com/r/Solving_A858/ Solving A858 - Reddit] * [http://www.reddit.com/r/Solving_Reddit_Codes Solving Reddit Codes - Reddit] === Cicada 3301 === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cicada_3301 Cicada 3301 - Wikipedia] * [http://www.fastcompany.com/3025785/meet-the-man-who-solved-the-mysterious-cicada-3301-puzzle Meet The Man Who Solved The Mysterious Cicada 3301 Puzzle - Fast Company] == Crime == === The Dark Web === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dark_Web Dark Web - Wikipedia] * [http://www.wired.com/2015/06/dark-web-know-myth/ The Dark Web as You Know It Is a Myth - Wired] == Alternative science == === Physics === ==== The Reciprocal System of Theory ==== * [http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Reciprocal_Theory Reciprocal Theory - RationalWiki] === Cosmology === ==== The Flat Earth ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modern_flat_Earth_societies Modern flat Earth societies - Wikipedia] * [https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLltxIX4B8_URNUzDE2sXctnUAEXgEDDGn Flat Earth Clues (playlist) - Mark Sargent - YouTube] === Cryptozoology === ==== Cryptids ==== ===== The Bridgewater Triangle ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bridgewater_Triangle Bridgewater Triangle - Wikipedia] * [http://spookysouthcoast.com/ Spooky Southcoast] - A paranormal radio show located near the Bridgewater Triangle. Each year they have an episode about it. ===== Living dinosaurs ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Living_dinosaur Living dinosaur - Wikipedia] ===== The Jersey Devil ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jersey_Devil Jersey Devil - Wikipedia] ===== Skinwalker Ranch ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skinwalker_Ranch Skinwalker Ranch - Wikipedia] ===== The Mothman ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mothman Mothman - Wikipedia] ===== The Loch Ness Monster ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loch_Ness_Monster Loch Ness Monster - Wikipedia] ===== Bigfoot ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patterson–Gimlin_film Patterson–Gimlin film - Wikipedia] - I don't care much about Bigfoot in general, but this film is intriguing. ==== Cryptid researchers ==== ===== Loren Coleman ===== * [http://cryptomundo.com/lorencoleman/ Bio of Loren Coleman - Cryptomundo] === Psychology === ==== ESP ==== ===== Diane Hennacy Powell ===== * [http://dianehennacypowell.com/consciousness/telepathy-project/ The Telepathy Project - Diane Hennacy Powell] ===== Rupert Sheldrake ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rupert_Sheldrake Rupert Sheldrake - Wikipedia] ==== The pineal gland ==== * [http://www.stufftheydontwantyoutoknow.com/podcasts/pineal-gland-eye/ The Pineal Gland: A Third Eye? - Stuff They Don't Want You to Know Podcast] * [http://www.vice.com/read/dmt-you-cannot-imagine-a-stranger-drug-or-a-stranger-experience-365 DMT: You Cannot Imagine a Stranger Drug or a Stranger Experience - Vice] - I don't condone the illegal use of hallucinogens and have no plans to try them, but this research is interesting. == Conspiracies == === The New World Order === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_World_Order_(conspiracy_theory) New World Order (conspiracy theory) - Wikipedia] === The shadow government === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shadow_government_(conspiracy) Shadow government (conspiracy) - Wikipedia] === The JFK assassination === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assassination_of_John_F._Kennedy Assassination of John F. Kennedy - Wikipedia] == UFOs and aliens == === UFO sightings === ==== The Phoenix Lights ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phoenix_Lights Phoenix Lights - Wikipedia] ==== The 2006 O'Hare International Airport UFO sighting ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2006_O%27Hare_International_Airport_UFO_sighting 2006 O'Hare International Airport UFO sighting - Wikipedia] === UFO researchers === ==== Jacques Vallée ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacques_Vallée Jacques Vallée - Wikipedia] ==== Hugh Ross ==== * [http://www.toledoblade.com/Religion/2003/01/04/Astronomer-links-UFOs-to-occultism.html Astronomer links UFOs to occultism - Toledo Blade] ==== Steven Greer ==== * [http://www.disclosureproject.org/ The Disclosure Project] === Alien races === ==== The Dutch ==== It is widely known that the Netherlands is on another planet and that the country's border is a portal to that planet. The Dutch, contrary to popular belief, are not humans who colonized this alien planet long ago but are aliens who visit Earth whenever they travel to other countries. * [http://ask.fm/Togedi3/answer/127837053174 Do you deny that you Dutch are aliens? - Togedi3 - Ask.fm] == Spirit beings == === Ghosts === ==== Country House Restaurant in Clarendon Hills ==== A local haunting. Chicagoland doesn't seem to have many. * [http://www.burgerone.com/clarendon/ghost-story.html Ghost Story - Clarendon Hills Country House] ==== Bachelor's Grove Cemetery ==== Another Chicagoland haunting. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bachelor%27s_Grove_Cemetery Bachelor's Grove Cemetery] ==== Cecilia Carrasco ==== * [https://uk.news.yahoo.com/paranormal-push--woman-claims-she-was-shoved-by-a-ghost-132640541.html Paranormal push? Watch moment woman claims she was shoved by a GHOST - Yahoo! News UK] == Related blog posts == * [http://www.thinkulum.net/blog/2015/06/25/weird-things-are-fun/ 2015/06/25: Weird things are fun] [[Category:Weirdness]] 624f657fedf2c81b001039dc82099d7395cc11dd 233 232 2016-06-13T17:10:44Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added an Amazon link for the Voynich manuscript. wikitext text/x-wiki These are strange events, people, places, objects, and ideas that especially interest me. I don't necessarily ''like'' them (some of them are about murder, for example), and I'm skeptical of a lot of them, but I'm interested in my reactions to them and in the issues they involve. This list is for historical and fringe science weirdness. Philosophical and religious weirdness and strange fiction will go in other lists. == Finding weird cases == There's no shortage of places on the Internet to find weird things. Here are a few I like. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Mysteries Category:Mysteries - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Fringe_theory Category:Fringe theory - Wikipedia] * [http://www.dmoz.org/Society/Paranormal/ Paranormal - DMOZ] * [http://www.dmoz.org/Science/Anomalies_and_Alternative_Science/ Anomalies and Alternative Science - DMOZ] * [http://www.dmoz.org/Society/Issues/Conspiracy/ Conspiracy - DMOZ] * [http://www.stufftheydontwantyoutoknow.com/ Stuff They Don't Want You to Know] * [http://paranormal.about.com/ Paranormal Phenomena - About.com] * [http://ufos.about.com/ UFOs and Aliens - About.com] * [http://www.reddit.com/r/UnresolvedMysteries/ Unresolved Mysteries - Reddit] * [http://boards.4chan.org/x/ /x/ (Paranormal) - 4chan] ** [http://www.dailydot.com/lifestyle/4chan-x-paranormal-board-creepy-pronunciation-book-mysteries/ Meet 4chan's /x/philes, investigators of the Internet's strangest mysteries] - The article that led me to the board. * [https://www.youtube.com/user/StrangeMysteries Strange Mysteries - YouTube] == Mysterious people == === Deaths === ==== The Taman Shud Case ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taman_Shud_Case Taman Shud Case - Wikipedia] ==== The Lead Masks Case ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lead_Masks_Case Lead Masks Case - Wikipedia] ==== Elisa Lam ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_of_Elisa_Lam Death of Elisa Lam - Wikipedia] ==== The Ourang Medan ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ourang_Medan Ourang Medan - Wikipedia] ==== Isdal Woman ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isdal_Woman Isdal Woman - Wikipedia] ==== The Dyatlov Pass Incident ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dyatlov_Pass_incident Dyatlov Pass incident - Wikipedia] === Disappearances === ==== The Bermuda Triangle ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bermuda_Triangle Bermuda Triangle - Wikipedia] * [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nnLaDvxgmwg 5 Terrifying & Mysterious Bermuda Triangle Stories - Top5s - YouTube] * [http://www.electronicfog.com/ Bruce Gernon's electronic fog theory] ==== Frederick Valentich ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disappearance_of_Frederick_Valentich Disappearance of Frederick Valentich - Wikipedia] === Unknown identities === ==== Benjaman Kyle ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benjaman_Kyle Benjaman Kyle - Wikipedia] === Time travelers === ==== John Titor ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Titor John Titor - Wikipedia] == Mysterious artifacts == === Toynbee tiles === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toynbee_tiles Toynbee tiles - Wikipedia] === Georgia Guidestones === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georgia_Guidestones Georgia Guidestones - Wikipedia] === Bouvet Island lifeboat === * [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1heSaBKgaeg Abandoned Boat Baffles Scientists for 70 Years - Strange Mysteries - YouTube] * [https://allkindsofhistory.wordpress.com/2011/02/13/an-abandoned-lifeboat-at-worlds-end/ An abandoned lifeboat at world's end - A Blast from the Past] == Mysterious places == === Oak Island === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oak_Island Oak Island - Wikipedia] == Codes and puzzles == === The Voynich manuscript === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voynich_manuscript Voynich manuscript - Wikipedia] * [https://www.amazon.com/dp/1599865556 The Voynich Manuscript: Full Color Photographic Edition - Amazon] - A print replica you can buy. === Kryptos === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kryptos Kryptos - Wikipedia] === Numbers stations === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Numbers_station Numbers station - Wikipedia] === Reddit codes === * [http://www.reddit.com/r/Solving_A858/ Solving A858 - Reddit] * [http://www.reddit.com/r/Solving_Reddit_Codes Solving Reddit Codes - Reddit] === Cicada 3301 === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cicada_3301 Cicada 3301 - Wikipedia] * [http://www.fastcompany.com/3025785/meet-the-man-who-solved-the-mysterious-cicada-3301-puzzle Meet The Man Who Solved The Mysterious Cicada 3301 Puzzle - Fast Company] == Crime == === The Dark Web === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dark_Web Dark Web - Wikipedia] * [http://www.wired.com/2015/06/dark-web-know-myth/ The Dark Web as You Know It Is a Myth - Wired] == Alternative science == === Physics === ==== The Reciprocal System of Theory ==== * [http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Reciprocal_Theory Reciprocal Theory - RationalWiki] === Cosmology === ==== The Flat Earth ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modern_flat_Earth_societies Modern flat Earth societies - Wikipedia] * [https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLltxIX4B8_URNUzDE2sXctnUAEXgEDDGn Flat Earth Clues (playlist) - Mark Sargent - YouTube] === Cryptozoology === ==== Cryptids ==== ===== The Bridgewater Triangle ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bridgewater_Triangle Bridgewater Triangle - Wikipedia] * [http://spookysouthcoast.com/ Spooky Southcoast] - A paranormal radio show located near the Bridgewater Triangle. Each year they have an episode about it. ===== Living dinosaurs ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Living_dinosaur Living dinosaur - Wikipedia] ===== The Jersey Devil ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jersey_Devil Jersey Devil - Wikipedia] ===== Skinwalker Ranch ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skinwalker_Ranch Skinwalker Ranch - Wikipedia] ===== The Mothman ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mothman Mothman - Wikipedia] ===== The Loch Ness Monster ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loch_Ness_Monster Loch Ness Monster - Wikipedia] ===== Bigfoot ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patterson–Gimlin_film Patterson–Gimlin film - Wikipedia] - I don't care much about Bigfoot in general, but this film is intriguing. ==== Cryptid researchers ==== ===== Loren Coleman ===== * [http://cryptomundo.com/lorencoleman/ Bio of Loren Coleman - Cryptomundo] === Psychology === ==== ESP ==== ===== Diane Hennacy Powell ===== * [http://dianehennacypowell.com/consciousness/telepathy-project/ The Telepathy Project - Diane Hennacy Powell] ===== Rupert Sheldrake ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rupert_Sheldrake Rupert Sheldrake - Wikipedia] ==== The pineal gland ==== * [http://www.stufftheydontwantyoutoknow.com/podcasts/pineal-gland-eye/ The Pineal Gland: A Third Eye? - Stuff They Don't Want You to Know Podcast] * [http://www.vice.com/read/dmt-you-cannot-imagine-a-stranger-drug-or-a-stranger-experience-365 DMT: You Cannot Imagine a Stranger Drug or a Stranger Experience - Vice] - I don't condone the illegal use of hallucinogens and have no plans to try them, but this research is interesting. == Conspiracies == === The New World Order === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_World_Order_(conspiracy_theory) New World Order (conspiracy theory) - Wikipedia] === The shadow government === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shadow_government_(conspiracy) Shadow government (conspiracy) - Wikipedia] === The JFK assassination === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assassination_of_John_F._Kennedy Assassination of John F. Kennedy - Wikipedia] == UFOs and aliens == === UFO sightings === ==== The Phoenix Lights ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phoenix_Lights Phoenix Lights - Wikipedia] ==== The 2006 O'Hare International Airport UFO sighting ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2006_O%27Hare_International_Airport_UFO_sighting 2006 O'Hare International Airport UFO sighting - Wikipedia] === UFO researchers === ==== Jacques Vallée ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacques_Vallée Jacques Vallée - Wikipedia] ==== Hugh Ross ==== * [http://www.toledoblade.com/Religion/2003/01/04/Astronomer-links-UFOs-to-occultism.html Astronomer links UFOs to occultism - Toledo Blade] ==== Steven Greer ==== * [http://www.disclosureproject.org/ The Disclosure Project] === Alien races === ==== The Dutch ==== It is widely known that the Netherlands is on another planet and that the country's border is a portal to that planet. The Dutch, contrary to popular belief, are not humans who colonized this alien planet long ago but are aliens who visit Earth whenever they travel to other countries. * [http://ask.fm/Togedi3/answer/127837053174 Do you deny that you Dutch are aliens? - Togedi3 - Ask.fm] == Spirit beings == === Ghosts === ==== Country House Restaurant in Clarendon Hills ==== A local haunting. Chicagoland doesn't seem to have many. * [http://www.burgerone.com/clarendon/ghost-story.html Ghost Story - Clarendon Hills Country House] ==== Bachelor's Grove Cemetery ==== Another Chicagoland haunting. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bachelor%27s_Grove_Cemetery Bachelor's Grove Cemetery] ==== Cecilia Carrasco ==== * [https://uk.news.yahoo.com/paranormal-push--woman-claims-she-was-shoved-by-a-ghost-132640541.html Paranormal push? Watch moment woman claims she was shoved by a GHOST - Yahoo! News UK] == Related blog posts == * [http://www.thinkulum.net/blog/2015/06/25/weird-things-are-fun/ 2015/06/25: Weird things are fun] [[Category:Weirdness]] 610f4227114d3ba991c080effb5d3a9e8f111eaf 6 96 234 2016-06-21T08:08:58Z Andy Culbertson 1 An example dice throw for rapid counting practice wikitext text/x-wiki An example dice throw for rapid counting practice 449848982c71309502ca5534bf9f0b025d8b0ba8 6 97 235 2016-06-21T08:10:55Z Andy Culbertson 1 Drawings of dot configurations for subitizing wikitext text/x-wiki Drawings of dot configurations for subitizing 111273d808832261406f5590137db98e6fe2b87b 6 98 236 2016-06-21T08:35:18Z Andy Culbertson 1 Tab-separated list of addition and subtraction equations with totals of 6-19 to import into a flashcard app wikitext text/x-wiki Tab-separated list of addition and subtraction equations with totals of 6-19 to import into a flashcard app b06ff8923133ed44270ca45c6a43719d6cc3709c 0 66 239 179 2016-06-27T05:16:59Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added commenting. wikitext text/x-wiki This chapter covers the basic concepts, skills, and concerns that apply across most of the math I'll learn. I'll introduce them here and try to highlight them where they're especially relevant throughout the rest of the project. In his book ''[http://www.worldcat.org/title/how-humans-learn-to-think-mathematically-exploring-the-three-worlds-of-mathematics/oclc/838192705 How Humans Learn to Think Mathematically]'' David Tall has incorporated most of these aspects of math into a framework for the development of mathematical thinking, which will probably guide a lot of my learning. I'll talk about his framework after looking at each factor. == Problem solving == Since I see math as primarily a way of dealing with the world, I'll start with problem solving. Problem solving is finding a way to change a situation from an undesired state to a desired one when the changes needed aren't obvious at first.<ref>Billstein et al. 2007, 2</ref><ref>Tall 2013, 176</ref> Problem solving serves a few purposes. The immediate benefit in everyday situations is that it makes a problem go away. But it also serves an educational purpose. It expands your understanding of the kinds of problems that can be solved and the kinds of solutions that are available. That is, it reveals new concepts and relationships in the problem's domain, in this case math. Thus it lets you create new knowledge structures, which is a key part of developing one's mathematical thinking. Ideally, studying math teaches you problem solving skills. This is because mathematical activity tends to be goal oriented and because many new math concepts are hard to grasp and apply at first, so you get regular practice at thinking creatively to expand your understanding and to achieve objectives. Then you get better at both solving familiar problems and figuring out how to solve new ones. Problem solving can also be a motivational learning tool. People like being challenged, if success feels achievable. One effective way of arranging challenges for learning is an inductive chain. Starting with simple problems, each problem to be solved teaches a concept, and each following problem uses the new concept to teach another one.<ref>Somers 2011</ref> Practically every math book I find that addresses problem solving mentions George Polya's ''[http://www.worldcat.org/title/how-to-solve-it-a-new-aspect-of-mathematical-method/oclc/523312 How to Solve It]'', a good starting point for studying problem solving, both in math and in general. == Patterns == If mathematics is the science of patterns, what is a pattern? How would you know one if you saw it? If you wanted to find one, what would you look for? A good definition is harder to find than I expected, but here's one that summarizes several points I've seen made: "A Pattern constitutes a set of numbers or objects in which all the members are related with each other by a specific rule."<ref>Krypton Inc n.d.</ref> We could also characterize a pattern as a repetition with differences. As a simple example, counting from 1 to 10 gives a pattern of whole numbers that increase by 1 each time. One procedure for recognizing a pattern might be to look for a collection of diverse items that all have something in common or that differ from each other in a repeating way.<ref>Hatfield et al. 2008, 124-125</ref><ref>Billstein et al. 2007, 22-23</ref> The recognition of patterns is one of the three shared human capacities that David Tall credits for our ability to develop mathematical thinking, the other two being repetition and language.<ref>Tall 2013, 21</ref> See the final section for more on those. Finding patterns is part of problem solving. If you can find the rules underlying a situation, you can often use them to learn enough about it to resolve its difficulties. == Logic == It seems logic isn't much easier to define than math,<ref>Hofweber 2011</ref> but I'll take a stab at it: Logic is the study of the rules governing implication and necessity. Roughly speaking, it deals with the truth-related relationships between statements, and those statements can be about anything. In this case, we're interested in mathematical statements. As I said in the [[Math_Relearning/Introduction|introduction]], math seems to be about the logical properties of mathematical objects such as numbers. In Tall's terminology, math is composed of crystalline concepts. A crystalline concept is a "thinkable concept that has a necessary structure as a consequence of its context." The mathematician describes, defines, and proves the properties of these concepts and their structures.<ref>Tall 2013, 27</ref> In math one major way logic is used is in proving and disproving patterns. A mathematician finds what they think is a pattern and states it as a conjecture. Then they or others either find counterexamples to disprove it or come up with a proof for it by chaining true statements together logically, ending with the conjecture they're proving.<ref>Billstein et al. 2007, 23-24</ref> == Algorithms == An algorithm is a precise, detailed procedure for achieving a result. Math operations are carried out by algorithms. Most people are familiar with the procedure for subtracting multi-digit numbers, which involves things like stacking them on top of each other, subtracting from right to left, and borrowing. People often skip carrying out the algorithms by using a calculator, but algorithms are still in play because calculators and other computers use them for every single operation. Often there's more than one algorithm that can accomplish an operation. The subtraction algorithm I mentioned earlier is the standard one for subtraction. Schools have begun teaching children alternate algorithms for the arithmetic operations, and it has some parents frustrated and alarmed. But the new algorithms do make sense. They even reflect the way adults actually do arithmetic.<ref>Mehta 2014</ref> For the purposes of this project, looking at multiple algorithms will help us think about the nature of the operations, and understanding that nature will let us be more flexible in solving problems that involve those operations. We can distinguish between algorithms and relations. An algorithm is a series of actions you take on some data that takes up time and proceeds in a more-or-less causal fashion. If you add 3 to 2, you get 5 at the end. But 2 + 3 = 5 also represents a timeless relationship between the numbers that exists apart from anything you do with them. One way to visualize the relationship is that on a number line, 5 is three whole numbers to the right of 2. From this perspective, when you perform the addition of 3 to 2, you're not creating the number 5 or changing a 2 to a 5. You're simply moving your attention from one number to another in their static places on the number line. We'll always need algorithms. But the advantages of thinking relationally are that it's simpler and more flexible. It's similar to telling someone how to get to a building. You can give them a route, or you can hand them a map and an address, or at least a pair of cross streets. A route saves them the work of finding their own route, but it might not fit their preferences (such as avoiding toll roads) or even their starting point. If they have a map, they can tailor their route to their circumstances. They can even change it mid-journey if they run across obstacles. Another advantage of thinking relationally is that if you understand the algorithms by knowing the underlying concepts, you can remember the algorithms more easily and avoid making mistakes. Edsger Dijkstra has more to say on relations vs. algorithms, which he speaks of in terms of equivalence and implication, respectively.<ref>Dijkstra 1985</ref><ref>Dijkstra 1986</ref> == Abstraction == An abstraction is an idealized generalization of some state of affairs. It embodies certain common attributes of the state and not other attributes that vary from one circumstance to another. This process wraps up a complex concept or procedure inside a simpler one that represents it and hides its details and variations. For example, the male and female restroom icons are abstracted representations of men and women. For mathematical examples, multiplication is an abstraction of repeated addition, and exponentiation is an abstraction of repeated multiplication. Abstraction is one place patterns show up in math. The commonalities in the relationships between the elements of the pattern get abstracted into a rule that describes the pattern. Abstraction plays a major role in Tall's model, where it also goes by the phrase compression of knowledge. He divides it into three tracks: structural abstraction for working with objects, operational abstraction for actions, and formal abstraction for axioms.<ref>Tall 2013, 10, 16</ref> I'll return to these tracks in the final section. == Language == The abstractness of math and its technical use of symbols can obscure one of its important features. Math is expressed through a language, or at least a register, which is a subset of a language meant to fulfill a certain function. The language of math has both written and spoken forms. It has a vocabulary (number names, shape names, operators, etc.), a syntax, and a set of symbols. And like any language, it's used to communicate.<ref>Pimm 1987, xiii, 7-20, 75</ref> In Tall's model, language is one of the shared human capacities that enables mathematical thinking. It allows us to compress experiences and procedures into concepts and specify their properties.<ref>Tall 2013, 12, 21, 24</ref> In other words, language aids abstraction. People sometimes say that math ''is'' a language, but I like to take a broad view of math and say that it ''has'' a language, though it is more than that language. We can distinguish between the words of a language and the objects or concepts the language is referring to. So the numeral 1 is a word, and the corresponding concept is the idea of one itself. This is similar to the relation-algorithm distinction I covered earlier. Relations and concepts both refer to the mathematical patterns that exist on their own, and algorithms and words refer to methods humans use to deal with those realities. The distinction is important to keep in mind because in the end, the word we pick to represent a concept is arbitrary, which is why there are so many languages. Math symbols and the ways we string them together into formulas had to be invented. We should always leave the door open to finding new ways to think about and represent the underlying mathematical concepts when the old ways become less helpful.<ref>Zheng 2015</ref> One part of speech that math makes special use of is a hybrid of verb and noun that Tall calls a procept. For example, the expression 2 + 3 acts as both an instruction to add 3 to 2 (a verb) and an object on its own that can be manipulated and reasoned about (a noun). The addends can be flipped to create the equivalent expression 3 + 2, for instance. Or 2 + 3 can be viewed as a stand-in for the result of the calculation. There are other contexts in which people treat verbs and even whole clauses as nouns, but it's an especially prominent feature of the mathematical language. And since procepts make it possible to reason about and to build conceptually on every mathematical action we perform, they're an especially important part of developing mathematical thinking.<ref>Tall 2013, 12-14</ref> The linguistic issues surrounding math extend beyond the symbols we use to represent its concepts and operations. We use language to talk about math for several purposes with both ourselves and other people. We use it to clarify math concepts or problems in our own minds, to teach concepts to others, to make mathematical requests ("Measure this length," for example), and so on. All these ways of encoding and communicating about math have to be learned, and mathematical language is both similar enough to and different enough from everyday ways of speaking and thinking that in the beginning learners will be confused. So it's important to pay careful attention to language while learning and teaching the subject. David Pimm explores all these linguistic issues in his books ''[http://www.worldcat.org/title/speaking-mathematically-communication-in-mathematics-classrooms/oclc/14273261 Speaking Mathematically]'' and ''[http://www.worldcat.org/title/symbols-and-meanings-in-school-mathematics/oclc/31515971 Symbols and Meanings in School Mathematics]''. == Sets == As they're learning the basic concepts of math, children work with small collections of physical objects. These unsuspecting children are actually learning the basic properties of and operations on sets. Math has an area that defines these properties and operations known as set theory, and in fact, mathematicians have apparently determined that they can form a logical foundation for most of mathematics partly on a particular version of set theory.<ref>''Wikipedia'', s.v. "Hilbert's Program," last modified January 3, 2014, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hilbert's_program</ref> It'll be a while before I know enough to understand this, so here I'll just mention it. But we can make use of the main idea, that set theory has something to say about the fundamental concepts of math. It's another potentially helpful angle from which to view math concepts. As I see it the main advantage of drawing from set theory at this point is that it directly addresses some of the ways we begin to learn about math and lets us be precise about them. So even though we're starting our math self-re-education with numbers, I'm also going to bring in a different mathematical object, the set. == How mathematical thinking develops == David Tall organizes his theory of math education around three mathematical worlds, several mechanisms of thought, and three stages of development. === Worlds of mathematics === Mathematics occupies three realms: objects, actions, and axioms.<ref>Tall 2013, 6-8</ref> Thinking in each realm involves different mental capacities and different methods of development. The world of objects deals primarily with space and shapes. We interact with it through processes of mental imagery based on experiences with physical objects, processes that Tall calls conceptual embodiment.<ref>Tall 2013, 12</ref> We grow our understanding of objects through our sensory capacity for recognition, which allows us to see patterns, similarities, and differences. We use our capacity for language to categorize objects based on these observations.<ref>Tall 2013, 21</ref> Structural abstraction, this grouping of concepts through categorization, is one way we form new concepts within the world of objects.<ref>Tall 2013, 10, 15</ref> The first stage of structural abstraction is empirical abstraction, in which children play with objects to learn their properties. The second stage is Platonic abstraction, in which physical objects become idealized mental objects, such as sizeless points and widthless lines.<ref>Tall 2013, 9</ref> Tall calls the methods of development in the world of objects conceptual embodiment.<ref>Tall 2013, 16</ref> The world of actions starts with arithmetic and algebra. We interact with it by mentally moving the positions of symbols, a process Tall calls functional embodiment.<ref>Tall 2013, 11</ref> We grow our understanding in this realm through our motor capacity for repetition, which allows us to practice action sequences until we can perform them unconsciously. Language enables us to encapsulate these processes.<ref>Tall 2013, 21</ref> Grouping actions through encapsulation is called operational abstraction. The first stage in this track is pseudo-empirical abstraction, in which children learn the properties of actions on objects. For example, the operation of counting leads to the concept of number. The operation of sharing leads to the concept of fraction. The second stage is reflective abstraction, in which actions become objects to be reasoned about, or procepts. At this level, the action of addition becomes the concept of sum, and repeated addition becomes the concept of product.<ref>Tall 2013, 9-10</ref> Tall calls the methods of development in the world of actions operational symbolism.<ref>Tall 2013, 16-17</ref> The world of axioms is the subject of formal mathematics at the university level and deals largely with sets. We grow our understanding of axiomatic math through our capacity for language, which allows us to define thinkable concepts that we assemble into increasingly sophisticated knowledge structures.<ref>Tall 2013, 21</ref> This labeling and defining of concepts is also how language compresses knowledge. Language then allows us to deduce the properties of these concepts through logical proofs, the process of formal abstraction.<ref>Tall 2013, 16</ref> Tall calls the methods of development in the world of axioms axiomatic formalism.<ref>Tall 2013, 17</ref> You can imagine these worlds of mathematical development as three circles in a Venn diagram that overlap in four areas. Embodied symbolism is the area leading from conceptual embodiment to operational symbolism. Embodied formalism is concerned with Euclidean proof. Symbolic formalism is the area of algebraic proof. And the area occupied by all three worlds covers proofs that combine embodiment and symbolism.<ref>Tall 2013, 18-19</ref> I'll call each of these seven areas a region, the four areas of overlap plus the three that purely concern a particular world. === Mechanisms of thought === In addition to all the processes mentioned above, Tall discusses a couple more that act across all three worlds. The first is met-befores, a play on metaphor. These are concepts the learner has encountered earlier that they use to understand a new concept. Met-befores can be either supportive or problematic for understanding the new concept. When a learner proposes a solution or explanation, met-befores enable the teacher to ask the question, "What have you met before that makes you think that?"<ref>Tall 2013, 22-23</ref> The second mechanism is blending. The mind creates new knowledge structures and thinkable concepts by compressing knowledge through abstraction, by connecting the thinkable concepts into knowledge structures, and by blending earlier knowledge structures into new ones. Blending involves linking different modes of thought and experience together, such as vision, touch, and abstract concepts. For example, real numbers are a blend of the physical number line (embodiment), the idea of decimal numbers (symbolism), and a particular set definition (formalism).<ref>Tall 2013, 24-25</ref> === Stages of development === Mathematical reasoning and proof develop in three stages, each of which involves multiple worlds. The first stage is practical mathematics, which explores geometry using physical objects and explores arithmetic using calculation. The second is theoretical mathematics, which covers Euclidean and algebraic proofs. The third is formal mathematics, which involves proving theorems from set-theoretic axioms.<ref>Tall 2013, 18-20</ref> Putting all the stages, capacities, and processes together, we arrive at an outline that looks like this:<ref>Tall 2013, 17, 19</ref> * Stage: practical mathematics ** Region: embodiment *** Concepts: space and shape *** Capacity: recognition (perception) *** Method: conceptual embodiment *** Embodiment: conceptual *** Abstraction: empirical ** Region: embodied symbolism *** Capacity: repetition (action) ** Region: symbolism *** Concepts: number, arithmetic, generalized arithmetic *** Method: operational symbolism *** Embodiment: functional *** Abstraction: pseudo-empirical * Stage: theoretical mathematics ** Region: embodied formalism *** Abstraction: Platonic ** Region: symbolic formalism *** Concepts: algebra, algebraic proof *** Abstraction: reflective ** Region: proof combining embodiment and symbolism * Stage: formal mathematics ** Region: formalism *** Method: axiomatic formalism *** Abstraction: formal Tall summarizes, "The whole development of mathematical thinking is presented as a combination of compression and blending of knowledge structures to produce crystalline concepts that can lead to imaginative new ways of thinking mathematically in new contexts."<ref>Tall 2013, 28</ref> == Open questions == * What gave us the idea that numbers are ruled by logic? * What is the relationship between numbers and sets? == Footnotes == <references/> <disqus/> [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Complete]] e160881eefaeff2da861257c0fa6470a406898cf 0 56 240 178 2016-06-27T05:17:21Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added commenting. wikitext text/x-wiki == Why numbers? == The ancient Greeks focused on geometry, but mathematics began before them with the basic numeric calculations the Babylonians and Egyptians needed for their societies to function.<ref>Devlin 1994, 1-2</ref> Math education for children today begins with teaching them what numbers are and how they generally work. If numbers are only one type of mathematical object, then there might be more than one starting point for learning about math. But since a lot of research has been done on starting math education with numbers and since numbers pervade so much of math and may even form its basis, I thought I'd start at the same place. But there will be some differences between this project and elementary school education. I'm going to start with the most basic number-related ideas I can find and build up from there, but I'll discuss these things abstractly rather than having us all do the kinds of concrete exercises children have to do to get used to the concept. == Properties of number == What are numbers, and what are their basic features that shape how we work with them? A helpful way to understand numbers is to examine the ways we use them, the way humanity developed its knowledge of them, and the ways we learn about them now. I'll refer to these factors as I go along. From my observations so far I believe the attributes of number can be broken out along several lines: the ways people represent numbers; the skills people need to work with them; the capacities humans have that enable those skills; the functions numbers serve; the methods people use to carry them out; and the properties of numbers that enable those representations, functions, and methods. First I'll offer a preliminary, operational definition of numbers that incorporates the properties I'd like to highlight, and then I'll break it down and talk about each property and how it relates to others. Here's my definition: ''Numbers are terms representing stable, interrelated abstractions of quantity that can be associated with objects to identify their quantity-related attributes.'' I suspect this definition isn't complete or broad enough, but I think it captures the characteristics that children are taught about numbers, and so it's a convenient and adequate entry point for thinking about them and about math. The features I'll discuss are representation, quantity, association, abstraction, stability, and relatedness. One caveat to these first few chapters is that even though the topics of number sense, measurement, geometry, and the basic operations are treated separately in education and I'll be treating them separately here, they're so closely interrelated that I have trouble talking about one concept without bringing in the rest. I think this is because although math is a highly abstract activity, our knowledge of it is rooted in our interactions with the physical world, and those interactions use all these concepts at once. === Representation === At face value, numbers are words, and at least in English, the written number takes two forms, symbolic and alphabetical.<ref>Hatfield et al. 2008, 189</ref> The spoken form of each written form is the same. Sometimes there's more than one symbolic way to represent the same number, and each symbolic form can be spelled out alphabetically. As words, numbers represent things. What a number represents varies depending on how you're using it. We use numbers in three ways: quantifying, ordering, and naming. In the first case, we count and measure objects and their attributes to determine their amounts or magnitudes. This quantifying use gives us the cardinal numbers, which are the number names we use for counting. In the second case, we arrange things in some kind of order and number them to keep track of that order. This ordering use gives us the ordinal numbers: first, second, and so on. I think of ordinal numbers as a more complex type of measurement than the cardinal numbers, so I'll wait to cover them till the chapter on measurement ([[Measurement]]). In the third case, we label things with arbitrary numbers simply as a way to refer to them without having to make up new names, as in the case of player numbers in sports teams. The naming use is a linguistic use for number words rather than a mathematical one, so we'll mostly leave it behind in our discussions.<ref>Chapin and Johnson 2006, 2-3; Yolkowski 2013</ref> === Quantity === It seems to me that the fundamental, defining feature of numbers is that they represent quantities, and their other features either arise from that fact or make it useful. Quantity uniquely defines the concept of number because we don't really have another way to represent specific quantities, and most of the time when we use numbers, quantity is at least implied. Quantity is a value that identifies how much or how many of something there is. To a certain degree our grasp of quantity is inborn. Even infants have some sense of quantity,<ref>Butterworth 1999, 101-105</ref> and we recognize collections of up to three objects without having to count, a process called subitizing.<ref>Dehaene 2011, 56-57</ref> Children gain a fuller sense of quantity by rational counting (see [[Measurement]]) and by comparing quantities of different sizes (see the Relatedness section below).<ref>Hatfield et al. 2008, 132-135</ref> This is one of the first places in math that patterns come into play. A number represents the repeated experience of collections containing a particular quantity.<ref>Devlin 1994, 9</ref> === Association === Numbers can be associated with things. This is a property of number that makes quantities useable. It's certainly not unique to number, though, because associating things is characteristic of the way human minds work in general. It's how we create new words, for example. This property of numbers is a basis for all three number uses--cardinal, ordinal, and nominal. I'll cover its use for cardinal and ordinal numbers in [[Measurement]]. We can think of these things that we assign numbers to as objects, even if it's a collective object or an abstract one like temperature. It's a convenient term for the whole, enormous class of things that have the trait that something else can be associated with them. And it brings out a further feature of association, that we're very flexible in our choice of targets for our associations. For example, you can pick a single product on an assembly line and give it a serial number, or you can look at the whole group of products that were made in one day and identify their total. === Abstraction === The fact that these associations can be made and broken freely means that numbers are abstract, one of the many abstractions of math. You don't need to find or manufacture a new set of numbers every time you want to quantify a new object or attribute. Numbers are abstract also because there are many kinds of quantifiable attributes, and many kinds of objects have them. We'll especially start to see this in [[Measurement]]. Numbers are made concrete and visible by the ways we represent them.<ref>Devlin 2000, 74</ref> We notate them using symbols and diagrams, and this helps us to work with them. === Stability === One of the math learning tasks for children that Piaget identified was number conservation, the understanding that when you rearrange the objects in a collection, it still has the same number of objects.<ref>Hatfield et al. 2008, 127-128</ref> Once you've learned this, of course, it seems obvious, but I think there's a principle to keep in mind that can be consciously applied to new mathematical situations: When you don't operate on a quantity in relevant ways, it remains the same. That is, a change in a situation may affect one quantity and not another, and it's important to distinguish between them. You don't have to re-count the quantity that stayed the same, but you also can't change the quantity with that operation. === Relatedness === The inverse of the stability property is what I'll call relatedness: When you do operate on a quantity in relevant ways, you arrive at another quantity. In this way numbers have relationships with each other. You could also say that individual numbers have properties or behavior and that each number has its own character. Furthermore, there are many mathematical paths between any number and any other, and this fact makes math a powerful tool for discovery, especially when combined with the many relationships among measurable attributes. Once you know a few quantitative facts about an object, you can perform calculations to learn a lot more about it. Sometimes you'll need to find the path between what you know about the object and what you want to know about it, and that can turn math into a puzzle or a game. Children learn a few basic number relationships as they're gaining a sense of number. One is that quantities have sizes that can be compared. Even without knowing the specific quantities in two sets of objects, they can match each item in one set with an item in the other and determine which set is larger based on which has items left over. Matching the items in two sets is called one-to-one correspondence.<ref>Hatfield et al. 2008, 132</ref> Comparison is the basis for seriation, the operation of sorting objects into sequences by the size of some attribute, one of the early number tasks children learn. To order a set of objects by ascending size, for example, you compare each to the others and place it in a sequence such that each object is larger than the one before it and smaller than the one after.<ref>Hatfield et al. 2008, 128</ref> Seriation is the basis for the sequence of numbers we use in counting and other operations. Even though we've all practiced the sequence of the counting numbers to the point that they're entirely natural to us, numbers don't occur in a particular sequence out in nature. There's no physical row of numbers we need to observe when we want to learn their order or discover a new number. The number sequence is a result of sorting the numbers by magnitude. We could choose a different sorting order, such as alphabetically by the number's name, but that would be drastically less useful. Another basic number relationship children learn is what Piaget called number inclusion, that items in a set can be grouped into sets of smaller quantities and that sets can be grouped together into larger sets. Grouping numbers together to form larger numbers is also called composition, and breaking them apart into smaller numbers is called decomposition. Number inclusion is the basis for the arithmetic operations.<ref>Hatfield et al. 2008, 127-128</ref> == Classification == Just as numbers often represent sets of objects, numbers themselves can be grouped into sets. This grouping is based on various criteria.<ref>Chapin and Johnson 2006, 1-2</ref> For example, the most basic major set of numbers we work with is the whole numbers. The whole numbers are a number system, not to be confused with the numeration systems in the next section. The whole numbers consist of the natural numbers and 0. The natural, or counting, numbers are 1, 2, 3, and so on.<ref>''Wikipedia'', s.v. “Number,” last modified August 4, 2014, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Number</ref> The whole numbers have the characteristic of representing countable quantities of whole units of whatever you're counting. There are numbers in other sets that represent part of a unit, and I'll start talking about those in the fractions chapter. As another example, whole numbers can be further classified as even or odd. You can find out if a number is even by forming pairs of items in a collection of that quantity. If you have one item left over, the number is odd. If all the items can form pairs, the number is even. So you could say an even number has the trait of being completely pairable within itself.<ref>Chapin and Johnson 2006, 9-10</ref> == Footnotes == <references/> <disqus/> [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Complete]] 8d82b3fe736a46658d941cb83265f3420aa3a2db 0 68 241 186 2016-06-27T05:17:59Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added commenting. wikitext text/x-wiki These pages are my random thoughts on the Common Core Math Progressions. The Common Core Standards are divided by grade level and, within each grade level, grouped by domain (in the lower grades) or conceptual category (in high school). The Progressions trace the development of each domain or conceptual category across the grades. These documents are helpful for understanding the Common Core approach to teaching math and getting a high-level overview of the topics a CC curriculum will cover. Each article in this section links to the related Progressions document at the top. At the start of each comment I've given a page number or phrase to indicate what I'm commenting on in the document. My comments are mostly notes to myself about my personal reactions to the material, so maybe only a few of them are of interest to anyone else. But they're here just in case. If I refer to things you aren't familiar with, there might be an explanation in another part of the Math Relearning project. Otherwise refer to the relevant Progressions document for context. The index page for the Progressions themselves: [http://achievethecore.org/page/254/progressions-documents-for-the-common-core-state-standards-for-mathematics Progressions Documents for the Common Core State Standards for Mathematics] * [[/Preface/]] * [[/K-5 Counting and Cardinality, Operations and Algebraic Thinking/]] * [[/K-5 Number and Operations in Base Ten/]] * [[/K-5 Data/]] * [[/K-5 Measurement/]] * [[/K-6 Geometry/]] * [[/3-5 Fractions/]] * [[/6-7 Ratios and Proportional Relationships/]] * [[/6-8 Expressions and Equations/]] * [[/6-8 Statistics and Probability/]] * [[/6-8 The Number System and High School Number/]] * [[/High School Functions/]] * [[/High School Algebra/]] * [[/High School Statistics and Probability/]] * [[/High School Modeling/]] <disqus/> [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Complete]] 12fc529ab791da2062bd216d51681125106cfef9 8 99 242 2016-06-27T06:13:27Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the Contact link. wikitext text/x-wiki * navigation ** mainpage|mainpage-description ** recentchanges-url|recentchanges ** randompage-url|randompage ** helppage|help ** http://www.thinkulum.net/blog/contact/|Contact * SEARCH * TOOLBOX * LANGUAGES 80e8a7e0a04cd2a74af6922305233e3328bc9028 243 242 2016-06-27T06:17:10Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the Blog link. wikitext text/x-wiki * navigation ** mainpage|mainpage-description ** recentchanges-url|recentchanges ** randompage-url|randompage ** helppage|help ** http://www.thinkulum.net/blog/|Blog ** http://www.thinkulum.net/blog/contact/|Contact * SEARCH * TOOLBOX * LANGUAGES 312fa1e18fea47c4cb5d9807a18aae8e40680c87 0 69 244 187 2016-06-27T06:19:06Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added commenting. wikitext text/x-wiki These are my comments on the Common Core Math Progressions document [http://achievethecore.org/file/1493 Preface] (PDF). == Preface for the Draft Progressions == These people seem to think like I do, especially in their concern for tying math together conceptually, tracing its development from basic to advanced concepts, and clarifying its vocabulary. I also share their concern for paying attention to the ways people learn and the misunderstandings of what they learn that hold them back. The "Other sources of information" seem worth reading. == Introduction == p. 8 - Aha! I'm not the only one who uses the terms operational and relational! The sources in the footnotes seem worth reading too. Especially http://commoncoretools.me/2012/06/09/jason-zimbas-wiring-diagram/. === Organization of the Common Core State Standards for Mathematics === The discussion of the structure of the Standards is confusing to me. I don't get the distinctions between some of the categories of features. === Reconceptualized topics; changed notation and terminology === New to me (NTM): "Notation for remainders in division of whole numbers." I've wondered how remainders fit into math for a while. This strikes me as a very good way to think of and notate them. === Terms and usage in the Standards and Progressions === <disqus/> [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Comments]] [[Category:Complete]] 59e8b7b073c928490e25bdfa9a531e4e72e080f8 0 72 247 190 2016-06-27T06:24:26Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added commenting. wikitext text/x-wiki These are my comments on the Common Core Math Progressions document [http://achievethecore.org/file/1170 Measurement & Data (data part): Grades K-5] (PDF). == Overview == line plot - Something I'll want to explore throughout this domain is the logic of the design of these different data displays. How necessary or flexible is the design? What does it accomplish? What data situations does each cover? Do the displays fall into families? What does each variation accomplish? Why do we order and place the elements as we do? context - This seems like a very important point that I want to keep in mind. Hmm, the GAISE report, another freely available document on conceptual math education. I feel like I should look for more of these. But maybe I shouldn't spend time on that and only collect them as they come up. I should at least keep a list of them on the website. == Measurement Data == === Grade 2 === It would also be good to ask what kinds of steps are involved in moving from data collection to representation. Also why do we pick out these features of the situation to represent in the display? "greatest and least values" - What questions do we typically ask of data? Why these particular questions? "fill in gaps" - Are there any categories that do act like numbers and would need to have gaps filled in? Letters come to mind maybe. "dots will 'pile up'" - Dots are a form of tally, and shorthand for tallies are numbers, which suggests a table. So why do we make plots, graphs, and other such displays? === Grade 5 === I'm listening to my [http://www.pandora.com/station/1214310825114920401 Pandora math station], as usual, and the numbers song from Einstein on the Beach is on. It occurred to me that the numbers could have multiple meanings that change based on the context. It would be interesting to explore that technique with words other than numbers. == Where the Measurement Data Progression is heading == Thinking more about why we represent data visually, do we do much with treating graphs like geometric figures? I guess I should get Tufte's quantitative information book to help me answer some of these questions. "not in order to make any claims" - You have to know how to read graphs in order not to draw inappropriate conclusions from them. <disqus/> [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Comments]] [[Category:Complete]] 3153ba871117494d6ce500bb19d9f2a85233c1fc 0 74 249 192 2016-06-27T06:25:20Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added commenting. wikitext text/x-wiki These are my comments on the Common Core Math Progressions document [http://achievethecore.org/file/1168 Geometry: Grades K-6] (PDF). Yay! I was looking forward to geometry. == Overview == "Levels of Geometric Thinking" - These distinctions seem vague. "Classification of Quadrilaterals" - Interesting topic for a book. I'm curious what benefits different definitions and classification schemes give us. "do not learn limited concepts" - Even if we decide not to require much math, we still have to teach the parts we do carefully, and it's probably more than non-specialists expect (definitely not just arithmetic like this article suggests: http://www.newsday.com/opinion/oped/if-you-want-kids-to-learn-math-stop-teaching-it-1.10206785). decomposing by covering - Interesting, I wouldn't have thought that would count. composing with units of units - I wonder if there are canonical or typical sets of compositions, maybe progressions of units. spatial structuring - Isn't this just mentally decomposing? == Grade 1 == "geometrically defining attributes" - Why do we pick these and not other attributes? I was going to dismiss the task of distinguishing between defining attributes and others, since I already basically know those, but then I thought I should examine the issue in my typical way, and I quickly arrived at that question, which I think will be enlightening to answer, so I'm glad I took another look. I was thinking later about how satisfying it is to dig up new concepts like that, or at least the questions that would lead to them, and how I won't get to do that as much now since the conceptual math people have already done so much. But then I thought it might achieve a similar result if I came up with the kinds of questions that could have led to the insights of those researchers. So I might do some of that. "like combining 10 ones ... foundations for later mathematics" - How far do the parallels go between shapes and counting or arithmetic? Area is a model for multiplication. The number line can model a lot. Geometry can be done through coordinates. What else? == Grade 2 == "need not have the same shape" - It would be good to explore how this works. It's closely related to the area-perimeter relationship. tangrams - I didn't know they were related to isosceles right triangles. I've wondered about the history/context of these puzzles, so I should look them up. "transformed into" - This confused me for a second, but I think they mean decomposing the first shape and composing the pieces into the second. This could be an interesting general model of some kinds of transformation. == Grade 3 == classification of shapes - This feels like an especially preparatory step, and it reminds me of the reason-orientedness of my project. The goal is largely to ask why we do things the way we do in math. Along those lines I can also ask why we learn the things we do. I know math is continually growing, like every other field, but are there key intermediate goals in math knowledge? Tasks we typically want to accomplish at certain points that require specific background knowledge? Relatedly, how do we select what to teach? Are there other lower level concepts we don't teach because they don't matter to our later goals? Are there concepts on those levels that we haven't investigated because they haven't really interested anyone? Things like the Ulam spiral. It's a pretty basic idea, but we didn't come up with it until 1963. "without making a priori assumptions regarding their classification ... may still need work building or drawing squares" - These progressions split up math tasks and skills very finely. Some of these distinctions might be worth pursuing for this project (concepts, problem types such as solving for various unknowns), and others would be less relevant (mental or physical abilities like drawing straight lines). == Grade 4 == "turtle geometry" - It's interesting that a feature of a particular computer program gets a type of geometry named after it. "connect what are often initially isolated ideas" - It's interesting that building shapes with the turtle can do this. "triangular (isometric) grids" - Interesting. I hadn't heard of this one. Hopefully EngageNY will cover the different kinds of grids. "shape is fixed by the side lengths" - Explore how this works. == Grade 5 == A lot of this and grade 4 seems like repetition of concepts and skills found elsewhere in the progressions, maybe with more technical terminology and combined in slightly different ways. At least it gives me less to write about. The relationship between spatial structuring and the coordinate plane does seem significant though. It's described as sort of a paradigm shift for the students. Venn diagram of quadrilaterals - Very useful! == Grade 6 == The concepts and skills are starting to rush past, so I'll wait to figure out what it all means until the curriculum. It's crossed my mind a few times whether the progressions would be adequate for pre-algebra, but I think I really will need the lesson plans. == Where the Geometry Progression is Heading == It's nice to know composition and decomposition aren't just training wheels for elementary school but are used past high school math. They do feel sort of like crutches, but it's reassuring that everyone uses them. The progressions give the impression that Common Core geometry ends after grade 6, but the standards continue it through high school, thankfully. In fact, James Milgram criticizes the CC technique of teaching geometry using rigid transformations after that point, saying it may be the only rigorous method we have, but it's also too advanced for most teachers. Well, that isn't really relevant to my project, so for now I'm happy with whatever's in store. <disqus/> [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Comments]] [[Category:Complete]] 14f7d4f5ec78efe2670b72239111b0eb45ac0e39 0 75 250 193 2016-06-27T06:25:47Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added commenting. wikitext text/x-wiki These are my comments on the Common Core Math Progressions document [http://achievethecore.org/file/1173 Number & Operations-Fractions: Grades 3-5] (PDF). == Grade 3 == "The meaning of fractions" - I like this, but what about Chapin and Johnson's other meanings? Of course, that's too much to cover in grade 3. I'd also like to explore the complex nature of the fraction representation. It's a single number that's represented using more than one number, to start with. "same shape and size" - Isn't size the only real requirement? "The importance of specifying the whole" - It seems like a lot of things (everything?) in math are identified in relation to something else. "basic building block of fractions" - This is the kind of thing I would come up with. "Estimate lengths" - This reminds me about a difference I observed between measurement and fractions. Fractions divide a whole into equal parts. Measurement adds up equal parts to reveal the amount of a whole, which may not be a multiple of a single part. I'm sure there's a better way to say that. == Grade 4 == (4 * 7)/(4 * 9) = 7/9 - Very interesting! There are some subtleties I want to understand here. Fractions are an interesting representation, since they have multiple parts, and their parts don't work quite like regular integers. "no mathematical reason" - Aha! Some things we do in math are for convenience, not for mathematical necessity. Take that, Jeremy! "multiplying by 1" - This is an example of a seemingly useless move that is very useful in a particular context. It works in this case because you're not just multiplying by 1 but by an equivalent in another representation. You've translated the 1 into a more powerful form. "2/3 + 5/8 as a length" - I notice the diagram doesn't mark the length of the whole. Instead it seems to base the fractional lengths on each other. This made me realize you can view two fractions as a ratio or proportion. "decimal as a fraction generalizes" - I don't see how a visual fraction model wouldn't generalize. Maybe I don't know what cases they mean. With these fraction examples I'm finding myself taking the symbol-manipulation shortcuts. I'm going to have to slow down when I'm doing the lessons and think about the problems conceptually. But as the concepts build on each other, I'll have to find summary models that'll remind me of what the more advanced concepts mean so I don't have to think through the whole chain of concepts for each problem. Conceptual understanding isn't just about being able to picture the meaning of the procedures but about being able to think about the concepts flexibly to solve problems, which means breaking down the situation and transforming it into more suitable forms for solving, perhaps largely by mixing and matching the conceptual pieces. So that's a skill to concentrate on. == Grade 5 == "least common denominator" - Interesting. I always thought that's just what you did, but I see that its non-necessity is an extension of the fact that simplifying fractions isn't mathematically necessary. fractions as division - Explore the relationship between this and fractions as addition or multiplication of parts. "contribute 1/3 of itself" - I usually think of division linearly as the objects being grouped as wholes except where the dividing lines cut through them, sort of like the second example solution with the sack of rice. "general formula for the product of two fractions" - The formula reminds me of how detailed math is and how long it would take to list all the concepts and formulas at a fine grained level. I sometimes think that would be a good thing to do, I think to give me a more concrete basis for mathematical problem solving, but the prospect is intimidating. This makes me think being decent at problem solving with math takes commitment! There are a lot of details to know and interrelate. "reason out many examples" - I might still have gaps to fill with my own investigation as I'm going through Common Core conceptual math. One type of question I still might ask is how these concepts might have developed in the first place, or at least how someone might develop them from experience and necessity, even if we don't know how they actually came about. "same as multiplying the number by a unit fraction, 1/3 x 5" - Wouldn't that be 5 x 1/3? I don't quite know how to conceptualize 5 x 1/3 = 5 ÷ 3. I only know that's the rule, and following it comes very easily to me. However, I do see that when you divide a part into parts, you get more (and smaller) parts, and maybe that's the key. area model for 3/4 x 5/3 - I wonder how people came up with these explanations for math concepts. They seem clever. That's another type of question worth exploring. Explanations of fraction operations would also be a good place to experiment with rewording the explanations to answer my own difficulties in understanding. Maybe translating the operations into English that makes sense to me would help. To take a later example, 3 ÷ 1/6 means "1/6 goes into 3 how many times?" "Multiplication as scaling" - I'm glad they're covering this. Keith Devlin is happy about it too, I'm sure. But I would've thought the scaling factor would come second in the expression, so 3 x 5 and 3 x 1/2 in the examples. You present what you have and then how you're changing it. I'm curious how they're conceptualizing the mathematical statement they're expressing. <disqus/> [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Comments]] [[Category:Complete]] 6cdcae022b511d42aaa0d10f2bef468f809a5c56 0 76 251 194 2016-06-27T06:26:13Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added commenting. wikitext text/x-wiki These are my comments on the Common Core Math Progressions document [http://achievethecore.org/file/1177 Ratios & Proportional Relationships: Grades 6-7] (PDF). == Overview == "Ratios have associated rates." - So a rate is a ratio where one side is set to one. And a proportion is an equality between two ratios? I couldn't quite tell if they were distinguishing between proportions and proportional relationships. And a percent is a ... rate, I think. Ratios and proportions are another area that will be hard to wrap my mind around. I think it's because, like fractions, they involve relating two or more numbers. Of course, every number is related to a reference point, if only 0. But fractions, ratios, and so on add numbers to relate to each other. My mind gets quickly overwhelmed with the moving parts. But I can think of it like a game. Actually I don't know how much that helps. Games can be pretty confusing too. But it's at least an interesting way to look at it. One thing that I think would help is translating the math into English. So what's involved in these relationships, and why do mathematicians pick these to study and teach? "collection of equivalent ratios" - So a coordinate can be seen as a ratio, and a line with certain conditions (e.g., through the origin) marks a collection of ratios that are equivalent and represents a proportional relationship between the two components of the ratios (right terms?). == Grade 6 == "Solving a percent problem" - This is an example of how falling behind in math causes problems when trying to learn later math. I'm not fluent with my fraction problem solving strategies, so I feel like I'm lagging when I follow the solution to this problem. Especially I haven't grasped how the fraction concepts relate to the rules I learned, so I fumble around when I try to connect the concepts to these ratio problems. I can imagine what it might be like for a student struggling with their homework or a test without the time needed to truly grasp what they're doing, feeling desperation or despair or resignation. Learning the concepts is supposed to help with problem solving, so to explore how the concepts help to think flexibly it would be good to concentrate on how the concepts translate into the various representations and skills and connect them. == Grade 7 == "Ratio problem specified by natural numbers" - These solutions all have implicit steps, which will confuse people like me who don't have a firm grasp on them. Some parts of the solution seem to work backward from the step's destination, like solving a maze from the other end. You have to know you can do this and how. Why make 6 batches, for example? Of course, hopefully by grade 7 students will have gotten enough instruction and practice to know these things. "what fraction of the paint is blue" - There's some ambiguity in using fractions in cases like this, if you're not thinking carefully. There's a fraction already involving blue paint in the problem, but you have to ask, a fraction of what? What's given is a fraction of a cup, but what you're looking for in this step is the fraction of the total paint. "not the case that for every 10 years" - At least at this stage, math is largely tied to application, and you have to understand the domain you're applying it to, in this case aging. "Correspondence among a table" - Even this helpful diagram has at least one key implicit step: deducing the 2/5 increase in y for every 1 increase in x. Obviously it comes from the 2 cups peach for every 5 grape, but it would make things crystal clear if we could see how that transformation happens via another diagram or two and the symbolic manipulation involved. "rationale from cross-multiplying" - Ah, finally. And it makes sense to me. Except that now I need the rationale for canceling out. "obscured by the traditional method" - I'm glad they acknowledge that some ways of expressing things can obscure more helpful methods of solving a problem. "Skateboard problem 1" - I dismissed tape diagrams at first, but I keep seeing how they're really useful for breaking down certain kinds of problems and translating them into other problems. In this case 80% becomes four of 20%, which highlights that you can divide the cost by 4 to give you a basis for the solution, which is to find 100%. That's only one possible method, of course. Tape diagrams are also useful for showing the difference between the first and second skateboard problems in terms of what wholes the 20% are referring to. The factoring and canceling of 140 * 100 / 80 in the second method is interesting. Explore that. "Using percentages in comparisons" - "25% more" sounds ambiguous to me. Does it mean 25% of the smaller or larger number? The smaller, as it turns out. This highlights the need to understand certain details of English grammar and usage. "I used percentages" - How do the multiplicative ratio table and the percentages relate? I'm always interested in how it is that different problem solving methods are equivalent. == Appendix == "Definitions and essential characteristics" - Lists like this of definitions and such are helpful for analyzing without extra, distracting explanations and comments on things like educational concerns. <disqus/> [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Comments]] [[Category:Complete]] dea56c71d553133e219ef9b4f062e1a30dc0d1b9 0 77 252 195 2016-06-27T06:26:37Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added commenting. wikitext text/x-wiki These are my comments on the Common Core Math Progressions document [http://achievethecore.org/file/1175 Expressions & Equations: Grades 6-8] (PDF). This is one of the topics I've been looking forward to, though I didn't really realize it. It feels like home base for me, a central stopping point for math skills. Earlier concepts were leading to it, and it leads to a bunch of others. Plus it's what I normally think about when I think of math, and I feel like I'm pretty good at this part. == Overview == "a series of nested or parallel operations" - This reminds me that I want to find various ways to represent complex structures like math expressions, ways like parse trees. == Grade 6 == "objects in their own right" - They must've read Tall. This sounds like procepts. "what is the meaning of the 7?" - Interesting, I hadn't really thought of coefficients as having their own meaning, but obviously it makes sense. "Looking for structure ... sequence of operations" - Structure vs sequence is a good pair of terms for the relation-operation dichotomy. Also, I've been privileging structure because Dijkstra did, but sequences have their own logic that's worth studying, and everything we do comes down to them anyway. The way we use it, at least in programming, structure is partly just a translation of sequence meant to hide (from) its difficulties. But sequence is unavoidable in many cases (microprocessors?, games, music), and it's long been mysterious to me. It's often a magical process I can't quite follow of transitioning from one state to a quite different one. "any order, any grouping" - I hadn't heard of that one. It seems like it should have a more formal name. I wonder if EngageNY will cover it. "hold numerical expressions unevaluated" - This seems related to my idea of translations as ways of making expressions more powerful for particular purposes. "does not necessarily dictate how to calculate them" - Another expression of relation vs operation, and an interesting one. The operation properties give you ways to regroup the quantities. "The distributive law is of fundamental importance" - Good to know. "accustomed to solving such problems by division" - It occurs to me that I should learn how the rules of transforming expressions work. This might mean tracing the meanings back to the basics, and for doing this, it might be good to have a list of concepts and skills and the visual models that represent them. "solving equations of the form" - It's interesting and helpful that we teach equations by grouping them by their form. It's worth asking why these groupings. "the number satisfying the equation" - I'm kind of impatient to get to graphing because I feel like it makes it easier for me to work out these solutions. Visualizations are reassuring and satisfying at least. "Analogous arithmetical and algebraic solutions" - I wonder why parents don't complain that algebra overcomplicates arithmetic. If they did, how would the teacher argue for algebra? == Grade 7 == "two different possible next steps" - I hadn't thought that there would be more than one way to simplify an expression. Reversing the distributive property is new to me. == Grade 8 == "Properties of Integer Exponents" - I'll need to see how these work. "we define 10^0 = 1 because" - Ah, a different explanation from the one I'd seen, which was based on division. Very interesting. And I used to think these questions were mysteries I'd have to dig for the answers to. Of course, maybe some of them still are. "sqrt p is defined to mean" - Why? "Know that sqrt 2 is irrational" - How did we find that out? How do we calculate it? I've seen an algorithm online somewhere. "visual representation of the relationship" - What does graphing do for us exactly? How does a visual representation help? "geometry of similar triangles" - Interesting! I'm looking forward to relating geometry and algebra. "easier for students than reasoning through a numerical solution" - Ah, good, an example of how algebra helps. "Linear equations also arise" - How did we get the idea to graph equations? What other kinds of coordinate systems are there, and how would the same equations look in each? "problems that lead to simultaneous equations" - The theater problem is actually an interesting one. It's a good example of a situation where math would give me a handle on a question that's too complex for me to guess at. I might like simultaneous equations. <disqus/> [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Comments]] [[Category:Complete]] 4e1b63e9b3bcb4fefc9db9c5e4b8110140a3b7b3 0 78 253 196 2016-06-27T06:27:03Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added commenting. wikitext text/x-wiki These are my comments on the Common Core Math Progressions document [http://achievethecore.org/file/1174 Statistics & Probability: Grades 6-8] (PDF). Statistics and probability aren't the most scintillating topics to me, but they're extremely important for most of the non-math subjects that do interest me. == Overview == "random sampling, a probabilistic concept" - I usually think of probability and statistics as two sides of a coin, but I'm sure that isn't their real relationship, since I'm ignorant about them, so it'll be good to learn that. So far I see that statistics depends on probability for random sampling. == Grade 6 == "interquartile range" - This is all more than I remember learning about statistics in school. And even at the time I noticed that they never seemed to teach us probability. It's like they changed the curriculum and our class ended up skipping it. == Grade 7 == "Chance processes and probability models" - Something I've always wondered is how probability works. It seems like magic to me. "structure is known" -> probability; "structure is unknown" -> statistics - What a concise and informative comparison! "'What proportion ...'" - Is this using proportion in the same sense as in the ratio progression? "taking a sample of 50 chips" - I'd probably get tired of this exercise quickly, since it seems tedious and I wouldn't immediately see the point. Asking myself how one would normally do the real task in the real world (e.g., surveying a bunch of people) might help me appreciate the purpose and also the ease of doing a simulation. "Why are sample sizes in public opinion polls" - If this was the point of the exercise, I'd like to have it spelled out at the beginning. I'll look ahead for things like that when I'm going through the curriculum. Keeping the goals in mind helps me pay attention to the right things while I'm working. "some knowledge of the amount of variation to expect" - At this point I got distracted imagining how I would teach people about variation and why they'd need to know it. <disqus/> [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Comments]] [[Category:Complete]] 838392e301b0f8797a2ad60a01efabed0fcd2508 0 79 254 197 2016-06-27T06:27:31Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added commenting. wikitext text/x-wiki These are my comments on the Common Core Math Progressions document [http://achievethecore.org/file/1176 The Number System: Grades 6-8 & Number and Quantity Standards (number part): High School] (PDF). === Overview === "mysterious acceptance that 'of' must mean multiplication" - Yes, I've never quite understood that translation. I suppose this explanation with the commutative property makes sense. The scaling model also seems to make sense of it. === Grade 6 === "measurement interpretation of division" - This makes me think of remainders and fractions as results of division and ask how they're related. What does it mean that 9 / 4 = 4 * 2 + 1 = 2 1/4? The larger point is that there are all kinds of angles on these operations to relate to each other. I may want to try to identify what can be related in case the curriculum doesn't do it all and I want to explore them. It's probably not necessary, but it could help with the flexible thinking needed for problem solving. Noting examples like this one I happen to think of will help me think about what to look for. "8/3 ÷ 2/3 = 4, because 4 is how many" - If you're muddle headed like me, you might be confused about what to do with which parts of this problem, and remembering something about dividing lengths of the number line into smaller parts from some earlier problem, you might try to solve this by dividing each third into thirds and then count off two of them at a time, which would give you 12. If you were on a better track, you might remember that third is a unit here, so you're just dividing 8 by 2. But if you're still a bit muddled, you might not know why one is a more correct approach than the other, so it would help to explore how the grammar of such an equation translates into a procedure. "linguistically different ... mathematically the same" - In this case it's because the answer to "how many" is "a fraction of one," which leads to the second question, "how much of one?" "find a common unit" - If you're working only with the visual model and not applying rules like "multiply the denominators," how would you decide on the common unit? "2/3 of a cup fills 3/4 of the container" - When there are multiple fractions in a situation, it starts to get hard to think about. It would help to have frameworks or guidelines for thinking about such problems, things to notice and ways to relate them. For example, you could make sure to pay attention to the units (cup, container) and what number is "of" another number (the liquid is filling an amount of the container). "The shaded area is 3/4 of the entire strip." - Maybe this will be clear with practice, but at first glance I'm confused by how the diagram relates to the equations. "leads us directly to the invert-and-multiply" - Ah, another procedure I've been wondering about. "denominator equal to a power of 10" - So are the denominators of irrational numbers infinity? What would that mean? I still need to find out how long division works in terms of place value and fractions and such. "prime factorization ... can be time-consuming and distract" - What do you have to say to that, James Milgram? They skip it on purpose. "In some cases 0 has an essential meaning" - Yes, though it seems relatively rare that 0 means what people normally think of, which is nothing, so that negative numbers are somehow less than nothing. It just means some chosen reference point. "line segments acquire direction" - That relates to a conclusion I came to when initially thinking about numbers in this project, that numbers, at least signed ones, are vectors, since they have both magnitude and direction. So even a simple number has some level of complexity. "larger in magnitude" - So there is a sense in which -7 is larger than -5. === Grade 7 === "the number located a distance |q|" - Interesting bringing absolute value into addition. "one-dimensional vector addition" - Aha! "integer chips are not suited" - I think Chapin and Johnson bring up another problem with using chips. "how you get from" - This way of expressing subtraction is very clear to me. "rely increasingly on the properties of operations" - I both welcome and dread this. Welcome because it's moving along the development of mathematical thinking that Tall describes toward abstract reasoning. Dread because I feel like it'll be harder for me to get a sense of what the math means without visual models. "a choice we make" - Are there really no real world situations where it applies? "you want to be able to say that" - What would happen if the distributive property didn't apply to negative numbers? And how would we know it didn't? I think the demonstration of multiplying p and q shows why the distributive property applies. "can extend division" - We are definitely getting into territory that ties my brain in knots, at least until I get more used to these ways of thinking about fractions. Right now my mind automatically applies the rules I learned, but I know I don't really understand what they mean. "an extension of the fraction notation" - Very interesting. This gets to C&J's list of interpretations of fractions. It's like some kind of trick. Somehow we apply a meaning of fractional notation that makes sense for one kind of number to another kind of number, where it still makes sense in one way but is nonsensical in another. I must ponder this when I get back to it in the curriculum. It's interesting that the physical world is limited in the ways it can directly express math, yet somehow we can still use other parts of math to reason about the world. I've read that some of these uses of math are like shortcuts for making real-world calculations, such as the use of imaginary numbers for the time dimension in equations related to the Big Bang. I'm sure math plays other indirect roles. I'll try to explore those as I go. "a sort of address system" - Is this not true for fractions with denominators that aren't powers of ten? Maybe this analogy is just meant to illustrate the progressive refinement of increasing the denominator or something. "1/3 is always sitting one third of the way" - How do we know this? Apparently the answer ("a rigorous treatment of this mysterious infinite expansion") will have to wait till after middle school. === Grade 8 === == High School, Number == === The Real Number System === "rational exponents" - Are there irrational exponents? "good practice for mathematical reasoning habits" - Is there really no practical relevance for irrational numbers? For example, knowing a number is irrational means you expect to be able to calculate it more precisely if needed. Is that too trivial? === Complex Numbers === How did we conclude complex numbers exist, that the square root of -1 has an actual solution? How do we know when some operation doesn't have a solution, such as dividing by zero? <disqus/> [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Comments]] [[Category:Complete]] d3dd0e6297a9e4eb09666a0f18ee61f51ab8e6d6 0 80 255 198 2016-06-27T06:27:56Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added commenting. wikitext text/x-wiki These are my comments on the Common Core Math Progressions document [http://achievethecore.org/file/1180 Functions: Grades 8-High School] (PDF). == Overview == "this document does not treat in detail all of the material studied" - At this point I'm not trying very hard to understand, since I'm sure they're about to get into territory I barely remember and they're not going into much detail. I'll understand it when I get there in the curriculum, and the faster I get through the progressions, the sooner I can start. "reasonable in the context" - It's kind of annoying that you can't figure everything out just by looking at the calculations, but it could be interesting to think about the relationship between the math and its context. And are mathematicians missing something by divorcing math from any context and thinking of it as a symbol manipulation game? "algebraic expressions may not be suitable" - I'm looking forward to learning the other options. == Grade 8 == "a linear function does not have a slope" - Why not? Just because it's not visual in itself? Is the function different from whatever you use to calculate the slope of its graph? "describe the relationships qualitatively" - Yes, it's good to remember that people are still human when they think about math. == High School == === Interpreting Functions === "Although it is common to say" - These kinds of language distinctions are important to me, so I want to come back to this when I get here in the curriculum. Actually I'm thinking of revisiting all the progressions as I go through the curriculum. "the vertical line test is problematic" - I don't know what this is about, but it sounds like the kind of thing I want to know. The discussion distinguishes between a flawed method and a better one, and it tries to get down to the real issue in the mathematical task it's addressing. "The square root function" - I've read that +/- 3 isn't the right solution but not why, so I'm glad they cover this. There's so much useful, in-depth information in the Common Core that I think people who dismiss it are cheating themselves. Unless they don't care to know math, in which case they may still be cheating themselves. "all students are expected to develop fluency" - At this point I do wonder why we make everyone learn so much math. Most people don't ever need these functions after school. How does it benefit them? If they're relevant to the kinds of statistics that inform public policy, that would be a good reason, but otherwise the only reasons I can come up with sound like rationalizations. "looking for and making use of structure" - This seems to be what some people mean when they talk about patterns, rather than simply noting and interpreting ambiguous, surface patterns like sequences. "To avoid this problem" - I'm glad these exercises are on Illustrative Mathematics. It might make me more likely to remember to come back to them when I'm in the curriculum. === Building Functions === "subtleties and pitfalls" - Sounds like fun. :) Until I get into it and feel the strain. "from scratch ... special recipes" - Yes, that's what I'm hoping this time, to learn the principles behind the recipes, so I can make my own math. "Some students might" - I'm glad I figured out early that it's a basic feature of math that operations can be converted into each other. It helped me understand some other reading I was doing today. It's important to look at math from different angles like that one--what math means, how it works, etc. I'm sure there are other angles I haven't learned about yet. My notes are starting to get repetitive, so I'm going to speed through the rest of the progressions. === Linear and Exponential Models === === Trigonometric Functions === I like that mathematicians have so fully studied circles. It's nice to completely understand something, at least the things you consider important about it. I wonder if it's possible to design a good, single diagram that displays all of a circle's important mathematical features. "Prove and apply trigonometric identities" - I'd like to try translating mathematical proofs into some other logical notation, just to clarify how the grammar of math relates to the grammar of logic. They're not the same thing. <disqus/> [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Comments]] [[Category:Complete]] a7a7f1ec57c7ce627641e6fe8539ab7f2ecaef25 0 81 256 199 2016-06-27T06:28:21Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added commenting. wikitext text/x-wiki These are my comments on the Common Core Math Progressions document [http://achievethecore.org/file/1179 Algebra: High School] (PDF). == Overview == "This insight allows for the method" - Occasionally I pause and have to find the point again--why are we learning these things? What's interesting or useful about them? Right now I'm thinking of the set of all math facts as an infinite, dense, undifferentiated field of necessary possibilities. That is, they're concepts that could become instantiated by real events and would then dictate certain features and outcomes of the situation. When we use or study a particular math concept, we're letting it stand out from the field for some reason. Maybe it helps us accomplish certain real-world goals; maybe it's a general concept that leads us to others we care about; maybe it gives us an organized way to think about the larger concepts they're a part of. == Seeing Structure in Expressions == "try possible manipulations mentally" - Keep this in mind as a skill. "simplest form ... [vs] equivalent forms that are suitable" - Important distinction. == Arithmetic with Polynomials and Rational Expressions == "equivalent expressions ... naming some underlying thing" - It would be nice to explore both approaches, (1) identifying the function the equivalent expressions define and (2) using the properties of operations to transform polynomials, treating polynomials as elements of a formal number system. Apparently a particular curriculum will or should use only one of the approaches, I assume to minimize confusion. "Polynomials form a rich ground" - Sounds great. I wonder what features will transform these math terms from vague concepts into familiar ones. Will I imagine a paradigmatic graph? Will I have in mind paradigmatic uses for each kind of formula? All of this reminds me of the progressive, building nature of math. I wonder what ways you could gamify math education. I'm sure people have at least started to do that somewhere. "Binomial Theorem" - Long equations like this look a little terrifying. I wonder if it would help me learn them with less intimidation if I knew how they were (or could be) developed. It looks like that's one of the exercises for learning this theorem ("why this rule follows algebraically from ..."). "construct polynomial functions with specified zeros" - I imagine the thought processes are similar to writing a program to achieve a particular result. "a computer algebra system" - This reminds me of reading [https://mitpress.mit.edu/sicp/ SICP], which so far is almost as much about math as it is about programming. This reminds me that knowing math might make the difference in my programming classes between sitting in a puddle of insecurity and participating energetically. This makes me wonder if I could approach my math education partly by thinking about what I'd like to know comfortably when I have math discussions with other people. What would I like to be able to reason about with them? == Creating Equations == "much more strategic in formulating" - It's like a game. This happens a lot in the games I play. "solution to an equation might involve more" - At what point does math get more complicated than is useful to an average person? I'm sure we've passed that point in these progressions. But how much math does a programmer generally need to know? This makes me think of the GCF discussion in SICP, which is used in later sections of the book. The main mathematical issue in programming is probably deciding on an algorithm. Sometimes you know of several that will achieve a solution. The way math algorithms are presented often makes it sound like mathematicians are only guessing with a shrug about good or best ways to calculate a formula. Well, how did we come up with the formulas in the first place, and does that give us any clues about good/best algorithms? It's kind of disturbing that algorithms don't seem as perfect or logically necessary as math generally is. == Reasoning with Equations and Inequalities == <disqus/> [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Comments]] [[Category:Complete]] 24163b5926dc8628339c0e798ac018ac1a3a37e1 0 82 257 200 2016-06-27T06:28:49Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added commenting. wikitext text/x-wiki These are my comments on the Common Core Math Progressions document [http://achievethecore.org/file/1178 Statistics & Probability: High School] (PDF). == Overview == "Probability is presented as an essential tool" - Right up my alley. And I'm so glad I'm studying this now, because I somehow missed it in school. I did take a statistics course in college though. It was for psychology majors. It was also at 8 in the morning. == Interpreting categorical and quantitative data == "decide on the median or mean" - I've always wondered this. I probably learned it in college and forgot. "accounting for possible effects of extreme data points" - I always wonder what to do with these. It sounds like there are ways of dealing with them that are more disciplined than the hand wringing I do. Honestly I feel like I'm guessing half the time I try to do anything meaningful with statistics. "Perhaps a better (and simpler) model" - Fitting lines to data is a good example of the importance of learning about functions. "always the possibility of a closer fit" - Does statistical software run through possibilities at least semi-automatically? It should. == Making inferences and justifying conclusions == "repeatedly drawing random samples of size 50" - Very interesting! I wonder if this technique has a name. I imagine there's a way to calculate the findings without actually drawing the samples. "no extreme data points" - Is there a mathematical way to determine if a data point is extreme, if you can't quite tell by looking? "re-randomizing" - Another interesting technique. == Conditional probability and the rules of probability == == Using probability to make decisions == == Where the Statistics and Probability Progression might lead == This is good info for students. I think probability and statistics is one of the most useful areas of math for the general population. So much human knowledge is statistical. <disqus/> [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Comments]] [[Category:Complete]] 9cff08ef5738b79cb74b109205629d24923f9d1e 0 83 258 201 2016-06-27T06:29:14Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added commenting. wikitext text/x-wiki These are my comments on the Common Core Math Progressions document [http://achievethecore.org/file/1181 Modeling: High School] (PDF). == Introduction == == Modeling in K-12 == == The Modeling Process == "Complex models are often built hierarchically" - I've wondered. I thought the designers of those were just geniuses. "nominal dollars ... [vs] constant dollars" - You really do have to understand the context to choose the right model. I don't understand these money concepts, and I'm sure I'd get the model wrong. == Modeling in High School == === The Modeling Cycle === "Judgment, approximation, and critical thinking" - This will be a leap in difficulty, so it's important to prepare students for it and guide them through it. I think modeling will help some of them understand that math is useful. Some will still wonder why *they* have to learn math, since they won't be using it for any of these situations. They're content to let experts do the math for them. === Units and Modeling === === Modeling and the Standards for Mathematical Practice === "mathematics and statistics" - I wonder why people separate these. "a capstone experience" - That's my impression. This progression hasn't taught anything new mathematically, just tied together what was taught in the other areas. "looking for entry points" - Yes, this is how I was thinking of the process. "reason inductively about data" - This is all the kind of reasoning people have to do in general, not just about math. It's probably worth mentioning this to students. Mathematical modeling is good practice, though I can see some students protesting that they could practice on the non-mathematical problems they actually care about. Math provides some rigor, though, that keeps a learner from fudging. But it's worth thinking through the parallels between mathematical modeling and reasoning in other contexts. "educed from some context" - I thought this was a typo. I learned a new word. "technology can enable" - I'm glad the standards don't ignore technology and insist that students do all the math with the power of their minds. Technology exists, and students will use it both as students and in their careers. Plus mathematicians use it. "the issue of uncertainty" - I'm glad the standards list all these aspects of modeling. It's a complex enough activity that a list will help me feel less overwhelmed. === Modeling and Reasonableness of Answers === "Stat-Spotting" - Sounds like a helpful book. === Statistics and Probability === == Developing High School Modeling == "situations that can become more complex" - You know, the Standards might move more slowly in the upper grades and not cover as many concepts as our curriculum did, but modeling sure sounds demanding, and I don't think we did much of it. === Linear and Exponential Models === "a distance d in t hours" - This reminds me that I'd like to learn physics alongside math, partly as a source of math applications to help me think about how math relates to the world. I don't know if I'll want to take the time for all that though. I might put physics off till later. "comparing quantities and making decisions" - Good point, and it's hard to argue with the fuel-efficient car example. People probably aren't going to bring their car buying decision to their local math expert. Or they should feel bad if they do, if they really could figure it out themselves. "horizontal intercept ... is the break-even point" - It's interesting to see this everyday example being expressed in mathematical terms and to know they're relevant to the problem. Being technical has a point. I wonder if students would be more interested in math if more of the examples came from everyday parts of their lives like video games. You could model Pokemon and learn interesting things about it that could help your gameplay. "question the assumptions" - Math gives you a more disciplined way to do this. Many of the assumptions have to be articulated as parts of the equations, so they're easier to notice and vary later. "learn to question why" - This is a good discussion of the example. It would be good to observe what kinds of questions come up in these discussions. What does math make it easier to ask? === Counting, Probability, Odds and Modeling === "reconcile accounts of probability" - Very interesting and important. Another set of examples it's hard to argue with. "everyday language and feelings" - Also interesting and important. "the birthday problem provides rich learning experiences" - Indeed! They get a lot of mileage of it. === Key Features to Model === === Formulas as Models === "Formulas are mathematical models" - I've been using formulas as a general term for expressions, equations, and whatever else, so I'll need to pick a different term. "mulch" - Another good example. You can't always just look mathematical things up or plug them into an app, although you might in this case. But sometimes you have to solve things dynamically, in uncommon situations that arise as life happens and aren't anticipated by software developers. Or instead of searching for an app, you could solve it yourself and feel more in control of the situation. I think those subjective benefits should be emphasized. There's a sense of satisfaction and power in doing math. It might also help to present examples humorously in terms of regret--"if only he had paid more attention in math class." "used in forensic science" - Interesting. An application of an application of math. == Where the Modeling Progression might lead == "extend simpler models" - Is this circular motion example supposed to be one that can be understood simply at first and then be examined more in depth as new concepts are introduced? <disqus/> [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Comments]] [[Category:Complete]] 69c477e452695e9c51f667dd466621023a9c163e 0 84 259 202 2016-06-27T06:29:41Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added commenting. wikitext text/x-wiki Comments on the [http://www.corestandards.org/Math/Practice/ Common Core Standards for Mathematical Practice]. After having read the Progressions, I'm reading these because they're starting to sound important. When I first read the K-8 standards, it was just to get ideas for creating my own curriculum, and I didn't think I needed the MP standards for that. I want to break these descriptions out into lists so the pieces are easier to work with for various purposes. Side note: I really like the font in the CC standards. I might try to match it for my personal font, if Google or whoever has something close. == Make sense of problems and persevere in solving them. == "explain correspondences between" - This reminds me of just how many math concepts there are to learn. It's a little intimidating. At the same time I suspect there are fewer than it seems because so many words are used to describe them. This reminds me that the CC standards are stated in terms of tasks, and the concepts are buried in the tasks. Furthermore, some of the concepts are split across tasks, probably mainly in the lower grades (e.g., working within certain number ranges in certain grades). I'll need to separate out the concepts and combine them when it makes sense. Separating things out would involve attending to the different levels and modes of concepts, especially whether something is a procedure or a reason for a procedure. I've often thought during my math reading that if you want puzzles to solve, you don't have to go any farther than your math textbooks, assuming the exercises are well written. == Reason abstractly and quantitatively. == Ah, all that talk of context relates to this standard, and it's only half the picture. I hadn't connected abstraction (decontextualization) and contextualization. "Quantitative reasoning entails" - I suspect once I get more familiar with math, I'll be able to introspect about the quantitative aspects of a situation like I do about its personal aspects. == Construct viable arguments and critique the reasoning of others. == == Model with mathematics. == == Use appropriate tools strategically. == == Attend to precision. == == Look for and make use of structure. == "drawing an auxiliary line" - So hopefully learning more geometry will give me clues for solving the world's hardest easy geometry problem. "step back for an overview and shift perspective" - I do this for non-mathematical situations a lot. It's nice to see this technique applies to math too. "single objects or as being composed" - Tall's procepts. == Look for and express regularity in repeated reasoning. == Isn't a generalization from specific data a conjecture, and doesn't it have to be proven afterward? I'm looking forward to learning how this happens. <disqus/> [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Comments]] [[Category:Complete]] b18033924c10d86f377d7988f816ba0b7f2a9ce0 0 58 260 176 2016-06-27T06:30:07Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added commenting. wikitext text/x-wiki I'm using pre-algebra to refer to elementary and maybe middle school math, but I've learned that those years cover not only algebra-related topics but also basic geometry, measurement, and statistics. I'm finding that these areas are interrelated, so I'm going to take a cue from elementary school curricula and cycle through them to make it easier to build the concepts on each other. As I analyze the concepts of pre-algebra and decide how to order them, I have the sense I'm on a journey. My destination is the general math of everyday life and the more formal treatment of these areas covered in the upper grades, and I'm mapping a course through the terrains of the various areas to get there. Several questions guide my route, directing my attention and reflection: What are numbers? How can we represent them in useful ways? What can we use them for? How can we work with them to achieve these purposes? How do we find the numbers we need in a situation? <disqus/> [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Complete]] 996067011c48f702dcce1dada364a0af405ec1ca 0 88 261 223 2016-06-27T06:31:39Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added commenting. wikitext text/x-wiki These are my comments on EngageNY's [https://www.engageny.org/resource/prekindergarten-mathematics-module-1 Prekindergarten Module 1]. I'm expecting to go through pre-K in a hurry, but I'll take some time to think through things more carefully at the beginning to make sure I don't neglect lines of thought I'd regret missing. == Overview == To help me wrap my mind around all the prose, I'll list the central points I gather from the material for each module, mainly from the module overview. I'll also list concepts from recent modules that are being applied in the current one. These lists will help me get a sense for the progression of concepts in the curriculum. In fact, to save time, for some modules the lists might be the extent of my comments, since grasping the progression is one of my few major goals. The standards mainly give skills and sometimes include concepts to understand, but in these lists I want to focus on the concepts. I don't want to take the time to make the statements rigidly formal at this point, but they'll be a bit more formal than descriptions in the curriculum. I'll call these statements propositional concepts to contrast them with nominal concepts, would would be nouns, such as attribute or counting. You'd find nominal concepts in a concept map or ontology. Speaking of ontologies, I've found a few for math I want to examine. New propositional concepts from this module: * Objects have attributes. * Objects can be compared according to the values of their attributes. * Objects can be matched by their attributes. * Objects can match at different degrees of similarity: exactly the same or the same in some attributes but different in others. * Objects can be grouped together based on their matching attributes. * The quantity of items in a group can be identified by a number. * The quantity of items in a group can be discovered by counting. * Number conservation: The quantity of items in a group remains the same when their spatial arrangement changes. * Two groups can have the same quantity of items even if they contain different types of items. * Rote counting: In the standard sequence for counting, each number is one greater than the previous number and one less than the following number. * One-to-one-correspondence: In counting a collection, each object is paired with one number using the standard sequence. * Cardinality: In counting a collection, the last number paired indicates the quantity in the collection. * Decomposition: Numbers have smaller numbers embedded in them. * Successively removing one from a collection is equivalent to a series of quantities that move backwards through the counting sequence. The topics in the number core (rote counting, one-to-one correspondence, etc.) match the kinds of issues raised for this age group in my other sources (Chapin and Johnson, etc.). It's interesting that even though counting is the first major goal, the learning actually begins with pattern recognition in terms of comparing and grouping objects by their attributes. This does seem like a fundamental skill. Recognizing attributes prepares students for counting, measurement, and geometry. I believe the immediate point for these lessons is that matching allows you to recognize a collection of objects to be counted. It's also interesting that the curriculum doesn't follow the standards in order. It starts with #2 in Measurement and Data. But that's a feature of CC. It gives a paradigm for teaching math and a set of benchmarks for measuring student progress, but it otherwise leaves the details of implementation up to the teachers. Learning to count on your fingers using a piano template is the best part of the whole curriculum. Next they need to develop CC standards for music that require everyone to learn the instrument. Okay, joking, half. Of course, the other reason it's important is that it gets students ready for the number line, which just shows how carefully these curriculum developers have thought through everything, which is one reason I love the CC. Topics E and F are already preparing the kids for arithmetic. The "1 more" pattern reminds me to include my earlier thoughts on counting somewhere, such as "the pattern embedded in the counting sequence," as they put it. The CC standards start with Kindergarten, so the PK ones came from somewhere else. It would be nice to have a plaintext list of the PK standards, and all the rest, so I or someone could use them more flexibly, say in CSV format. I imagine that exists somewhere. Okay, after searching, I found [http://schools.nyc.gov/NR/rdonlyres/C0971909-165F-46F5-B209-F3425A90C5E8/0/p_12_common_core_learning_standards_mathematics_final.pdf this] (PDF), [https://www.ixl.com/standards/new-york/math/pre-k this], and [http://www.p12.nysed.gov/earlylearning/standards/documents/PrekindergartentoKindergartenStandardsAlignmentMath.pdf this] (PDF). == Topic A: Matching Objects == It would be nice to analyze the standards by the concepts they contain and the relationships between those concepts as well as the kinds of tasks. It might help to translate the standards into some kind of formal language, such as a programming language. It's tempting to copy these coherence links into a spreadsheet for diagramming purposes. I'm curious if their links are different from Jason Zimba's. What does it mean for an object to have an attribute? What does it mean that multiple different attributes exist and than an object can have more than one? === Lesson 1: Match 2 objects that are exactly the same === ==== Fluency Practice ==== This would take way too much time if I did it for every lesson, but if I were going to analyze the fluency practice, it would go something like this: This exercise illustrates the abstractness of numbers by associating them with multiple objects (fingers, claps, people). The connections are somewhat implicit. The teacher doesn't say, "We're counting fingers." The students are supposed to intuit that holding up a finger means it's being associated with the number. ==== Concept Development ==== I like CC's emphasis on vocabulary. I always try to nail down terms and use them somewhat consistently. It helps keep communication clear, and it contributes to a feeling that I'm doing things right. If I comment much on the PK lessons, it'll probably be on combinations of lessons, since each one covers so little ground. For example, I'd group the grouping lessons and discuss their connections and distinctions. Why would I pay any attention to the math concepts and skills preschoolers have to learn? Even though adults don't normally have to think consciously about them, sometimes unusual situations come up that require some conscious consideration about these basic concepts and skills. For example, let's say you're counting drops of water for some reason, and some of them combine while you're counting. You suddenly have to think a bit about conservation: The amount of water is the same, but the number of drops has changed. What are you going to consider a drop? How will you know you've counted every drop only once? These kinds of basic issues especially come up in programming, because you're having to think about unconscious, intuitive thought processes and spell them out in detailed, logical, repeatable steps so the computer can reliably reproduce them. This is certainly true in the field of AI. For example, if a program is counting moving objects, how will it keep track of each one to make sure it gets counted but only once? But I'm not creating computer algorithms for all these procedures right now, so for this project I'm only making a note of the issues that occur to me as I'm reading. Matching is easy to think about. When I was reading the Progressions, I found that I didn't get out of elementary school before starting to strain my brain, at least with mental math involving word problems. It'd be good to pay attention to the point at which math becomes an unnatural way of thinking for me. General questions I would ask for each lesson if I were analyzing everything: * What is the meaning or nature of the task of the lesson or topic? For matching I'd talk about things like the nature of objects having the same attribute and the workings of human perception and categorization. * What is involved in the objective possibility of the task? What's involved in the human activity? In this case, what is it about objects that allows them to be grouped? What capabilities and actions do humans need in order to do the grouping? * How does this lesson relate to the lessons it prepares for? * Why are mathematicians interested in this concept, and why do we select it for teaching? This is a question that came up a few times during the Progressions, and it reminds me I want to reread my Progressions notes and list my other recurring questions. Analyzing things to death is fun, but for this project the important question is, what am I looking for from the lessons in this curriculum that would help me achieve my goals? My tentative answer is that I want to know all the math concepts and skills I need, and I want mental aids for understanding them deeply enough to apply them to problems flexibly. An added bonus would be to contribute to people's thinking about math as a result of my ruminations while learning. So generally I'm listing concepts, skills, and mental aids. Even if I don't analyze them now, the lists will make it easier to think about them later. ==== Student Debrief ==== Math misconceptions help me think about the concepts. I run across discussions of them here and there, some of them more organized and complete than others. I'll probably link to some of the better ones somewhere in this project at some point, probably on the intro page. It's too bad they don't talk about specific mistakes (so far) in the curriculum, since they have the teachers listen for them to correct them. === Lesson 2: Match 2 objects that are the same, but… === === Lesson 3: Match 2 objects that are the same, but… === Lesson 3 is the same as Lesson 2 but uses different words. === Lesson 4: Match 2 objects that are used together. === Interesting. This Lesson expands the idea of association beyond visual attributes. == Topic D: Matching 1 Numeral with up to 3 Objects == At about this point I settled on a rhythm for reading these early-grade lessons. I'm reading the module and topic overviews, the note paragraphs from the lessons, and the questions in the student debriefs. I'm also skimming the assessments. == End-of-Module Assessment == It's interesting that even at this point in the curriculum the students are solving for unknowns, though the material doesn't call it that. That's one reason I'm reading the student debriefs. The questions there approach the lesson's concepts from different angles to make sure the students can think flexibly about them. For example, you could state the idea of the Topic A, Lesson 1 as "(1) Objects A and B (2) are (3) exactly the same (4) if they are the same shape, size, and color." The student debrief asks the students to solve for each part of that statement as an unknown: (1) specific objects that match ("Do you see any things in our classroom that match?"), (2) whether two objects match ("Are these 2 students exactly the same?"), (3) the vocabulary of matching ("These counters are _________."), and (4) the conditions for matching ("How did you choose things that were exactly the same?"). Since matching and counting are things I already know how to do, there isn't much to learn, so it's hard not to see this material as a big wall of text. It's helpful to have a framework to fit the content into so it means something to me. There's something of a framework in the Module 1 overview (the number core: rote counting, one-to-one correspondence, cardinality, and written numerals), but it's a little clearer in the Counting and Cardinality Progression, and it's even clearer in Hatfield et al, or at least spelled out in more detail. Counting is a surprisingly complicated activity. You have to know the sequence of counting numbers and the pattern that each number is one more than the previous one. You have to match each number with each object you're counting without missing or double-counting any objects, and you have to know that the last number you say is the quantity of objects in the collection. Then if you're going to write the number down, you have to know the numeral that corresponds to that number name. And if it's over 9, you have to know the base 10 system. Kids aren't born knowing any of this, and it takes lots of careful instruction and practice to learn. <disqus/> [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Comments]] [[Category:Complete]] 8f64f0a61d48d3715ca4f865f1d9c158b850d078 0 90 262 217 2016-06-27T06:32:03Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added commenting. wikitext text/x-wiki These are my comments on EngageNY's [https://www.engageny.org/resource/prekindergarten-mathematics-module-2 Prekindergarten Module 2]. == Overview == New propositional concepts from this module: * Objects have shape as one of their attributes. * Shapes consist of their outlines and not their interiors. * Shapes have attributes, such as their number of sides and corners. * Shapes can be classified and named by their numbers of sides and corners and by the straightness or roundness of their lines. * Objects have positions in relation to each other that can be described using terms such as above, behind, below, and between. * Three-dimensional shapes have two-dimensional faces of particular shapes. * Three-dimensional objects have functional properties particular to their shapes, such as the ability to stack, roll, or slide. * When a quantity is separated into groups, each group is smaller than the original quantity. * Real-world objects have shapes that can be identified with mathematical shapes. * Objects in the real world can be modeled by simpler objects that represent them. I might not include term definitions in these lists of propositional concepts, since they're defined in the curriculum material. Connections to earlier concepts: * Shapes can be matched and sorted into groups by their attributes. * Certain attributes of a shape can be counted, such as its sides and corners. * Shapes in a group can be counted. Before deciding on Common Core to learn math, my approach to geometry was going to be somewhat different. I was going to start with measurement, which would include counting, and I would've used measurement to introduce the concept of length, which would introduce the notion of continuous quantities. Counting would introduce the idea of discrete quantities. After measurement I'd have covered geometry and introduced the idea of a shape by describing an angle as a line with a discrete change in direction and a curve as a line with a continuous change in direction. Then I'd have described common shapes, and that's as far as I got. Common Core takes a more holistic approach and starts with the knowledge students already have, guiding them to analyze that knowledge so they begin learning the formal properties of familiar shapes. "the whole triangle consists only of its outline" - I've wondered that. This curriculum is achieving my purpose for it, filling in gaps in my knowledge. == Topic A: Two-Dimensional Shapes == === Lesson 1: Find and describe circles, rectangles, squares, and triangles using informal language without naming === We learned how to sort and count everyday objects in Module 1. Now we're sorting mathematical objects--shapes--and doing it by counting their features--their sides and corners. I notice the teacher does the sorting at first, which ends up prioritizing the number of sides and corners as a criterion. Is there any mathematical reason to sort shapes by some other attribute? == Topic B: Constructing Two-Dimensional Shapes == === Lesson 7: Construct a rectangle and a square === "Which balls are bigger, when we made two balls or when we made four balls?" - Ah, slipping in a little 2.MD.2. Smaller units means more units in the measurement. == Topic C: Three-Dimensional Shapes == Whoa, 3D shapes already in preschool, slow down! Okay, not really. But a third dimension does add potentially a lot of complexity. For example, consider 3D ambigrams. There's one on the cover of the book ''Gödel, Escher, Bach''. Each block is shaped so that it looks like a different letter from the angle of each axis, as shown by the shadows on the walls and floor. It takes some time for me to picture the shape of a block in my mind so that it forms each specific shadow from each angle. Fortunately, we're only working with familiar shapes in preschool, so the students won't have to construct brand new shapes in their minds. In my pre-Common Core contemplations, I hadn't thought about how to approach 3D shapes, so this is new to me. Somehow their very physical, experimental approach to it is striking to me, even though they've been taking that approach for everything else. The kids learn about the shapes by using them and watching the results, especially by noticing their behavior while building with them, observing their fitness for different building purposes (e.g., flat faces are good for stacking; pointed ones aren't). The stamp activity is another good one, helping the kids isolate the shapes' features by observing their "footprints." === Lesson 11: Identify, analyze, sort, compare, and build with solid shapes === The curriculum takes the physical behavior of shapes seriously enough to devote a lesson to it, as if it were a class in engineering, though transformations analogous to rolling and sliding are part of geometry. === Lesson 12: Position solid shapes to create a model of a familiar place === This modeling exercise fits into K.G.5, so I don't know why the authors didn't list a corresponding pre-K standard. <disqus/> [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Comments]] [[Category:Complete]] 1b9e036e1f43015822f0f6c879647c2cd7b30cec 0 91 263 218 2016-06-27T06:32:36Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added commenting. wikitext text/x-wiki These are my comments on EngageNY's [https://www.engageny.org/resource/prekindergarten-mathematics-module-3 Prekindergarten Module 3]. == Overview == This module is mostly an application of Module 1 to a wider range of numbers, so there aren't many new concepts. New propositional concepts from this module: * The concept of "none" is symbolized by the numeral 0. Connections to earlier concepts: * In the standard sequence for counting, each number is one greater than the previous number and one less than the following number. Numbers have smaller numbers embedded in them. So any counting number can be decomposed into two parts. It's helpful to view a counting number as a combination of the previous number in the counting sequence and 1 more. It's helpful to view a counting number between 5 and 10 as 5 and a certain number more. People can subitize (recognize without counting) quantities of 2 or 3. I think this is why the curriculum emphasizes the relationship of other numbers to 5: 5 is both a factor of 10, which is the central number in our place-value system, and a combination of two numbers we can subitize. But the students also learn how to decompose numbers into other pairs that don't involve 5, such as in the Concept Development of Lesson 26, where they identify all the number pairs that make up 9, including 9 and 0. It would be good to experiment with ways of quickly counting larger groups of objects when they're in convenient arrangements. This module does some of this. Ten-frames are one example. They'll show up in Kindergarten. The dot arrangements on dice are another, though that only goes up to 6, unless you combine dice, which takes you up to at least 12. Then there are ingredient arrangements on crafting tables in ''Minecraft'', which take you to 9. You could also use the corners of geometric figures. I don't know how high you could comfortably take that. I'd probably recognize up to 9 because of the Enneagram, though looking at Lesson 27, I see it's harder without the interior lines. With more complicated shapes like the pentagram (for 10), which let you visually group the items, you could go higher. === Topic A: ''How Many'' Questions with up to 7 Objects === ==== Overview ==== Lesson 5 introduces the array visual model, which "is an arrangement of a set of objects organized into equal groups in rows and columns. Arrays help make counting easy. Counting by equal groups is more efficient than counting objects one by one." {''How to Implement'' 28} I want to keep track of models like this, since I'm paying attention to mental aids for doing math, but I don't know how exactly I want to record them. I could put them in the propositional concepts lists, but I'm not sure they belong there. Plus they're already defined in the material, though there's a benefit in restating the definition in the context in which the model's used. <disqus/> [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Comments]] [[Category:Complete]] 23a3c09680aa94d35e4578e256c4ff4482b6afb0 0 92 264 219 2016-06-27T06:33:03Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added commenting. wikitext text/x-wiki These are my comments on EngageNY's [https://www.engageny.org/resource/prekindergarten-mathematics-module-4 Prekindergarten Module 4]. == Overview == New propositional concepts from this module: * Objects have attributes that are measurable, such as length, weight, and capacity. * Objects can be compared to each other on the basis of a measurable attribute using certain terms related to that attribute. * When comparing lengths, one endpoint of each object must be aligned with the other. * A balance scale can be used to compare weights. * With respect to an attribute, one object can be more than, less than, or about the same as another object. * Events such as counting happen in a sequence in time, which gives them an order. * The first event, which starts the sequence, and the last event, which ends the sequence, can be especially important, such as when keeping track of which objects in a group have been counted. * The order of objects can also refer to their spatial arrangement, such as when they're in a line and facing a particular direction. * The same object can occupy different positions in different counting sequences. * The quantity of objects in a group remains the same even if the order in which they're counted changes. * Objects in two groups can be matched to determine if one group contains more objects than the other, which can be specified with the phrases "fewer than," "more than," and "the same as." * Numbers can be compared even when they don't refer to quantities of objects, and in this case the terms are "less than" and "greater than." * In certain cases, a group has enough objects if it has at least as many (exactly enough or enough with extras) as another group whose objects need to be matched with those of the first group. * If a group doesn't have enough objects, it can have enough if more objects are brought into it. I'm going to skip the connections with earlier concepts for now. == Topic A: Comparison of Length == === Lesson 3: Compare length using ''longer than'', ''shorter than'', and ''about the same as'' with a stick of linking cubes === I don't know if I should keep track of techniques like the "Say Ten Way," where the teen numbers are stated by saying "ten" and the number added to ten (ten 1, ten 2, etc.). <disqus/> [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Comments]] [[Category:Complete]] 9454d036dd8e3241af8b42f324e1dd09aa471636 0 93 265 220 2016-06-27T06:33:29Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added commenting. wikitext text/x-wiki These are my comments on EngageNY's [https://www.engageny.org/resource/prekindergarten-mathematics-module-5 Prekindergarten Module 5]. == Overview == New propositional concepts from this module: * Addition situations include (1) adding to an existing set ("add to with result unknown") and (2) composing a whole out of parts ("put together with total unknown"). * Subtraction situations include removing things from an existing set ("take from with result unknown"). * Story problems can be represented visually on a spectrum from concrete (acting out, manipulating objects, representational drawing) to abstract (fingers, cubes, abstract drawings). * Story problems should be decontextualized to work out the problem (representing the problem abstractly) and then recontextualized when giving the answer (stating the answer in terms of its units and their situation). * Addition and subtraction situations can be expressed as number sentences, such as "3 plus 1 equals 4." * One type of structure in math is a pattern. * Two types of patterns are repeating and growth patterns. * Growth patterns can be based on different numbers, such as growing a quantity by 1 or by 2. I'd like to explore the concepts of addition and subtraction further, but I might wait on it, since this module doesn't go into it in much depth. I don't think it even presents subtraction as the opposite of addition. I've read warnings against having students decode word problems rotely by matching operations to English phrases, which, yes, would be a problem if the students didn't learn to understand what the word problems mean. But I don't think my source gave an alternative method, so I wonder how they'd recommend recognizing and analyzing an addition story and how they'd have students distinguish it from, for example, a multiplication story. In any case, at the pre-K level EngageNY gives the students phrases to recognize. These kinds of language issues are important, but I don't know if they belong in the propositional concept lists. == Topic B: Contextualizing Addition Stories to Solve == === Lesson 6: Act out ''add to with result unknown'' story problems to solve === I expected to see some strategy for adding, such as counting on, but the lesson seems to expect the children to just know the answer or else to find their own strategies. The fluency exercises haven't been practicing addition facts, just counting. == Topic F: Duplicating and Extending Patterns == === Overview === New vocab word: repetend, the repeating part of a pattern. I thought it was a typo at first. I like finding out technical terms like this one. <disqus/> [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Comments]] [[Category:Complete]] 654226d77c7fdba7df6a0e4a378ad139e2ded54b 0 94 266 237 2016-06-27T06:33:57Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added commenting. wikitext text/x-wiki These are my comments on EngageNY's [https://www.engageny.org/resource/kindergarten-mathematics Kindergarten modules]. == General == Kindergarten is largely the same as pre-K, just moving a bit faster. This is because New York's pre-K standards are practically the same as the K standards. This actually makes it harder for me to work with in a short time frame because I don't want to replicate my efforts with pre-K, but I don't want to take too much time to sort out what's unique about Kindergarten. These comments will mostly document my false starts and other ideas I had but postponed. At this point I'd like to note that the lesson objectives of this curriculum basically form a second set of standards. I might be even more interested in these than in the Common Core standards because, since they're meant for actual teaching, they're more granular, and they're specifically ordered to unfold the concepts logically. But the lesson objectives aren't enough by themselves to give me the sense that I'm grasping everything. I want something I can read that will make me feel like every statement flows logically into the next. For that I need concepts and not just lists of tasks. When I think about formalizing math concepts, these concept types seem important: objects, properties (of objects), relationships (among objects; relationships include things like equations), tasks (specific results to achieve using relationships), algorithms (procedures for carrying out tasks), capabilities (types of situations that particular relationships and tasks can address), applications (specific real-world situations to be solved with math). These form components of a system for doing math. I think I'm enough of a visual learner that diagrams really would help me grasp this stuff. Right now the curriculum material feels like a wall of text. I'm thinking of extracting the relevant graphics from the lesson files and putting them in a new document listing the concepts. I also think it would help me remember the concepts and piece them together if I had a name for each one. That would take a lot of work on top of all the work of discerning and spelling out the concepts, but it might be worthwhile. Taking notes that simply copy from the source material feels like a waste of time, but it's helpful to have a streamlined set of information to examine and review, so maybe it is worth the time. New propositional concepts from Module 1: * A collection of objects can have attributes that allow it to be grouped with other collections, such as the quantity of objects they contain. I'll dispense with the new propositional concepts for the rest of Kindergarten for now. It takes a little too much time to separate the new ones from the ones covered in pre-K. I might come back to it later. One characteristic of this curriculum that makes the pre-K/K comparison harder is the ways the lesson objectives are worded and the tasks and concepts woven together as the lessons progress. To be honest it looks more like a tangle to me. I thought a more worthwhile use of my limited time on the material would be to tease the threads apart somewhat and separate them into more distinct strands, but that also ended up being too much work. Each lesson objective has this general structure, possibly with some elements left out: Perform action A on object B within parameters C for purpose D. Several actions can be chained or simply collected within one lesson. If I had lots more time, I might come up with a normalized version of these objectives that followed a small set of grammatical patterns and used a more controlled vocabulary. It would make the objectives and their progression a little easier to think about, but really it's overkill for what I need. I did make a list of verbs, nouns, and modifiers the objectives used to see what basic tasks and objects the grade covered, and then I started writing a simplified set of tasks for it, but then I realized I was basically reproducing the Common Core standards, so I scrapped that idea. Instead I'll just review the standards. I'll also review the sections of the Progressions that cover Kindergarten, and I'll do that for each later grade as I get to it. They seem to discuss most of the conceptual material I want to explore. == Exercises == I'm comfortable with most of the Kindergarten tasks, of course, but there are a few I'd like to spend some time on. === Object counting === I'd like to get better at counting objects quickly in my head. I've experimented with a couple of approaches. ==== Graph paper dot configurations ==== [[File:Dot-configurations.jpg|200px|thumb|right|Drawings of dot configurations for subitizing]] The first was to begin drawing configurations of dots on graph paper. The idea was to learn to recognize the configurations when I saw them within scattered configurations so the objects would be easier to group. Then counting becomes a matter of adding the quantities in the groups. In my drawings I started with 1 dot and increased by one each set, following a couple of rules for each configuration: # Each dot is adjacent to another dot, either orthogonally or diagonally. # 90-degree rotations of a configuration are not allowed, though one 45-degree rotation is allowed. I've uploaded the (haphazard, possibly inconsistent) results, which you can download using the thumbnail on this page. I got through pretty much all the 4-dot configurations and a little way into 5 dots. I thought about writing a program to generate the configurations, but I didn't want to spend that much time on them. It became obvious that there were far too many configurations to memorize, but it was interesting to observe patterns among them. For example, I found I could create configurations in an orderly manner by starting with a line of dots and then moving each end one space at a time. You can see that in the 5-dot set. I also noticed that part of seeing a configuration was mentally associating its parts in particular relationships or seeing the dots as having specific roles, which I think amounts to the same thing. This means I can think of certain 4-dot configurations in relation to similar 5-dot configurations, which might help me with my persistent confusion between 4- and 5-object groups. So if there are 3 dots in a line and 1 below the middle dot (configuration 24 on my page of drawings), I could certainly think of that as 3 + 1 or as a squished box (configuration 27), which directly give me a count of 4; but if one of those conceptualizations doesn't occur to me, I can notice that there aren't 2 dots in the bottom row, which I'm used to associating with 5 (configuration 43). Or I can think of it as the X pattern of 5 on a die (configuration 33) with one of the corner dots missing. ==== Dice on paper ==== [[File:Dice-counting.jpg|200px|thumb|right|An example dice throw for rapid counting practice]] Since there were too many configurations to memorize, not even counting the ones that didn't fit nicely on a small grid, I decided to create scattered configurations by dropping actual objects and to observe patterns in counting that emerged as I practiced. I decided on dice, since I have enough of them for groups of at least 10. I placed a letter-size sheet of paper on my surface and determined which dice to count by including only the ones that landed fully on the paper (see the example image). What I noticed about counting these truly scattered configurations is that groups of 3 were good to look for. Sometimes I'd notice 4, 5, or 2, but 3 gives me a good basis for noticing larger groups, up to at least 6 (easy because it's two groups of 3). === Addition and subtraction === My mind gets a little stuck on certain arithmetic facts, and it takes me a second to remember them, which is irritating when I'm doing mental math. I think I just need practice. So based on the addition and subtraction situations in [http://achievethecore.org/file/1172 Counting & Cardinality and Operations & Algebraic Thinking: Grades K-5] (PDF), I made a tab-separated file to import into the flashcard app I use on my phone, [http://orangeorapple.com/Flashcards/ Flashcards Deluxe]. You can download the file [[Media:Number_Decompositions_6-19.txt|here]]. The general range of numbers I'm decomposing in these equations is 1-20, since that's the focus in Kindergarten and it's the basis for all other addition--you're either working within 10 or across at least one 10 grouping. But I limited my actual range of totals to 6-19 because I don't think I have trouble decomposing 1-5 or 20. I've only barely started studying them, but one thing I've noticed is that for some reason I have trouble when the unknown is 11. === Tangrams === I didn't see much in Kindergarten geometry I needed to practice, but I thought it'd be interesting to explore shape compositions, so I bought a used [https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/983/tangoes Tangoes] set to solve [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tangram tangram] puzzles. EngageNY suggests using tangrams to challenge above-grade-level students (Module 6, Lesson 7), so I feel pretty special. <disqus/> [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Comments]] [[Category:Developing]] fc2d246363d2ba44f45b73a3364b9760006d7cdb 0 54 267 229 2016-07-04T04:44:21Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added EngageNY Grade 1. wikitext text/x-wiki == [[/Introduction/]] == == Preliminaries == * [[/Fundamentals/]] * [[/Number Sense/]] == [[/Progressions/|Common Core Math Progressions]] == * [[/Progressions/Preface/]] * [[/Progressions/K-5 Counting and Cardinality, Operations and Algebraic Thinking/]] * [[/Progressions/K-5 Number and Operations in Base Ten/]] * [[/Progressions/K-5 Data/]] * [[/Progressions/K-5 Measurement/]] * [[/Progressions/K-6 Geometry/]] * [[/Progressions/3-5 Fractions/]] * [[/Progressions/6-7 Ratios and Proportional Relationships/]] * [[/Progressions/6-8 Expressions and Equations/]] * [[/Progressions/6-8 Statistics and Probability/]] * [[/Progressions/6-8 The Number System and High School Number/]] * [[/Progressions/High School Functions/]] * [[/Progressions/High School Algebra/]] * [[/Progressions/High School Statistics and Probability/]] * [[/Progressions/High School Modeling/]] == Common Core State Standards == * [[/Mathematical Practice/]] == [[/Pre-algebra/]] == * [[/Measurement/]] == EngageNY == === Prekindergarten === * [[/EngageNY/GPK/Module 1: Counting to 5/]] * [[/EngageNY/GPK/Module 2: Shapes/]] * [[/EngageNY/GPK/Module 3: Counting to 10/]] * [[/EngageNY/GPK/Module 4: Comparison of Length, Weight, Capacity, and Numbers to 5/]] * [[/EngageNY/GPK/Module 5: Addition and Subtraction Stories and Counting to 20/]] === [[/EngageNY/GK/|Kindergarten]] === === [[/EngageNY/G1/|Grade 1]] === == [[/References/]] == [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Mathematics]] [[Category:Developing]] 8d39f2f0a4aab01dd32768e3da45099d42b3363c 273 267 2016-09-27T07:07:23Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the Math Student Simulator section and its introduction. wikitext text/x-wiki == [[/Introduction/]] == == Preliminaries == * [[/Fundamentals/]] * [[/Number Sense/]] == [[/Progressions/|Common Core Math Progressions]] == * [[/Progressions/Preface/]] * [[/Progressions/K-5 Counting and Cardinality, Operations and Algebraic Thinking/]] * [[/Progressions/K-5 Number and Operations in Base Ten/]] * [[/Progressions/K-5 Data/]] * [[/Progressions/K-5 Measurement/]] * [[/Progressions/K-6 Geometry/]] * [[/Progressions/3-5 Fractions/]] * [[/Progressions/6-7 Ratios and Proportional Relationships/]] * [[/Progressions/6-8 Expressions and Equations/]] * [[/Progressions/6-8 Statistics and Probability/]] * [[/Progressions/6-8 The Number System and High School Number/]] * [[/Progressions/High School Functions/]] * [[/Progressions/High School Algebra/]] * [[/Progressions/High School Statistics and Probability/]] * [[/Progressions/High School Modeling/]] == Common Core State Standards == * [[/Mathematical Practice/]] == [[/Pre-algebra/]] == * [[/Measurement/]] == EngageNY == === Prekindergarten === * [[/EngageNY/GPK/Module 1: Counting to 5/]] * [[/EngageNY/GPK/Module 2: Shapes/]] * [[/EngageNY/GPK/Module 3: Counting to 10/]] * [[/EngageNY/GPK/Module 4: Comparison of Length, Weight, Capacity, and Numbers to 5/]] * [[/EngageNY/GPK/Module 5: Addition and Subtraction Stories and Counting to 20/]] === [[/EngageNY/GK/|Kindergarten]] === === [[/EngageNY/G1/|Grade 1]] === == Math Student Simulator == * [[/Math Student Simulator/Introduction/]] == [[/References/]] == [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Mathematics]] [[Category:Developing]] 0d96e6c5adc0b447a04031fdcfb1d4de01c95a13 0 100 268 2016-07-04T04:49:21Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the article. wikitext text/x-wiki These are my comments on EngageNY's [https://www.engageny.org/resource/grade-1-mathematics Grade 1 modules]. == General == I'm still developing my procedure for working through the material. Currently I'm reading the CC Standards, the sections of the Progressions that relate to the grade, the misconceptions from the Ohio model curriculum, and the module overviews from EngageNY, plus any material from the lessons that would help me understand or practice. All that reading ends up being more time consuming than I expect. As I read the material for grade 1, I'm aware of two things: # I feel like I'm losing the threads of the various progressions of concepts and procedures. I'm coming to the conclusion that a visual approach really would help me more than a verbal one for tracking and reviewing them. So rather than writing lists of conceptual propositions, I might make a series of diagrams to illustrate the progressions, or more likely borrow them from some Creative Commons source, such as EngageNY. Elementary school starts with very concrete illustrations using physical objects, but I'd start with moderately abstract diagrams, since this is aimed at adults who can already think abstractly. # One theme that keeps coming to mind is the fact that each concept and procedure involves interrelated parts, and each new one only gets more extensive and complex. I'm wondering if it would take too much extra time to develop a program throughout the curriculum that would pick apart and represent these concepts and procedures. That would give me a way of articulating and remembering my observations along these lines that would be more rigorous than writing in normal English. #* It might be good to write my own glossary in some form as part of this code. I'm picturing it largely taking the form of things like class and method definitions and items in data structures. #* I'd love to use this as an opportunity to learn Scheme or some other functional programming language, since I've been wanting to see what insights that paradigm would give me into the structure of math, but for now I'm going to use Python, since I already know it and it's easier to read, and this program will primarily be for reading rather than executing. I can combine these two types of documents with literate programming, which is where you interweave documentation and code in a way that lets you filter and reorder the content to be read by a person or run by a computer. This might take a lot of extra time to learn and implement, but it might be worth it. I've been meaning to experiment with literate programming for years. It might be time to start another side project I've been intending for this material, which is a math programming coverage table. I'll list math operations and briefly describe how to do them in certain programming contexts, such as the Python programming language and the Sage open source math software. Technically I could include this in the literate programming document, but its purpose doesn't fit the others' all that closely, and I think it would be more helpful and easier to maintain as a standalone table. At the moment I think my focus should be on the program and the table. Diagrams and literate programming will probably come later, but right now figuring those out would slow me down more than I'd like. == Exercises == These are the standards I'll likely create exercises for: * [http://www.corestandards.org/Math/Content/1/OA/C/6/ 1.OA.6] * [http://www.corestandards.org/Math/Content/1/NBT/C/4/ 1.NBT.4] * [http://www.corestandards.org/Math/Content/1/NBT/C/6/ 1.NBT.6] * [http://www.corestandards.org/Math/Content/1/MD/C/4/ 1.MD.4] * [http://www.corestandards.org/Math/Content/1/G/A/2/ 1.G.2] <disqus/> [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Comments]] [[Category:Developing]] 1a2977b8980def1c5c184ec59dbc95ab20ba7193 269 268 2016-07-04T04:51:29Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added a remark about learning by programming. wikitext text/x-wiki These are my comments on EngageNY's [https://www.engageny.org/resource/grade-1-mathematics Grade 1 modules]. == General == I'm still developing my procedure for working through the material. Currently I'm reading the CC Standards, the sections of the Progressions that relate to the grade, the misconceptions from the Ohio model curriculum, and the module overviews from EngageNY, plus any material from the lessons that would help me understand or practice. All that reading ends up being more time consuming than I expect. As I read the material for grade 1, I'm aware of two things: # I feel like I'm losing the threads of the various progressions of concepts and procedures. I'm coming to the conclusion that a visual approach really would help me more than a verbal one for tracking and reviewing them. So rather than writing lists of conceptual propositions, I might make a series of diagrams to illustrate the progressions, or more likely borrow them from some Creative Commons source, such as EngageNY. Elementary school starts with very concrete illustrations using physical objects, but I'd start with moderately abstract diagrams, since this is aimed at adults who can already think abstractly. # One theme that keeps coming to mind is the fact that each concept and procedure involves interrelated parts, and each new one only gets more extensive and complex. I'm wondering if it would take too much extra time to develop a program throughout the curriculum that would pick apart and represent these concepts and procedures. That would give me a way of articulating and remembering my observations along these lines that would be more rigorous than writing in normal English. I sometimes think that programming is a good way for me to learn a subject, and this would be a good test of that idea. #* It might be good to write my own glossary in some form as part of this code. I'm picturing it largely taking the form of things like class and method definitions and items in data structures. #* I'd love to use this as an opportunity to learn Scheme or some other functional programming language, since I've been wanting to see what insights that paradigm would give me into the structure of math, but for now I'm going to use Python, since I already know it and it's easier to read, and this program will primarily be for reading rather than executing. I can combine these two types of documents with literate programming, which is where you interweave documentation and code in a way that lets you filter and reorder the content to be read by a person or run by a computer. This might take a lot of extra time to learn and implement, but it might be worth it. I've been meaning to experiment with literate programming for years. It might be time to start another side project I've been intending for this material, which is a math programming coverage table. I'll list math operations and briefly describe how to do them in certain programming contexts, such as the Python programming language and the Sage open source math software. Technically I could include this in the literate programming document, but its purpose doesn't fit the others' all that closely, and I think it would be more helpful and easier to maintain as a standalone table. At the moment I think my focus should be on the program and the table. Diagrams and literate programming will probably come later, but right now figuring those out would slow me down more than I'd like. == Exercises == These are the standards I'll likely create exercises for: * [http://www.corestandards.org/Math/Content/1/OA/C/6/ 1.OA.6] * [http://www.corestandards.org/Math/Content/1/NBT/C/4/ 1.NBT.4] * [http://www.corestandards.org/Math/Content/1/NBT/C/6/ 1.NBT.6] * [http://www.corestandards.org/Math/Content/1/MD/C/4/ 1.MD.4] * [http://www.corestandards.org/Math/Content/1/G/A/2/ 1.G.2] <disqus/> [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Comments]] [[Category:Developing]] d3bae35db24c62e84b467882b62d4aa2e114eb77 0 63 270 233 2016-07-11T04:35:55Z Andy Culbertson 1 Moved fringe theories into the Fringe Theories article. wikitext text/x-wiki These are strange events, people, places, objects, and ideas that especially interest me. I don't necessarily ''like'' them (some of them are about murder, for example), and I'm skeptical of a lot of them, but I'm interested in my reactions to them and in the issues they involve. This list is for historical mysteries and the paranormal, aside from aliens. Aliens, fringe science, and conspiracies are in [[Fringe Theories]]. Philosophical and religious weirdness and strange fiction will go in other lists. == Finding weird cases == There's no shortage of places on the Internet to find weird things. Here are a few I like. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Mysteries Category:Mysteries - Wikipedia] * [http://www.dmoz.org/Society/Paranormal/ Paranormal - DMOZ] * [http://paranormal.about.com/ Paranormal Phenomena - About.com] * [http://www.reddit.com/r/UnresolvedMysteries/ Unresolved Mysteries - Reddit] * [http://boards.4chan.org/x/ /x/ (Paranormal) - 4chan] ** [http://www.dailydot.com/lifestyle/4chan-x-paranormal-board-creepy-pronunciation-book-mysteries/ Meet 4chan's /x/philes, investigators of the Internet's strangest mysteries] - The article that led me to the board. * [https://www.youtube.com/user/StrangeMysteries Strange Mysteries - YouTube] == Mysterious people == === Deaths === ==== The Taman Shud Case ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taman_Shud_Case Taman Shud Case - Wikipedia] ==== The Lead Masks Case ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lead_Masks_Case Lead Masks Case - Wikipedia] ==== Elisa Lam ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_of_Elisa_Lam Death of Elisa Lam - Wikipedia] ==== The Ourang Medan ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ourang_Medan Ourang Medan - Wikipedia] ==== Isdal Woman ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isdal_Woman Isdal Woman - Wikipedia] ==== The Dyatlov Pass Incident ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dyatlov_Pass_incident Dyatlov Pass incident - Wikipedia] === Disappearances === ==== The Bermuda Triangle ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bermuda_Triangle Bermuda Triangle - Wikipedia] * [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nnLaDvxgmwg 5 Terrifying & Mysterious Bermuda Triangle Stories - Top5s - YouTube] * [http://www.electronicfog.com/ Bruce Gernon's electronic fog theory] ==== Frederick Valentich ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disappearance_of_Frederick_Valentich Disappearance of Frederick Valentich - Wikipedia] === Unknown identities === ==== Benjaman Kyle ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benjaman_Kyle Benjaman Kyle - Wikipedia] === Time travelers === ==== John Titor ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Titor John Titor - Wikipedia] == Mysterious artifacts == === Toynbee tiles === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toynbee_tiles Toynbee tiles - Wikipedia] === Georgia Guidestones === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georgia_Guidestones Georgia Guidestones - Wikipedia] === Bouvet Island lifeboat === * [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1heSaBKgaeg Abandoned Boat Baffles Scientists for 70 Years - Strange Mysteries - YouTube] * [https://allkindsofhistory.wordpress.com/2011/02/13/an-abandoned-lifeboat-at-worlds-end/ An abandoned lifeboat at world's end - A Blast from the Past] == Mysterious places == === Oak Island === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oak_Island Oak Island - Wikipedia] == Codes and puzzles == === The Voynich manuscript === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voynich_manuscript Voynich manuscript - Wikipedia] * [https://www.amazon.com/dp/1599865556 The Voynich Manuscript: Full Color Photographic Edition - Amazon] - A print replica you can buy. === Kryptos === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kryptos Kryptos - Wikipedia] === Numbers stations === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Numbers_station Numbers station - Wikipedia] === Reddit codes === * [http://www.reddit.com/r/Solving_A858/ Solving A858 - Reddit] * [http://www.reddit.com/r/Solving_Reddit_Codes Solving Reddit Codes - Reddit] === Cicada 3301 === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cicada_3301 Cicada 3301 - Wikipedia] * [http://www.fastcompany.com/3025785/meet-the-man-who-solved-the-mysterious-cicada-3301-puzzle Meet The Man Who Solved The Mysterious Cicada 3301 Puzzle - Fast Company] == Crime == === The Dark Web === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dark_Web Dark Web - Wikipedia] * [http://www.wired.com/2015/06/dark-web-know-myth/ The Dark Web as You Know It Is a Myth - Wired] == Spirit beings == === Ghosts === ==== Country House Restaurant in Clarendon Hills ==== A local haunting. Chicagoland doesn't seem to have many. * [http://www.burgerone.com/clarendon/ghost-story.html Ghost Story - Clarendon Hills Country House] ==== Bachelor's Grove Cemetery ==== Another Chicagoland haunting. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bachelor%27s_Grove_Cemetery Bachelor's Grove Cemetery] ==== Cecilia Carrasco ==== * [https://uk.news.yahoo.com/paranormal-push--woman-claims-she-was-shoved-by-a-ghost-132640541.html Paranormal push? Watch moment woman claims she was shoved by a GHOST - Yahoo! News UK] == Related blog posts == * [http://www.thinkulum.net/blog/2015/06/25/weird-things-are-fun/ 2015/06/25: Weird things are fun] [[Category:Weirdness]] f794e2dc8bcd3d7ae67ab6e8917165198d173304 0 101 271 2016-07-11T04:38:03Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the article, consisting of material moved from Favorite Weird Cases. wikitext text/x-wiki == General resources == * [http://www.dmoz.org/Science/Anomalies_and_Alternative_Science/ Anomalies and Alternative Science - DMOZ] * [http://www.dmoz.org/Society/Issues/Conspiracy/ Conspiracy - DMOZ] * [http://www.stufftheydontwantyoutoknow.com/ Stuff They Don't Want You to Know] * [http://ufos.about.com/ UFOs and Aliens - About.com] == Alternative science == === Physics === ==== The Reciprocal System of Theory ==== * [http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Reciprocal_Theory Reciprocal Theory - RationalWiki] === Cosmology === ==== The Flat Earth ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modern_flat_Earth_societies Modern flat Earth societies - Wikipedia] * [https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLltxIX4B8_URNUzDE2sXctnUAEXgEDDGn Flat Earth Clues (playlist) - Mark Sargent - YouTube] === Cryptozoology === ==== Cryptids ==== ===== The Bridgewater Triangle ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bridgewater_Triangle Bridgewater Triangle - Wikipedia] * [http://spookysouthcoast.com/ Spooky Southcoast] - A paranormal radio show located near the Bridgewater Triangle. Each year they have an episode about it. ===== Living dinosaurs ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Living_dinosaur Living dinosaur - Wikipedia] ===== The Jersey Devil ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jersey_Devil Jersey Devil - Wikipedia] ===== Skinwalker Ranch ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skinwalker_Ranch Skinwalker Ranch - Wikipedia] ===== The Mothman ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mothman Mothman - Wikipedia] ===== The Loch Ness Monster ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loch_Ness_Monster Loch Ness Monster - Wikipedia] ===== Bigfoot ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patterson–Gimlin_film Patterson–Gimlin film - Wikipedia] - I don't care much about Bigfoot in general, but this film is intriguing. ==== Cryptid researchers ==== ===== Loren Coleman ===== * [http://cryptomundo.com/lorencoleman/ Bio of Loren Coleman - Cryptomundo] === Psychology === ==== ESP ==== ===== Diane Hennacy Powell ===== * [http://dianehennacypowell.com/consciousness/telepathy-project/ The Telepathy Project - Diane Hennacy Powell] ===== Rupert Sheldrake ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rupert_Sheldrake Rupert Sheldrake - Wikipedia] ==== The pineal gland ==== * [http://www.stufftheydontwantyoutoknow.com/podcasts/pineal-gland-eye/ The Pineal Gland: A Third Eye? - Stuff They Don't Want You to Know Podcast] * [http://www.vice.com/read/dmt-you-cannot-imagine-a-stranger-drug-or-a-stranger-experience-365 DMT: You Cannot Imagine a Stranger Drug or a Stranger Experience - Vice] - I don't condone the illegal use of hallucinogens and have no plans to try them, but this research is interesting. == Conspiracies == === The New World Order === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_World_Order_(conspiracy_theory) New World Order (conspiracy theory) - Wikipedia] === The shadow government === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shadow_government_(conspiracy) Shadow government (conspiracy) - Wikipedia] === The JFK assassination === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assassination_of_John_F._Kennedy Assassination of John F. Kennedy - Wikipedia] == UFOs and aliens == === UFO sightings === ==== The Phoenix Lights ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phoenix_Lights Phoenix Lights - Wikipedia] ==== The 2006 O'Hare International Airport UFO sighting ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2006_O%27Hare_International_Airport_UFO_sighting 2006 O'Hare International Airport UFO sighting - Wikipedia] === UFO researchers === ==== Jacques Vallée ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacques_Vallée Jacques Vallée - Wikipedia] ==== Hugh Ross ==== * [http://www.toledoblade.com/Religion/2003/01/04/Astronomer-links-UFOs-to-occultism.html Astronomer links UFOs to occultism - Toledo Blade] ==== Steven Greer ==== * [http://www.disclosureproject.org/ The Disclosure Project] === Alien races === ==== The Dutch ==== It is widely known that the Netherlands is on another planet and that the country's border is a portal to that planet. The Dutch, contrary to popular belief, are not humans who colonized this alien planet long ago but are aliens who visit Earth whenever they travel to other countries. * [http://ask.fm/Togedi3/answer/127837053174 Do you deny that you Dutch are aliens? - Togedi3 - Ask.fm] [[Category:Weirdness]] d91123903767bd2e4a7c1c62ba028f70d72d224a 272 271 2016-07-11T08:14:05Z Andy Culbertson 1 Reorganized the general links, added the Skeptics section, and added some theories/theorists. wikitext text/x-wiki == General resources == === Articles === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Fringe_theory Category: Fringe theory - Wikipedia] === Forums === * [https://www.reddit.com/r/FringeTheory/ Fringe Theory - Reddit] === Podcasts === * [http://www.stufftheydontwantyoutoknow.com/ Stuff They Don't Want You to Know] == Skeptics == === Websites === * [http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Main_Page RationalWiki] * [http://www.skepdic.com/ The Skeptic's Dictionary] * [http://www.snopes.com/ Snopes] === Podcasts === * [http://www.yrad.com/cs/ The Conspiracy Skeptic] * [https://pseudoastro.wordpress.com/ Exposing PseudoAstronomy] * [http://edgydoc.com/about-ba/ QuackCast] * [http://www.trcpodcast.com/ The Reality Check] == Alternative science == === General === * [http://www.dmoz.org/Science/Anomalies_and_Alternative_Science/ Anomalies and Alternative Science - DMOZ] === Physics === ==== The Reciprocal System of Theory ==== * [http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Reciprocal_Theory Reciprocal Theory - RationalWiki] === Cosmology === ==== The Flat Earth ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modern_flat_Earth_societies Modern flat Earth societies - Wikipedia] * [https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLltxIX4B8_URNUzDE2sXctnUAEXgEDDGn Flat Earth Clues (playlist) - Mark Sargent - YouTube] === History === ==== General ==== * [https://www.reddit.com/r/AlternativeHistory/ Alternative History - Reddit] ==== The Great Sphinx of Giza ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sphinx_water_erosion_hypothesis Sphinx water erosion hypothesis - Wikipedia] === Cryptozoology === ==== Cryptids ==== ===== The Bridgewater Triangle ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bridgewater_Triangle Bridgewater Triangle - Wikipedia] * [http://spookysouthcoast.com/ Spooky Southcoast] - A paranormal radio show located near the Bridgewater Triangle. Each year they have an episode about it. ===== Living dinosaurs ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Living_dinosaur Living dinosaur - Wikipedia] ===== The Jersey Devil ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jersey_Devil Jersey Devil - Wikipedia] ===== Skinwalker Ranch ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skinwalker_Ranch Skinwalker Ranch - Wikipedia] ===== The Mothman ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mothman Mothman - Wikipedia] ===== The Loch Ness Monster ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loch_Ness_Monster Loch Ness Monster - Wikipedia] ===== Bigfoot ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patterson–Gimlin_film Patterson–Gimlin film - Wikipedia] - I don't care much about Bigfoot in general, but this film is intriguing. ==== Cryptid researchers ==== ===== Loren Coleman ===== * [http://cryptomundo.com/lorencoleman/ Bio of Loren Coleman - Cryptomundo] ===== JC Johnson ===== * [https://www.youtube.com/user/cryptofourcorners JC Johnson - YouTube] * [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f33Ccevaez4 Ahhh Real Monsters!!! Stories Of Cryptozoology With Jc Johnson - TruthSeekah - YouTube] === Psychology === ==== ESP ==== ===== Diane Hennacy Powell ===== * [http://dianehennacypowell.com/consciousness/telepathy-project/ The Telepathy Project - Diane Hennacy Powell] ===== Rupert Sheldrake ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rupert_Sheldrake Rupert Sheldrake - Wikipedia] ==== The pineal gland ==== * [http://www.stufftheydontwantyoutoknow.com/podcasts/pineal-gland-eye/ The Pineal Gland: A Third Eye? - Stuff They Don't Want You to Know Podcast] * [http://www.vice.com/read/dmt-you-cannot-imagine-a-stranger-drug-or-a-stranger-experience-365 DMT: You Cannot Imagine a Stranger Drug or a Stranger Experience - Vice] - I don't condone the illegal use of hallucinogens and have no plans to try them, but this research is interesting. == Conspiracies == === General === * [http://www.dmoz.org/Society/Issues/Conspiracy/ Conspiracy - DMOZ] * [https://www.reddit.com/r/conspiracy/ Conspiracy - Reddit] * [http://www.conspiracyanddemocracy.org/ Conspiracy and Democracy - Cambridge University] - An academic project to study the nature of conspiracy theories, how they work, and their role in society. * Burnett, Thom. [http://www.worldcat.org/title/conspiracy-encyclopedia-the-encyclopedia-of-conspiracy-theories/oclc/62162975 ''Conspiracy Encyclopedia'']. New York: Chamberlain Bros., 2005. * Weishaupt, Isaac. [https://www.amazon.com/Grand-Unified-Conspiracy-Theory-Illuminati-ebook/dp/B00CR0Z38U ''A Grand Unified Conspiracy Theory: The Illuminati, Ancient Aliens, and Pop Culture'']. 2013. === The Illuminati === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Illuminati Illuminati - Wikipedia] * [http://www.podcastchart.com/podcasts/out-of-darkness-into-the-light/episodes/illuminati-agent-alex-jones-was-comedian-bill-hicks-says-mark-jungwirth Out of Darkness, Into the Light] (podcast) === The New World Order === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_World_Order_(conspiracy_theory) New World Order (conspiracy theory) - Wikipedia] === The shadow government === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shadow_government_(conspiracy) Shadow government (conspiracy) - Wikipedia] === The Watchers === * [http://kingdomintelligencebriefing.com/ Kingdom Intelligence Briefing] (podcast) === The JFK assassination === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assassination_of_John_F._Kennedy Assassination of John F. Kennedy - Wikipedia] == UFOs and aliens == === General === * [http://ufos.about.com/ UFOs and Aliens - About.com] * [http://www.whoswhointhecosmiczoo.com/ Who's Who in the Cosmic Zoo?] === UFO sightings === ==== The Phoenix Lights ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phoenix_Lights Phoenix Lights - Wikipedia] ==== The 2006 O'Hare International Airport UFO sighting ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2006_O%27Hare_International_Airport_UFO_sighting 2006 O'Hare International Airport UFO sighting - Wikipedia] === UFO researchers === ==== Jacques Vallée ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacques_Vallée Jacques Vallée - Wikipedia] ==== Hugh Ross ==== * [http://www.toledoblade.com/Religion/2003/01/04/Astronomer-links-UFOs-to-occultism.html Astronomer links UFOs to occultism - Toledo Blade] ==== Steven Greer ==== * [http://www.disclosureproject.org/ The Disclosure Project] === Alien races === ==== The Dutch ==== It is widely known that the Netherlands is on another planet and that the country's border is a portal to that planet. The Dutch, contrary to popular belief, are not humans who colonized this alien planet long ago but are aliens who visit Earth whenever they travel to other countries. * [http://ask.fm/Togedi3/answer/127837053174 Do you deny that you Dutch are aliens? - Togedi3 - Ask.fm] [[Category:Weirdness]] 9262a74afd19c6dddacbd9995cb09bd50c62d032 0 102 274 2016-09-27T07:19:30Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the article. wikitext text/x-wiki == Description == Math Student Simulator is an attempt to use the process of programming to learn certain aspects of math. It's a part of my math relearning project. I'm posting the code and its documentation on GitHub [https://github.com/thinkulum/math-student-sim here]. You can download and run it yourself for free. I'll update the GitHub content over time as the project progresses. Here on the wiki I'll be documenting some of the process of creating the program. The program will cover concept definitions and procedures from at least the [http://www.corestandards.org/Math/ Common Core standards]. If I get through all of those, I might add other areas of math. The structure of the program will be hierarachical. Complex concepts and procedures will be built from simpler ones. This is a key feature, because one of the main characteristics of math I want to explore is its interrelatedness. In the code for this program I'm striving for clarity, since I'll need to review it so I can learn. For the amount of thought it requires to create, code is distressingly easy to forget, and if you're not careful, it's easy to write it in such an obscure way that, when you reread it weeks after writing it, it takes a lot of work to figure out what it means and does. I expect at least three features to help with review: * I'll use generally recognized good coding practices, such as breaking the code up into small, descriptively named functions. * I'll have the program show its work as it's executing my mathematical commands. That way I can watch the hierarchy of math as it comes into play during a specific procedure. * I'll use literate programming to document my code so I can explain everything in excruciating detail while organizing and formatting my explanations clearly. Literate programming lets you write your program as essentially an article or book with the code interspersed. You then run a processing program that formats your documentation nicely for people to read and assembles the code from your document so that the computer can run it. Why do I think programming to learn math is a good idea? First let's look at what I've been trying to accomplish and the methods I've been using to achieve it, and then I'll talk about how programming could solve some of the problems I've been having with those methods. == Goals == My goals in doing my math relearning project are to relearn (1) standard math topics plus selected others (2) at an accelerated pace, (3) with enough fluency that I can work with math quickly and confidently, and (4) with a deep enough understanding that I can think flexibly about them to solve unfamiliar problems (and deep enough to keep me interested and to quench my unquenchable thirst for understanding). I expect to use math extensively in my future career (probably cognitive science) and in many of my personal projects, and I feel hindered until I can learn the math I need. == Subject matter == In several ways math is a uniquely challenging subject to learn: (1) It's almost entirely concerned with and ruled by logic, which makes its behavior very rigid, precise, and unforgiving, whereas most human minds are sloppy and hazy until they learn discipline. (2) To many people (including me) mathematical concepts feel empty and meaningless, and thus arbitrary, so they don't stick in the mind easily and can take a lot of effort to think about. (3) Math involves a large number of concepts and procedures that are highly interconnected, which can be confusing if you don't take the time to sort them out. This third factor has been my major problem so far in this project, as I'll explain below. == Current methods == Any learning, especially if, like math, it involves developing skills, will require several kinds of learning activities and multiple passes over the material so the information and skills can be processed into long-term memory. See [[A_Framework_and_Agenda_for_Memory_Improvement]] for more on that. But if a rapid pace of learning is one of your goals, you have to select your learning activities carefully so you learn adequately without wasting a lot of time. You also have to select your material's degree of breadth and depth carefully, since more of either will take a longer time to learn. What learning activities have I been trying so far? Mainly I've been reading books and other documents that explain math to teachers so they can pass on the understanding to their students. But since a lot of these documents don't explain things in quite the order and manner I'm looking for, I've been analyzing the content to articulate, separate, and trace the conceptual threads as they develop through the grades. Basically I've been expanding and shaping the content from my sources into a structure that I think will give me the kind of knowledge and skill I need. I've been writing my insights as I go. I did a pass over the whole K-12 curriculum to get an overview and then started over with pre-K to learn in detail. As I've come across procedures I'd like to perform with more fluency, I've come up with exercises I think would help me, since I don't need the kinds of exercises for young children the curriculum offers at the early levels. What kind of mathematical knowledge structure am I trying to create? It has two broad features: interconnectedness and incremental progression. The interconnectedness feature comes from (1) the idea that math is a set of logically interconnected concepts and procedures, and (2) the idea that our starting point in the development of mathematical thinking is math's relationship with the world, and (3) my goal of understanding math deeply in order to develop my mathematical intuition. This approach has a name: Teaching math in terms of its real-world meaning and its interrelationships is called conceptual math. Its opposite is procedural math, which teaches it primarily as a set of rote procedures. The second feature, incremental progression, means that ideally I'd like to find out how the whole edifice of mathematics might grow logically from the ground of human experiences and needs. Presumably that's more or less how it developed historically, though many of the details are lost to us. This goal means that each concept would be explained in terms of the more basic concepts that came before it as well as any experiences or needs that suggest the new concept or make it necessary. You'd try to avoid bringing in more advanced concepts to explain it, even if that means only explaining it to a very limited degree at first. Essentially I want a map, which is a common theme for me. If I need to navigate freely through a domain of knowledge or skill, I feel lost unless I have some kind of mental map that tells me what places are there, the borders of each place, what other places are accessible or inaccessible from it, and ways to get from one place to another. And if the map is in some concrete form so I don't have to rely completely on my shaky memory, I feel even better. Feeling lost looks like, for example, blanking on how to use a piece of knowledge, or worrying that I'll use it wrong because I know I've forgotten related pieces that would probably affect the application. It's not that feeling lost keeps me from knowing things or ever using what I know. I have impartial knowledge of all kinds of subjects, and I still get by. It just nags at me and distracts me with uncertainty, and it would be nice for once in my life to scratch the itch of wanting a well-organized body of knowledge when such a body is clearly available. === Source material === ==== Content ==== Where would I find such conceptual explanations of math? It turns out education researchers have spent decades coming up with them, and their findings have been condensed into resources I can access, such as Chapin and Johnson's <i>[http://www.worldcat.org/title/math-matters-understanding-the-math-you-teach-grades-k-8/oclc/63164894 Math Matters]</i>. However, I had trouble finding a building block approach to conceptual math until I looked into the Common Core Standards and their associated resources, primarily the [http://achievethecore.org/page/254/progressions-documents-for-the-common-core-state-standards-for-mathematics Progressions] and the [https://www.engageny.org/common-core-curriculum EngageNY curriculum]. While building up from basic concepts and experiences is the way children are taught math, adults who are being taught to teach math conceptually don't need things explained in such a stepwise fashion because they already have a broad knowledge of math and only need the concepts better integrated. So, for example, the early books I looked at thought nothing of analyzing place value in terms of exponents, even though children need to know something about place value years before they're ready to know anything about exponents. Common Core is focused on how to teach conceptual math to children rather than adults, so its developers were careful to limit their explanations of math concepts to the level of understanding available at each stage. How well they succeeded is a matter of debate, but I think they did well enough for my purposes. Why do I need to do all this work analyzing and expanding these sources' content? To form a good map, all the necessary information needs to be present, explicit, and direct. My sources don't really share my goal of building a complete mathematical edifice, so their information doesn't always follow this pattern. This was especially true of the pre-Common Core sources. Some of the information I wanted to know was missing, so as I read and tried to fill in my picture of math, I had to answer certain questions myself, such as what is a number? This was fun but took a lot of time, though in the case of defining numbers I was pleased with the results (see [[/Math_Relearning/Number_Sense]]). Fortunately, the Common Core sources answered a lot more questions for me. But then as I began reading EngageNY, I thought it'd be helpful to spell out all the propositional concepts in each module so I could trace the progression of mathematical ideas in a clear and logical order. Many of these propositions were implicit in the source material, since the logical progression I had in mind took very small steps, similar to a proof. And statements in any work are rarely written as directly as I'd like. Spelling these out or rewriting them took only a moderate amount of time, but it still felt like too much considering the amount of uncertainty I felt about the result. More on that in the Notes section below. Like I said, confusion over math's interconnections has been my major problem. The density of math itself is bad enough, but it's even worse if you're learning math by reading material about how to teach it, which brings in extra, though possibly relevant, concepts about psychology. For example, knowing the mistakes students commonly make is helpful for highlighting various aspects of the correct understanding. But this is a roundabout way of gaining insight, so it takes time to sort out. ==== Format ==== If the source material were already in reviewable form, I could just read and reread it to study. But most documents aren't written to be studied just as they are, and the Progressions and curriculum were no exception. It became clear that even familiarizing myself with their explicit content would require some kind of notetaking. I was planning to wait till I read the curriculum to concentrate on the details, but as I read through the Progressions at a moderate, steady pace, I worried that I was going to miss or forget concepts that would help me understand later ones, and with good reason, since it happened even in the middle of the reading I was doing. Especially when I got to fractions, I found myself wanting to flip back to reread earlier explanations so I could put the pieces together in my mind. But when I did flip back, the content looked less like a network of beautifully interlinked concepts and more like a bewildering wall of text. This meant that if I ''were'' going to try to learn the details this way, I'd have to spend a lot of time re-deciphering and filtering the text to review. This, to me, highlights the need to visually design complicated material so its complexity is easier to trace at a glance. In other words, prose isn't always the best tool for describing math. So as I pushed myself along, I wondered how to think of the concepts in ways that would help me truly understand and remember them. This added uncertainty and a subtle stress to the project. === Notes === A good notetaking method is a central practice in learning, because it transforms your source material into a version you can (1) understand and (2) review. Hence, if you're having trouble taking notes, it's a central problem for your learning. Since I was only reading the Progressions to give me an idea of what a Common Core curriculum would cover and how it would explain the concepts, my few notes were limited to my reactions to the content. As I mentioned earlier, I took more serious notes when I began reading the EngageNY curriculum. But as I usually do when I'm taking notes, I ran into problems even there. I didn't know how complete or reviewable my notes were. Were they expressed clearly and consistently? I didn't know if I was recording information at the best level of granularity--where did I need to spell things out in detail, and where could I write something more general, wave my hands, and say, "I know what I mean"? And was I including all the information I wanted and not extra pieces I'd have to actively ignore or delete later? I didn't have a great way to decide. I was making up my math notetaking language as I went along, and I didn't know if it was adequate or where it would get too awkward for expressing what I wanted to say. I also didn't know if I'd be wasting time writing particular kinds of notes. Should I spell out algorithms? Write out definitions? If they were already stated clearly in my sources, would it waste more time to copy them or to flip through my documents to find them again for study? So I've had problems with not only my source material but even with the notes I've been taking to wrangle it. I want to end up with a map of mathematics I can study and use, so the statements that describe it need to be explicit and direct, and it needs to be complete. My sources cover a lot of that ground (and I love them for it), but compared to what I'm looking for, their content still contains gaps, and their prose format makes rapid reviewing difficult. But when I try to lay out this math map in my notes, I find that my idea of what the map should contain and how its contents should be described is unclear. I don't know if I'll find better sources, but I know I need a better way to take notes, and I think I have one. == Programming == Programming isn't normally done as a learning activity. It's usually done to create a product, a computer program, that will perform certain functions that the user can trigger to accomplish some result in a particular domain, such as using financial software for money management. If you wanted a product that facilitated learning, you could create, for example, a flashcard program for memorization. When developers do use the actual process of programming to learn, it's usually to learn some aspect of programming, such as a specific programming language, library, or technique. But you can also use programming to learn about a domain. Someone could write a money management program simply to teach themselves how money management works. Some authors write a book to teach themselves about a topic (and in fact, writing this project introduction has helped me work out how programming can aid learning). A programmer can do the same thing by writing a program. I see two levels of benefit that programming would bring to my math learning. Programming in general has characteristics that make it a fitting vehicle for learning, and this specific project comes with its own opportunities. === General benefits === Programming has three main abilities that assist learning: aiding thought, settling emotions, and granting freedom. These abilities derive from some of the fundamental traits of programming itself and of the culture surrounding it. I'll talk about these traits first and then the benefits they enable. ==== Basic characteristics ==== Programming has two main features that let it work as a learning approach. First, it's a linguistic activity that's broad enough to express practically anything you want to say. This means you can model almost anything you can think of with a computer program, and the description of this model in the form of code acts as its map. Programming's linguistic nature also comes with the ability to record these expressions for the computer to recall later. Second, it's executable, so the computer can act on your model in some way to produce some result. The execution of a computer program is based on logic, which comes with a number of benefits that I'll explore below, such as the ability to automatically check your work for accuracy. It's also what I'd call passive execution, because on its own the computer can't reason about its instructions and make decisions about them the way a human can, which means, among other things, you have to think more carefully about the instructions you're giving it. To highlight these two overarching features, you could call programming a means of executable expression. On top of the features of programming itself, the culture of software development has at least one feature that shapes programming into an effective tool for learning, and that is its concern for efficiency. In addition to writing fast programs that conserve computer memory, developers try to minimize the amount of time, effort, money, and customer good will they spend on fixing errors in their programs and creating new features. So they look for programming practices that will avoid introducing errors and make their code easier to work with. For instance, when their program needs to do the same thing in more than one place, instead of duplicating the code, they name parts of their code and simply refer to those parts by name. That way they only have to make changes to one copy of the code (because there is only one copy), so they don't have to worry whether they've changed the copies consistently. This attention to efficiency results in various patterns that can aid learning, such as the growth of interacting software objects that can serve as pieces of your domain model. These characteristics of programming and software development lead to the benefits of sharpening thought, allowing freedom of movement, and providing emotional security. ==== Crystallization ==== As a means of executable expression, programming sharpens thought. For me, this is the main attraction of programming as an approach to learning. It crystallizes an understanding of the subject matter from the vaporous notions you start with. It does this by narrowing focus, clarifying vagueness, and enforcing logic. ===== Focus ===== Programming narrows focus. In keeping with the developer's concern for efficiency, most of the time when you're writing a program, you're focused on functionality, instructing the computer to carry out the procedures that are part of the program, which will have at least somewhat defined parameters. You could, by contrast, tell the program to do a collection of unrelated things and decorate your code with irrelevant information, but the general expectation in software development is that your code will efficiently express instructions to carry out a fairly narrow range of related tasks. After you've been programming a while, you develop an intuitive sense of the kind of information in a situation that's relevant to creating functionality in a program, and specifically in the kind of program you want to create. It's like solving a word problem in math, or better, using math to solve problems in real life. You pick out the mathematically relevant information and put it together to find the information you're missing. So as I'm reading my source material, keeping my program in mind can tell me what information to include and what to ignore, at least until later. Math clearly benefits from a focus on functionality, since you could say half of mathematical activity is calculation, a purely algorithmic endeavor. The other half is creative problem solving, which is harder to condense into a specific procedure. So you can capture a lot of mathematical knowledge in a program, and a lot of the program's functionality will be a representation of that knowledge, the content you're out to learn. Aside from whatever you write in the documentation, the code represents the domain's content in a stripped-down form, so you don't have to wade through a lot of extra verbiage to get to the essential details. ===== Clarity ===== Programming clarifies vagueness. It does this by enabling expression, requiring explicitness, and fostering organization. ====== Expression ====== Programming's enabling of expression comes from its linguistic nature. To give shape to concepts, first you need a language, and a program is a language for describing a domain, in this case math. In programming you can create bundles of data or instructions in the form of variables, functions, classes, and so on, give the bundles names, and then use the names in other instructions. It's the programming equivalent of creating words and using them in sentences. The range of data and instructions a program can represent is very broad, so you can create whole languages this way. Since they have to be executed, to a certain extent these languages are rigorously defined, and they're called formal languages, as opposed to the natural languages people speak. They also tend to be more like grammars than fully fledged languages. A programming language is the skeleton of a language, and most of the actual words are created when you use it to write a specific program. ====== Explicitness ====== The explicitness requirement arises from the logical and passive nature of the computer's execution. Even apart from computer technology, any effective method of executing instructions will be based on logic, since the results would be unpredictable otherwise, and in that case you might as well not even have the instructions. But when humans are the executors, a lot of the instructions can be implicit, since people will fill in the gaps intuitively. This means that if the instructions are written poorly because the author actually hadn't worked out all the details, the person who carries them out can end up with a much better understanding of the procedure than the person who wrote them. The computer's executing abilities are much more helpless than a human's, and a programmer has to give it an explicit instruction for every single step of its procedures. Not every programmer needs to write all of these instructions, because a set of instructions can be saved in a library or module to be included in later programs, and these libraries are often shared among programmers. But within the realm of procedures that aren't already contained in a library, if the program is to fulfill its functions, then the programmer has to work out all the details themselves, which means they'll end up with an extensive understanding of the program's domain, and many holes in their initial understanding will be filled in. While creating an algorithm, you'll discover a lot of details you weren't expecting, such as pieces of data or whole side algorithms you didn't know you'd need. This will happen even when translating a perfectly adequate procedure written for humans into code for a computer. But to me digging up new information hidden in the source material is half the fun. ====== Organization ====== Organization groups items that are related and presents them in an order that helps the reader see their relationships. It's certainly possible and even common to write very disorganized "spaghetti code," but if you're following the principle of efficiency, you'll engage in development practices that will organize your code in ways that let it function as a conceptual map. You'll move code around to more appropriate locations, streamline inefficient or duplicate code, or rework whole algorithms, and concepts and patterns will emerge as you do. If you're using an object-oriented paradigm, for example, your data structures and algorithms will get grouped into objects with properties and behaviors, and these objects will relate to each other by using each other in their behaviors or as values for their properties. You may form layers of related functionality, such as in the model-view-controller pattern, where distinct sets of code handle the program's data, its user interface, and the interaction between the two. As you organize, your mental picture of the domain will improve. You'll also think specifically about readability factors such as using consistent naming conventions and using a consistent visual formatting style for your code, which will make the code easier to review. ===== Logic ===== Programming enforces logic. Instructions written for humans can contain not only gaps but logical inconsistencies. These can be annoying for the people carrying out the instructions, but they aren't necessarily show stoppers, because people can actively determine what the correct instructions are likely to be. A computer, with its passive execution, will simply follow the exact instructions you specified, and if they have logical problems, it'll give you an incorrect result or stop executing the program altogether, leaving you to figure out what went wrong. And as you figure it out, your understanding of the domain will sharpen. Programming's dependence on logic makes it a good choice for modeling math, since math is also tightly tied to logic. (In fact, looking at the breadth of topics mathematicians consider fair game, ranging from numbers to the grammar of natural languages, I wonder if math could be defined as the study of logical structures.) The translation from math to code can be relatively simple and direct. In fact, math is one of the primary uses for programming, and I think it's safe to say any kind of math people have wanted to do has already been represented on a computer by some programming language. ==== Freedom ==== In addition to sharpening thought, programming gives you the freedom to move through the domain's content in any order, which enables various patterns of coverage. Even code that does very little is still a valid, working program. Additional functionality can attach to a lot of different places in the code, which means there's a lot of freedom in the order of features you add, and in the case of my project this freedom means I can start my code simple, start anywhere in the curriculum, and choose when I address its topics and in how much detail. It gives me the power to follow the needs of my mind and my schedule while reaping the other benefits of programming. Two examples of coverage patterns are working backward and working breadth first. Working backward would mean starting with the math I need to know for a project and learning about the earlier math that would make sense of it and so on until I got to math I already know. Working breadth first would mean learning all the topics I want to cover at a superficial, procedural level and then passing through them a few more times, learning them at increasing levels of depth. I very well might follow these patterns. Just because I want to end up with a map and because the map-like Common Core material takes a depth-first, bottom-up approach doesn't mean I have to follow that outline, even though it's what I've had in mind till now. ==== Security ==== In addition to sharpening thought, programming also gives me a strong subjective sense of security, which is important for my ability to progress in a project. This security is different from the typical IT concerns about data theft or loss from things like hackers or hardware failures. It's the emotional assurance that writing my code isn't a waste of time. Generally speaking, if I write a program that's designed well and works correctly, the following things will be true: First, the code will be stored, so I won't lose it by forgetting (data loss by wetware failure!). This seems trivial, because it's true of every program or any other content that's saved to a file, but the semi-permanence of stored information is always a subtle but profound relief to me. It lets me stop worrying about the information and turning it over and over fruitlessly in my mind. That obsessiveness comes from the fear of losing ideas I feel are important. Second, since the programming will have performed its thought crystallizing functions and the resulting code will be reviewable, I'll feel that rewriting my sources' content in code form was worthwhile. And I don't have to wait till the end to feel the security from this factor. Since I have a decent idea of the concerns that result in good code, I have a clearer way to decide whether I'm wasting my time writing each line. But even the simple fact that each part of the code contributes to its functionality is inherently reassuring to me. Each part is worthwhile just because it has a purpose within the program, even if that purpose has little to do with learning. By contrast, I wasn't clear on how well a lot of my prose notes supported my learning goals or any goals at all, which sapped my motivation to write them. Third, because it's executable in a logical fashion and gives me rapid feedback I can use to verify it, my code will make sense because it works the way I expect. The only way I could independently verify my prose notes would be to have a math expert check them, which is slower, harder to repeat, and still more error prone than a computer. Fourth, as I described in the previous section, even when the code is incomplete, it's still worthwhile, because it has a solid potential to grow into code that does more. === Project benefits === In addition to programming's general benefits for learning, I can use this particular programming project to advance other projects of mine, both during and after my work on this one. ==== During ==== Coding a math implementation gives me an earlier chance to practice and explore certain areas that'll be useful to me in future projects. I like to kill multiple birds with one (cumbersome) stone. I'd get around to learning at least some of these anyway, but it'd happen much later if I excluded programming from all the time I'd be spending on math relearning. Since they have such broad applications for me, these explorations are as much the point of the project as learning math. First, I can learn some general programming tools and techniques I've had in mind for a while: mainly [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Git Git] and [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GitHub GitHub], [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Literate_programming literate programming], [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Test-driven_development test-driven development], [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Design_by_contract design by contract], and [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aspect-oriented_programming aspect-oriented programming]. It might slow me down too much to use them all for this project, but learning at least some of them should greatly benefit future projects, or at least give me an idea of if and when they're worth using. Second, I can use the project to explore the subject of knowledge representation, which is an aspect of artificial intelligence, which feeds into cognitive science. This project is basically an exercise in knowledge representation, so it's no stretch to study it in the process of writing the program. For a long time I've had the idea that content should be stated in what I call usable form, which means organizing it so I can quickly find the information that's relevant to my needs, such as arranging it in if-then tables or flowcharts. Full-blown knowledge representation would take usable form a step further and make the content executable. Finally, it'll let me explore the general concept of learning by programming, which is an idea I've had for years but never tried. This introductory essay is also part of this larger project. Since I haven't seen others discussing this approach to learning, for me the idea is an untested but very strong hunch. As I experiment, I'll observe what works and what doesn't, with the aim of developing general methods that will work across disciplines. ==== After ==== At the end, the project will give me code and documentation I can use for purposes other than its main one of giving me a typical American math education. First, the code can act as a skeleton for organizing math reflections that aren't easily translated into code, such as discussions on math education or the philosophy of math. Some of this will probably happen even as I write the documentation for the simulator itself, though I'll try not to let it distract me for long periods. Second, it can act as a library for use in programmatic math explorations that don't fit within the curriculum, rabbit trails off the main learning path. There are already math libraries that a programmer can use to run calculations, and they're programmed much better than this one will be, but maybe mine will be organized more conveniently for some purposes. Third, this project can act as a framework for learning projects in other subject areas. I'm picturing a multi-level framework containing a software framework, an information design framework, a learning process framework, and maybe others. A general notetaking app based on these models is a tempting future project. === Reservations === With a description of programming's characteristics and benefits under our belts, it's worthwhile to look at some objections someone might make to the notion of backing up in my math relearning project to take this new approach. Given my goal of learning a lot of math deeply and quickly, is it really a good idea? '''Won't you spend all your time programming and not get to other important learning activities?''' That's certainly a danger. I agree with [http://nautil.us/issue/40/learning/how-i-rewired-my-brain-to-become-fluent-in-math-rp Barbara Oakley] that fluency is a necessary part of math learning that can easily be crowded out by a preoccupation with conceptual understanding. Similarly, telling the computer how to do math is different from developing the skills to do it myself. I'm hoping that being aware of the problem will keep me motivated to work on my fluency. '''Won't the program leave out a lot of the information you're looking for--a lot of work for not enough result?''' It's true that it won't tell me everything I'd like to know, but since I want to know how to actually do math and not just what it means, it'll tell me at least half of what I want to know, and it'll give me a better starting point than prose notes for further learning and reflection. And with programming's focus on functionality, it might help me put aside questions I'd like to explore that aren't as important and would only slow me down. Enough conceptual understanding is good. Too much is a distraction. '''Won't the overhead of programming take too much time (design, infrastructure, debugging)?''' Maybe, but certain factors reduce the usual time sink: (1) The math I'll be programming is well defined, so I'll have less to figure out than in some other domains. (2) I'm trying not to be [http://www.codethinked.com/dont-be-clever clever]. (3) The interface will be simple. (4) Since the code isn't meant to be used, I can skimp on some of the plumbing if it's slowing me down too much. (5) Always remember [https://twitter.com/Pinboard/status/761656824202276864 the Programmers' Credo]: "we do these things not because they are easy, but because we thought they were going to be easy." '''Wouldn't another learning method take less time?''' Possibly, but programming can often accomplish the same results better, so I think it's worth the extra investment. Let's look at some other approaches I might take: * ''Teaching.'' Explaining things to a student does make them clearer and more memorable to the teacher. But this is essentially what I'm doing when I program. I'm teaching the computer. And in some ways the computer asks better questions than a human student because it needs every logical detail fed to it or else it gives the wrong result or crashes the program. * ''Problem solving.'' Programming is 90% problem solving. Much of the time it's problems related to the content, and the problems reveal a lack of clarity in my understanding that gradually resolves as I figure out how the computer should carry out its task. But my program won't give me real-world situations to apply math to, so I'll need to supplement my learning with more typical word problems from regular learning materials. * ''Diagrams.'' I would love to be able to represent math knowledge as a series of incremental diagrams that can be understood and reviewed with extreme ease. I hope I can do that someday. But I'd have to find or invent a visual language that could express everything adequately, whereas I'm familiar with programming already. Plus not many diagrams are executable, so they wouldn't carry the advantages of executability. Programs in visual programming languages are executable diagrams, but I don't know those languages, and I suspect they're not the kinds of diagrams I have in mind. Making more diagram types executable is on my future project list. * ''Pseudocode.'' It's true that if I wrote my program in pseudocode instead of real code, I could approach the explicitness of regular programming without needing so much of the overhead. But it also wouldn't give me the enforced clarity of actual execution. I might leave out important details or make errors in logic that I'd never notice. It's too easy to fudge with pseudocode. * ''Traditional classroom methods.'' Here I'm thinking of (haphazard) notetaking, drills, and prepared exercises, focusing on procedural knowledge and troubleshooting that with occasional conceptual understanding. Well, I'm in favor of drills and exercises. But the main point of this project is that programming tells me how to take notes. Taking notes helps you understand what you're learning and record it in reviewable form. I strongly suspect programming will give me a focused, disciplined way to do that, and the thought of going back to random notetaking fills me with mild despair. Programming versus prose notetaking is like the difference between driving on paved roads and off-roading. Both might get me to my destination, but I prefer roads. '''Shouldn't you just trust the process instead of trying some new, untested method that'll take extra work?''' If I knew the process was trustworthy, yes. If someone with the relevant experience could tell me that anyone with my goals, my time frame, and my type of mind will succeed with these traditional methods, then I might get myself to submit to them. But a lot of the problems I've described are really frustrations I had my whole school career across a variety of subjects, and even though I did well in school, I never really got a handle on the traditional study methods. I'd like to try something new. If I can't get it to work, then I'll know it's a dead end and have a good idea of the reasons, and that'll be valuable information. '''Do you really need to trace all these conceptual threads so completely?''' Probably not, but I can start simple and add more detail later until I'm satisfied. I suspect I'll feel able to move on with my studies before I've learned all the details that interest me, and maybe I'll be able to add the rest as a side project afterward. '''Doesn't starting over waste time?''' I have a few points to make on this one. * It doesn't feel like a waste. I want a complete map, and starting it from where I left off would give me a big gap or smudge at the lower levels. It'd be like telling a driver they have to off-road for the first part of their journey because the builders couldn't be bothered to pave that area. Sometimes I like to step back and look at the big picture, tracing through the whole outline of a subject to reassure myself that it all works and I know my way around. Gaps in my notes (the program) would make that harder. * The cost to starting over is low. I hadn't gotten very far, just taken a long time to do it. This time I'm not covering all that ground--no pre-K and no philosophizing about the fundamentals of math or the meaning of numbers. I'm not even trying to digest all the educational material. I'll be focusing on the algorithms and whatever concepts they require, so the program will cover less territory per grade. * All learning involves iteration, and it's better when the iterations place the content in different contexts. The program will cover some of the same ground but very differently from my first reading, which will help whatever learning I still need to do in that area. This whole project is an experiment to see if the idea of learning by programming can work. Will I learn math as a result? Will I finish the project? Will I even get past arithmetic? I don't know. But when the other options seem worse, not knowing how well something will work is no reason not to try it. And if a project is an experiment, any failure is a success because it gives you valuable information. If the project does work, it's an approach I and others can apply to many other subject areas. <disqus/> [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Complete]] 8bced3e690ec3ef34e4090173473a6bf3ddc19d0 275 274 2016-09-27T07:21:20Z Andy Culbertson 1 Raised the Reservations section a level. wikitext text/x-wiki == Description == Math Student Simulator is an attempt to use the process of programming to learn certain aspects of math. It's a part of my math relearning project. I'm posting the code and its documentation on GitHub [https://github.com/thinkulum/math-student-sim here]. You can download and run it yourself for free. I'll update the GitHub content over time as the project progresses. Here on the wiki I'll be documenting some of the process of creating the program. The program will cover concept definitions and procedures from at least the [http://www.corestandards.org/Math/ Common Core standards]. If I get through all of those, I might add other areas of math. The structure of the program will be hierarachical. Complex concepts and procedures will be built from simpler ones. This is a key feature, because one of the main characteristics of math I want to explore is its interrelatedness. In the code for this program I'm striving for clarity, since I'll need to review it so I can learn. For the amount of thought it requires to create, code is distressingly easy to forget, and if you're not careful, it's easy to write it in such an obscure way that, when you reread it weeks after writing it, it takes a lot of work to figure out what it means and does. I expect at least three features to help with review: * I'll use generally recognized good coding practices, such as breaking the code up into small, descriptively named functions. * I'll have the program show its work as it's executing my mathematical commands. That way I can watch the hierarchy of math as it comes into play during a specific procedure. * I'll use literate programming to document my code so I can explain everything in excruciating detail while organizing and formatting my explanations clearly. Literate programming lets you write your program as essentially an article or book with the code interspersed. You then run a processing program that formats your documentation nicely for people to read and assembles the code from your document so that the computer can run it. Why do I think programming to learn math is a good idea? First let's look at what I've been trying to accomplish and the methods I've been using to achieve it, and then I'll talk about how programming could solve some of the problems I've been having with those methods. == Goals == My goals in doing my math relearning project are to relearn (1) standard math topics plus selected others (2) at an accelerated pace, (3) with enough fluency that I can work with math quickly and confidently, and (4) with a deep enough understanding that I can think flexibly about them to solve unfamiliar problems (and deep enough to keep me interested and to quench my unquenchable thirst for understanding). I expect to use math extensively in my future career (probably cognitive science) and in many of my personal projects, and I feel hindered until I can learn the math I need. == Subject matter == In several ways math is a uniquely challenging subject to learn: (1) It's almost entirely concerned with and ruled by logic, which makes its behavior very rigid, precise, and unforgiving, whereas most human minds are sloppy and hazy until they learn discipline. (2) To many people (including me) mathematical concepts feel empty and meaningless, and thus arbitrary, so they don't stick in the mind easily and can take a lot of effort to think about. (3) Math involves a large number of concepts and procedures that are highly interconnected, which can be confusing if you don't take the time to sort them out. This third factor has been my major problem so far in this project, as I'll explain below. == Current methods == Any learning, especially if, like math, it involves developing skills, will require several kinds of learning activities and multiple passes over the material so the information and skills can be processed into long-term memory. See [[A_Framework_and_Agenda_for_Memory_Improvement]] for more on that. But if a rapid pace of learning is one of your goals, you have to select your learning activities carefully so you learn adequately without wasting a lot of time. You also have to select your material's degree of breadth and depth carefully, since more of either will take a longer time to learn. What learning activities have I been trying so far? Mainly I've been reading books and other documents that explain math to teachers so they can pass on the understanding to their students. But since a lot of these documents don't explain things in quite the order and manner I'm looking for, I've been analyzing the content to articulate, separate, and trace the conceptual threads as they develop through the grades. Basically I've been expanding and shaping the content from my sources into a structure that I think will give me the kind of knowledge and skill I need. I've been writing my insights as I go. I did a pass over the whole K-12 curriculum to get an overview and then started over with pre-K to learn in detail. As I've come across procedures I'd like to perform with more fluency, I've come up with exercises I think would help me, since I don't need the kinds of exercises for young children the curriculum offers at the early levels. What kind of mathematical knowledge structure am I trying to create? It has two broad features: interconnectedness and incremental progression. The interconnectedness feature comes from (1) the idea that math is a set of logically interconnected concepts and procedures, and (2) the idea that our starting point in the development of mathematical thinking is math's relationship with the world, and (3) my goal of understanding math deeply in order to develop my mathematical intuition. This approach has a name: Teaching math in terms of its real-world meaning and its interrelationships is called conceptual math. Its opposite is procedural math, which teaches it primarily as a set of rote procedures. The second feature, incremental progression, means that ideally I'd like to find out how the whole edifice of mathematics might grow logically from the ground of human experiences and needs. Presumably that's more or less how it developed historically, though many of the details are lost to us. This goal means that each concept would be explained in terms of the more basic concepts that came before it as well as any experiences or needs that suggest the new concept or make it necessary. You'd try to avoid bringing in more advanced concepts to explain it, even if that means only explaining it to a very limited degree at first. Essentially I want a map, which is a common theme for me. If I need to navigate freely through a domain of knowledge or skill, I feel lost unless I have some kind of mental map that tells me what places are there, the borders of each place, what other places are accessible or inaccessible from it, and ways to get from one place to another. And if the map is in some concrete form so I don't have to rely completely on my shaky memory, I feel even better. Feeling lost looks like, for example, blanking on how to use a piece of knowledge, or worrying that I'll use it wrong because I know I've forgotten related pieces that would probably affect the application. It's not that feeling lost keeps me from knowing things or ever using what I know. I have impartial knowledge of all kinds of subjects, and I still get by. It just nags at me and distracts me with uncertainty, and it would be nice for once in my life to scratch the itch of wanting a well-organized body of knowledge when such a body is clearly available. === Source material === ==== Content ==== Where would I find such conceptual explanations of math? It turns out education researchers have spent decades coming up with them, and their findings have been condensed into resources I can access, such as Chapin and Johnson's <i>[http://www.worldcat.org/title/math-matters-understanding-the-math-you-teach-grades-k-8/oclc/63164894 Math Matters]</i>. However, I had trouble finding a building block approach to conceptual math until I looked into the Common Core Standards and their associated resources, primarily the [http://achievethecore.org/page/254/progressions-documents-for-the-common-core-state-standards-for-mathematics Progressions] and the [https://www.engageny.org/common-core-curriculum EngageNY curriculum]. While building up from basic concepts and experiences is the way children are taught math, adults who are being taught to teach math conceptually don't need things explained in such a stepwise fashion because they already have a broad knowledge of math and only need the concepts better integrated. So, for example, the early books I looked at thought nothing of analyzing place value in terms of exponents, even though children need to know something about place value years before they're ready to know anything about exponents. Common Core is focused on how to teach conceptual math to children rather than adults, so its developers were careful to limit their explanations of math concepts to the level of understanding available at each stage. How well they succeeded is a matter of debate, but I think they did well enough for my purposes. Why do I need to do all this work analyzing and expanding these sources' content? To form a good map, all the necessary information needs to be present, explicit, and direct. My sources don't really share my goal of building a complete mathematical edifice, so their information doesn't always follow this pattern. This was especially true of the pre-Common Core sources. Some of the information I wanted to know was missing, so as I read and tried to fill in my picture of math, I had to answer certain questions myself, such as what is a number? This was fun but took a lot of time, though in the case of defining numbers I was pleased with the results (see [[/Math_Relearning/Number_Sense]]). Fortunately, the Common Core sources answered a lot more questions for me. But then as I began reading EngageNY, I thought it'd be helpful to spell out all the propositional concepts in each module so I could trace the progression of mathematical ideas in a clear and logical order. Many of these propositions were implicit in the source material, since the logical progression I had in mind took very small steps, similar to a proof. And statements in any work are rarely written as directly as I'd like. Spelling these out or rewriting them took only a moderate amount of time, but it still felt like too much considering the amount of uncertainty I felt about the result. More on that in the Notes section below. Like I said, confusion over math's interconnections has been my major problem. The density of math itself is bad enough, but it's even worse if you're learning math by reading material about how to teach it, which brings in extra, though possibly relevant, concepts about psychology. For example, knowing the mistakes students commonly make is helpful for highlighting various aspects of the correct understanding. But this is a roundabout way of gaining insight, so it takes time to sort out. ==== Format ==== If the source material were already in reviewable form, I could just read and reread it to study. But most documents aren't written to be studied just as they are, and the Progressions and curriculum were no exception. It became clear that even familiarizing myself with their explicit content would require some kind of notetaking. I was planning to wait till I read the curriculum to concentrate on the details, but as I read through the Progressions at a moderate, steady pace, I worried that I was going to miss or forget concepts that would help me understand later ones, and with good reason, since it happened even in the middle of the reading I was doing. Especially when I got to fractions, I found myself wanting to flip back to reread earlier explanations so I could put the pieces together in my mind. But when I did flip back, the content looked less like a network of beautifully interlinked concepts and more like a bewildering wall of text. This meant that if I ''were'' going to try to learn the details this way, I'd have to spend a lot of time re-deciphering and filtering the text to review. This, to me, highlights the need to visually design complicated material so its complexity is easier to trace at a glance. In other words, prose isn't always the best tool for describing math. So as I pushed myself along, I wondered how to think of the concepts in ways that would help me truly understand and remember them. This added uncertainty and a subtle stress to the project. === Notes === A good notetaking method is a central practice in learning, because it transforms your source material into a version you can (1) understand and (2) review. Hence, if you're having trouble taking notes, it's a central problem for your learning. Since I was only reading the Progressions to give me an idea of what a Common Core curriculum would cover and how it would explain the concepts, my few notes were limited to my reactions to the content. As I mentioned earlier, I took more serious notes when I began reading the EngageNY curriculum. But as I usually do when I'm taking notes, I ran into problems even there. I didn't know how complete or reviewable my notes were. Were they expressed clearly and consistently? I didn't know if I was recording information at the best level of granularity--where did I need to spell things out in detail, and where could I write something more general, wave my hands, and say, "I know what I mean"? And was I including all the information I wanted and not extra pieces I'd have to actively ignore or delete later? I didn't have a great way to decide. I was making up my math notetaking language as I went along, and I didn't know if it was adequate or where it would get too awkward for expressing what I wanted to say. I also didn't know if I'd be wasting time writing particular kinds of notes. Should I spell out algorithms? Write out definitions? If they were already stated clearly in my sources, would it waste more time to copy them or to flip through my documents to find them again for study? So I've had problems with not only my source material but even with the notes I've been taking to wrangle it. I want to end up with a map of mathematics I can study and use, so the statements that describe it need to be explicit and direct, and it needs to be complete. My sources cover a lot of that ground (and I love them for it), but compared to what I'm looking for, their content still contains gaps, and their prose format makes rapid reviewing difficult. But when I try to lay out this math map in my notes, I find that my idea of what the map should contain and how its contents should be described is unclear. I don't know if I'll find better sources, but I know I need a better way to take notes, and I think I have one. == Programming == Programming isn't normally done as a learning activity. It's usually done to create a product, a computer program, that will perform certain functions that the user can trigger to accomplish some result in a particular domain, such as using financial software for money management. If you wanted a product that facilitated learning, you could create, for example, a flashcard program for memorization. When developers do use the actual process of programming to learn, it's usually to learn some aspect of programming, such as a specific programming language, library, or technique. But you can also use programming to learn about a domain. Someone could write a money management program simply to teach themselves how money management works. Some authors write a book to teach themselves about a topic (and in fact, writing this project introduction has helped me work out how programming can aid learning). A programmer can do the same thing by writing a program. I see two levels of benefit that programming would bring to my math learning. Programming in general has characteristics that make it a fitting vehicle for learning, and this specific project comes with its own opportunities. === General benefits === Programming has three main abilities that assist learning: aiding thought, settling emotions, and granting freedom. These abilities derive from some of the fundamental traits of programming itself and of the culture surrounding it. I'll talk about these traits first and then the benefits they enable. ==== Basic characteristics ==== Programming has two main features that let it work as a learning approach. First, it's a linguistic activity that's broad enough to express practically anything you want to say. This means you can model almost anything you can think of with a computer program, and the description of this model in the form of code acts as its map. Programming's linguistic nature also comes with the ability to record these expressions for the computer to recall later. Second, it's executable, so the computer can act on your model in some way to produce some result. The execution of a computer program is based on logic, which comes with a number of benefits that I'll explore below, such as the ability to automatically check your work for accuracy. It's also what I'd call passive execution, because on its own the computer can't reason about its instructions and make decisions about them the way a human can, which means, among other things, you have to think more carefully about the instructions you're giving it. To highlight these two overarching features, you could call programming a means of executable expression. On top of the features of programming itself, the culture of software development has at least one feature that shapes programming into an effective tool for learning, and that is its concern for efficiency. In addition to writing fast programs that conserve computer memory, developers try to minimize the amount of time, effort, money, and customer good will they spend on fixing errors in their programs and creating new features. So they look for programming practices that will avoid introducing errors and make their code easier to work with. For instance, when their program needs to do the same thing in more than one place, instead of duplicating the code, they name parts of their code and simply refer to those parts by name. That way they only have to make changes to one copy of the code (because there is only one copy), so they don't have to worry whether they've changed the copies consistently. This attention to efficiency results in various patterns that can aid learning, such as the growth of interacting software objects that can serve as pieces of your domain model. These characteristics of programming and software development lead to the benefits of sharpening thought, allowing freedom of movement, and providing emotional security. ==== Crystallization ==== As a means of executable expression, programming sharpens thought. For me, this is the main attraction of programming as an approach to learning. It crystallizes an understanding of the subject matter from the vaporous notions you start with. It does this by narrowing focus, clarifying vagueness, and enforcing logic. ===== Focus ===== Programming narrows focus. In keeping with the developer's concern for efficiency, most of the time when you're writing a program, you're focused on functionality, instructing the computer to carry out the procedures that are part of the program, which will have at least somewhat defined parameters. You could, by contrast, tell the program to do a collection of unrelated things and decorate your code with irrelevant information, but the general expectation in software development is that your code will efficiently express instructions to carry out a fairly narrow range of related tasks. After you've been programming a while, you develop an intuitive sense of the kind of information in a situation that's relevant to creating functionality in a program, and specifically in the kind of program you want to create. It's like solving a word problem in math, or better, using math to solve problems in real life. You pick out the mathematically relevant information and put it together to find the information you're missing. So as I'm reading my source material, keeping my program in mind can tell me what information to include and what to ignore, at least until later. Math clearly benefits from a focus on functionality, since you could say half of mathematical activity is calculation, a purely algorithmic endeavor. The other half is creative problem solving, which is harder to condense into a specific procedure. So you can capture a lot of mathematical knowledge in a program, and a lot of the program's functionality will be a representation of that knowledge, the content you're out to learn. Aside from whatever you write in the documentation, the code represents the domain's content in a stripped-down form, so you don't have to wade through a lot of extra verbiage to get to the essential details. ===== Clarity ===== Programming clarifies vagueness. It does this by enabling expression, requiring explicitness, and fostering organization. ====== Expression ====== Programming's enabling of expression comes from its linguistic nature. To give shape to concepts, first you need a language, and a program is a language for describing a domain, in this case math. In programming you can create bundles of data or instructions in the form of variables, functions, classes, and so on, give the bundles names, and then use the names in other instructions. It's the programming equivalent of creating words and using them in sentences. The range of data and instructions a program can represent is very broad, so you can create whole languages this way. Since they have to be executed, to a certain extent these languages are rigorously defined, and they're called formal languages, as opposed to the natural languages people speak. They also tend to be more like grammars than fully fledged languages. A programming language is the skeleton of a language, and most of the actual words are created when you use it to write a specific program. ====== Explicitness ====== The explicitness requirement arises from the logical and passive nature of the computer's execution. Even apart from computer technology, any effective method of executing instructions will be based on logic, since the results would be unpredictable otherwise, and in that case you might as well not even have the instructions. But when humans are the executors, a lot of the instructions can be implicit, since people will fill in the gaps intuitively. This means that if the instructions are written poorly because the author actually hadn't worked out all the details, the person who carries them out can end up with a much better understanding of the procedure than the person who wrote them. The computer's executing abilities are much more helpless than a human's, and a programmer has to give it an explicit instruction for every single step of its procedures. Not every programmer needs to write all of these instructions, because a set of instructions can be saved in a library or module to be included in later programs, and these libraries are often shared among programmers. But within the realm of procedures that aren't already contained in a library, if the program is to fulfill its functions, then the programmer has to work out all the details themselves, which means they'll end up with an extensive understanding of the program's domain, and many holes in their initial understanding will be filled in. While creating an algorithm, you'll discover a lot of details you weren't expecting, such as pieces of data or whole side algorithms you didn't know you'd need. This will happen even when translating a perfectly adequate procedure written for humans into code for a computer. But to me digging up new information hidden in the source material is half the fun. ====== Organization ====== Organization groups items that are related and presents them in an order that helps the reader see their relationships. It's certainly possible and even common to write very disorganized "spaghetti code," but if you're following the principle of efficiency, you'll engage in development practices that will organize your code in ways that let it function as a conceptual map. You'll move code around to more appropriate locations, streamline inefficient or duplicate code, or rework whole algorithms, and concepts and patterns will emerge as you do. If you're using an object-oriented paradigm, for example, your data structures and algorithms will get grouped into objects with properties and behaviors, and these objects will relate to each other by using each other in their behaviors or as values for their properties. You may form layers of related functionality, such as in the model-view-controller pattern, where distinct sets of code handle the program's data, its user interface, and the interaction between the two. As you organize, your mental picture of the domain will improve. You'll also think specifically about readability factors such as using consistent naming conventions and using a consistent visual formatting style for your code, which will make the code easier to review. ===== Logic ===== Programming enforces logic. Instructions written for humans can contain not only gaps but logical inconsistencies. These can be annoying for the people carrying out the instructions, but they aren't necessarily show stoppers, because people can actively determine what the correct instructions are likely to be. A computer, with its passive execution, will simply follow the exact instructions you specified, and if they have logical problems, it'll give you an incorrect result or stop executing the program altogether, leaving you to figure out what went wrong. And as you figure it out, your understanding of the domain will sharpen. Programming's dependence on logic makes it a good choice for modeling math, since math is also tightly tied to logic. (In fact, looking at the breadth of topics mathematicians consider fair game, ranging from numbers to the grammar of natural languages, I wonder if math could be defined as the study of logical structures.) The translation from math to code can be relatively simple and direct. In fact, math is one of the primary uses for programming, and I think it's safe to say any kind of math people have wanted to do has already been represented on a computer by some programming language. ==== Freedom ==== In addition to sharpening thought, programming gives you the freedom to move through the domain's content in any order, which enables various patterns of coverage. Even code that does very little is still a valid, working program. Additional functionality can attach to a lot of different places in the code, which means there's a lot of freedom in the order of features you add, and in the case of my project this freedom means I can start my code simple, start anywhere in the curriculum, and choose when I address its topics and in how much detail. It gives me the power to follow the needs of my mind and my schedule while reaping the other benefits of programming. Two examples of coverage patterns are working backward and working breadth first. Working backward would mean starting with the math I need to know for a project and learning about the earlier math that would make sense of it and so on until I got to math I already know. Working breadth first would mean learning all the topics I want to cover at a superficial, procedural level and then passing through them a few more times, learning them at increasing levels of depth. I very well might follow these patterns. Just because I want to end up with a map and because the map-like Common Core material takes a depth-first, bottom-up approach doesn't mean I have to follow that outline, even though it's what I've had in mind till now. ==== Security ==== In addition to sharpening thought, programming also gives me a strong subjective sense of security, which is important for my ability to progress in a project. This security is different from the typical IT concerns about data theft or loss from things like hackers or hardware failures. It's the emotional assurance that writing my code isn't a waste of time. Generally speaking, if I write a program that's designed well and works correctly, the following things will be true: First, the code will be stored, so I won't lose it by forgetting (data loss by wetware failure!). This seems trivial, because it's true of every program or any other content that's saved to a file, but the semi-permanence of stored information is always a subtle but profound relief to me. It lets me stop worrying about the information and turning it over and over fruitlessly in my mind. That obsessiveness comes from the fear of losing ideas I feel are important. Second, since the programming will have performed its thought crystallizing functions and the resulting code will be reviewable, I'll feel that rewriting my sources' content in code form was worthwhile. And I don't have to wait till the end to feel the security from this factor. Since I have a decent idea of the concerns that result in good code, I have a clearer way to decide whether I'm wasting my time writing each line. But even the simple fact that each part of the code contributes to its functionality is inherently reassuring to me. Each part is worthwhile just because it has a purpose within the program, even if that purpose has little to do with learning. By contrast, I wasn't clear on how well a lot of my prose notes supported my learning goals or any goals at all, which sapped my motivation to write them. Third, because it's executable in a logical fashion and gives me rapid feedback I can use to verify it, my code will make sense because it works the way I expect. The only way I could independently verify my prose notes would be to have a math expert check them, which is slower, harder to repeat, and still more error prone than a computer. Fourth, as I described in the previous section, even when the code is incomplete, it's still worthwhile, because it has a solid potential to grow into code that does more. === Project benefits === In addition to programming's general benefits for learning, I can use this particular programming project to advance other projects of mine, both during and after my work on this one. ==== During ==== Coding a math implementation gives me an earlier chance to practice and explore certain areas that'll be useful to me in future projects. I like to kill multiple birds with one (cumbersome) stone. I'd get around to learning at least some of these anyway, but it'd happen much later if I excluded programming from all the time I'd be spending on math relearning. Since they have such broad applications for me, these explorations are as much the point of the project as learning math. First, I can learn some general programming tools and techniques I've had in mind for a while: mainly [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Git Git] and [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GitHub GitHub], [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Literate_programming literate programming], [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Test-driven_development test-driven development], [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Design_by_contract design by contract], and [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aspect-oriented_programming aspect-oriented programming]. It might slow me down too much to use them all for this project, but learning at least some of them should greatly benefit future projects, or at least give me an idea of if and when they're worth using. Second, I can use the project to explore the subject of knowledge representation, which is an aspect of artificial intelligence, which feeds into cognitive science. This project is basically an exercise in knowledge representation, so it's no stretch to study it in the process of writing the program. For a long time I've had the idea that content should be stated in what I call usable form, which means organizing it so I can quickly find the information that's relevant to my needs, such as arranging it in if-then tables or flowcharts. Full-blown knowledge representation would take usable form a step further and make the content executable. Finally, it'll let me explore the general concept of learning by programming, which is an idea I've had for years but never tried. This introductory essay is also part of this larger project. Since I haven't seen others discussing this approach to learning, for me the idea is an untested but very strong hunch. As I experiment, I'll observe what works and what doesn't, with the aim of developing general methods that will work across disciplines. ==== After ==== At the end, the project will give me code and documentation I can use for purposes other than its main one of giving me a typical American math education. First, the code can act as a skeleton for organizing math reflections that aren't easily translated into code, such as discussions on math education or the philosophy of math. Some of this will probably happen even as I write the documentation for the simulator itself, though I'll try not to let it distract me for long periods. Second, it can act as a library for use in programmatic math explorations that don't fit within the curriculum, rabbit trails off the main learning path. There are already math libraries that a programmer can use to run calculations, and they're programmed much better than this one will be, but maybe mine will be organized more conveniently for some purposes. Third, this project can act as a framework for learning projects in other subject areas. I'm picturing a multi-level framework containing a software framework, an information design framework, a learning process framework, and maybe others. A general notetaking app based on these models is a tempting future project. == Reservations == With a description of programming's characteristics and benefits under our belts, it's worthwhile to look at some objections someone might make to the notion of backing up in my math relearning project to take this new approach. Given my goal of learning a lot of math deeply and quickly, is it really a good idea? '''Won't you spend all your time programming and not get to other important learning activities?''' That's certainly a danger. I agree with [http://nautil.us/issue/40/learning/how-i-rewired-my-brain-to-become-fluent-in-math-rp Barbara Oakley] that fluency is a necessary part of math learning that can easily be crowded out by a preoccupation with conceptual understanding. Similarly, telling the computer how to do math is different from developing the skills to do it myself. I'm hoping that being aware of the problem will keep me motivated to work on my fluency. '''Won't the program leave out a lot of the information you're looking for--a lot of work for not enough result?''' It's true that it won't tell me everything I'd like to know, but since I want to know how to actually do math and not just what it means, it'll tell me at least half of what I want to know, and it'll give me a better starting point than prose notes for further learning and reflection. And with programming's focus on functionality, it might help me put aside questions I'd like to explore that aren't as important and would only slow me down. Enough conceptual understanding is good. Too much is a distraction. '''Won't the overhead of programming take too much time (design, infrastructure, debugging)?''' Maybe, but certain factors reduce the usual time sink: (1) The math I'll be programming is well defined, so I'll have less to figure out than in some other domains. (2) I'm trying not to be [http://www.codethinked.com/dont-be-clever clever]. (3) The interface will be simple. (4) Since the code isn't meant to be used, I can skimp on some of the plumbing if it's slowing me down too much. (5) Always remember [https://twitter.com/Pinboard/status/761656824202276864 the Programmers' Credo]: "we do these things not because they are easy, but because we thought they were going to be easy." '''Wouldn't another learning method take less time?''' Possibly, but programming can often accomplish the same results better, so I think it's worth the extra investment. Let's look at some other approaches I might take: * ''Teaching.'' Explaining things to a student does make them clearer and more memorable to the teacher. But this is essentially what I'm doing when I program. I'm teaching the computer. And in some ways the computer asks better questions than a human student because it needs every logical detail fed to it or else it gives the wrong result or crashes the program. * ''Problem solving.'' Programming is 90% problem solving. Much of the time it's problems related to the content, and the problems reveal a lack of clarity in my understanding that gradually resolves as I figure out how the computer should carry out its task. But my program won't give me real-world situations to apply math to, so I'll need to supplement my learning with more typical word problems from regular learning materials. * ''Diagrams.'' I would love to be able to represent math knowledge as a series of incremental diagrams that can be understood and reviewed with extreme ease. I hope I can do that someday. But I'd have to find or invent a visual language that could express everything adequately, whereas I'm familiar with programming already. Plus not many diagrams are executable, so they wouldn't carry the advantages of executability. Programs in visual programming languages are executable diagrams, but I don't know those languages, and I suspect they're not the kinds of diagrams I have in mind. Making more diagram types executable is on my future project list. * ''Pseudocode.'' It's true that if I wrote my program in pseudocode instead of real code, I could approach the explicitness of regular programming without needing so much of the overhead. But it also wouldn't give me the enforced clarity of actual execution. I might leave out important details or make errors in logic that I'd never notice. It's too easy to fudge with pseudocode. * ''Traditional classroom methods.'' Here I'm thinking of (haphazard) notetaking, drills, and prepared exercises, focusing on procedural knowledge and troubleshooting that with occasional conceptual understanding. Well, I'm in favor of drills and exercises. But the main point of this project is that programming tells me how to take notes. Taking notes helps you understand what you're learning and record it in reviewable form. I strongly suspect programming will give me a focused, disciplined way to do that, and the thought of going back to random notetaking fills me with mild despair. Programming versus prose notetaking is like the difference between driving on paved roads and off-roading. Both might get me to my destination, but I prefer roads. '''Shouldn't you just trust the process instead of trying some new, untested method that'll take extra work?''' If I knew the process was trustworthy, yes. If someone with the relevant experience could tell me that anyone with my goals, my time frame, and my type of mind will succeed with these traditional methods, then I might get myself to submit to them. But a lot of the problems I've described are really frustrations I had my whole school career across a variety of subjects, and even though I did well in school, I never really got a handle on the traditional study methods. I'd like to try something new. If I can't get it to work, then I'll know it's a dead end and have a good idea of the reasons, and that'll be valuable information. '''Do you really need to trace all these conceptual threads so completely?''' Probably not, but I can start simple and add more detail later until I'm satisfied. I suspect I'll feel able to move on with my studies before I've learned all the details that interest me, and maybe I'll be able to add the rest as a side project afterward. '''Doesn't starting over waste time?''' I have a few points to make on this one. * It doesn't feel like a waste. I want a complete map, and starting it from where I left off would give me a big gap or smudge at the lower levels. It'd be like telling a driver they have to off-road for the first part of their journey because the builders couldn't be bothered to pave that area. Sometimes I like to step back and look at the big picture, tracing through the whole outline of a subject to reassure myself that it all works and I know my way around. Gaps in my notes (the program) would make that harder. * The cost to starting over is low. I hadn't gotten very far, just taken a long time to do it. This time I'm not covering all that ground--no pre-K and no philosophizing about the fundamentals of math or the meaning of numbers. I'm not even trying to digest all the educational material. I'll be focusing on the algorithms and whatever concepts they require, so the program will cover less territory per grade. * All learning involves iteration, and it's better when the iterations place the content in different contexts. The program will cover some of the same ground but very differently from my first reading, which will help whatever learning I still need to do in that area. This whole project is an experiment to see if the idea of learning by programming can work. Will I learn math as a result? Will I finish the project? Will I even get past arithmetic? I don't know. But when the other options seem worse, not knowing how well something will work is no reason not to try it. And if a project is an experiment, any failure is a success because it gives you valuable information. If the project does work, it's an approach I and others can apply to many other subject areas. <disqus/> [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Complete]] 2bd8f398a1973434a79072984678a4cf76ca4c95 276 275 2016-09-27T07:28:31Z Andy Culbertson 1 Fixed the Number Sense and Memory Improvement links. wikitext text/x-wiki == Description == Math Student Simulator is an attempt to use the process of programming to learn certain aspects of math. It's a part of my math relearning project. I'm posting the code and its documentation on GitHub [https://github.com/thinkulum/math-student-sim here]. You can download and run it yourself for free. I'll update the GitHub content over time as the project progresses. Here on the wiki I'll be documenting some of the process of creating the program. The program will cover concept definitions and procedures from at least the [http://www.corestandards.org/Math/ Common Core standards]. If I get through all of those, I might add other areas of math. The structure of the program will be hierarachical. Complex concepts and procedures will be built from simpler ones. This is a key feature, because one of the main characteristics of math I want to explore is its interrelatedness. In the code for this program I'm striving for clarity, since I'll need to review it so I can learn. For the amount of thought it requires to create, code is distressingly easy to forget, and if you're not careful, it's easy to write it in such an obscure way that, when you reread it weeks after writing it, it takes a lot of work to figure out what it means and does. I expect at least three features to help with review: * I'll use generally recognized good coding practices, such as breaking the code up into small, descriptively named functions. * I'll have the program show its work as it's executing my mathematical commands. That way I can watch the hierarchy of math as it comes into play during a specific procedure. * I'll use literate programming to document my code so I can explain everything in excruciating detail while organizing and formatting my explanations clearly. Literate programming lets you write your program as essentially an article or book with the code interspersed. You then run a processing program that formats your documentation nicely for people to read and assembles the code from your document so that the computer can run it. Why do I think programming to learn math is a good idea? First let's look at what I've been trying to accomplish and the methods I've been using to achieve it, and then I'll talk about how programming could solve some of the problems I've been having with those methods. == Goals == My goals in doing my math relearning project are to relearn (1) standard math topics plus selected others (2) at an accelerated pace, (3) with enough fluency that I can work with math quickly and confidently, and (4) with a deep enough understanding that I can think flexibly about them to solve unfamiliar problems (and deep enough to keep me interested and to quench my unquenchable thirst for understanding). I expect to use math extensively in my future career (probably cognitive science) and in many of my personal projects, and I feel hindered until I can learn the math I need. == Subject matter == In several ways math is a uniquely challenging subject to learn: (1) It's almost entirely concerned with and ruled by logic, which makes its behavior very rigid, precise, and unforgiving, whereas most human minds are sloppy and hazy until they learn discipline. (2) To many people (including me) mathematical concepts feel empty and meaningless, and thus arbitrary, so they don't stick in the mind easily and can take a lot of effort to think about. (3) Math involves a large number of concepts and procedures that are highly interconnected, which can be confusing if you don't take the time to sort them out. This third factor has been my major problem so far in this project, as I'll explain below. == Current methods == Any learning, especially if, like math, it involves developing skills, will require several kinds of learning activities and multiple passes over the material so the information and skills can be processed into long-term memory. See [[A Framework and Agenda for Memory Improvement]] for more on that. But if a rapid pace of learning is one of your goals, you have to select your learning activities carefully so you learn adequately without wasting a lot of time. You also have to select your material's degree of breadth and depth carefully, since more of either will take a longer time to learn. What learning activities have I been trying so far? Mainly I've been reading books and other documents that explain math to teachers so they can pass on the understanding to their students. But since a lot of these documents don't explain things in quite the order and manner I'm looking for, I've been analyzing the content to articulate, separate, and trace the conceptual threads as they develop through the grades. Basically I've been expanding and shaping the content from my sources into a structure that I think will give me the kind of knowledge and skill I need. I've been writing my insights as I go. I did a pass over the whole K-12 curriculum to get an overview and then started over with pre-K to learn in detail. As I've come across procedures I'd like to perform with more fluency, I've come up with exercises I think would help me, since I don't need the kinds of exercises for young children the curriculum offers at the early levels. What kind of mathematical knowledge structure am I trying to create? It has two broad features: interconnectedness and incremental progression. The interconnectedness feature comes from (1) the idea that math is a set of logically interconnected concepts and procedures, and (2) the idea that our starting point in the development of mathematical thinking is math's relationship with the world, and (3) my goal of understanding math deeply in order to develop my mathematical intuition. This approach has a name: Teaching math in terms of its real-world meaning and its interrelationships is called conceptual math. Its opposite is procedural math, which teaches it primarily as a set of rote procedures. The second feature, incremental progression, means that ideally I'd like to find out how the whole edifice of mathematics might grow logically from the ground of human experiences and needs. Presumably that's more or less how it developed historically, though many of the details are lost to us. This goal means that each concept would be explained in terms of the more basic concepts that came before it as well as any experiences or needs that suggest the new concept or make it necessary. You'd try to avoid bringing in more advanced concepts to explain it, even if that means only explaining it to a very limited degree at first. Essentially I want a map, which is a common theme for me. If I need to navigate freely through a domain of knowledge or skill, I feel lost unless I have some kind of mental map that tells me what places are there, the borders of each place, what other places are accessible or inaccessible from it, and ways to get from one place to another. And if the map is in some concrete form so I don't have to rely completely on my shaky memory, I feel even better. Feeling lost looks like, for example, blanking on how to use a piece of knowledge, or worrying that I'll use it wrong because I know I've forgotten related pieces that would probably affect the application. It's not that feeling lost keeps me from knowing things or ever using what I know. I have impartial knowledge of all kinds of subjects, and I still get by. It just nags at me and distracts me with uncertainty, and it would be nice for once in my life to scratch the itch of wanting a well-organized body of knowledge when such a body is clearly available. === Source material === ==== Content ==== Where would I find such conceptual explanations of math? It turns out education researchers have spent decades coming up with them, and their findings have been condensed into resources I can access, such as Chapin and Johnson's <i>[http://www.worldcat.org/title/math-matters-understanding-the-math-you-teach-grades-k-8/oclc/63164894 Math Matters]</i>. However, I had trouble finding a building block approach to conceptual math until I looked into the Common Core Standards and their associated resources, primarily the [http://achievethecore.org/page/254/progressions-documents-for-the-common-core-state-standards-for-mathematics Progressions] and the [https://www.engageny.org/common-core-curriculum EngageNY curriculum]. While building up from basic concepts and experiences is the way children are taught math, adults who are being taught to teach math conceptually don't need things explained in such a stepwise fashion because they already have a broad knowledge of math and only need the concepts better integrated. So, for example, the early books I looked at thought nothing of analyzing place value in terms of exponents, even though children need to know something about place value years before they're ready to know anything about exponents. Common Core is focused on how to teach conceptual math to children rather than adults, so its developers were careful to limit their explanations of math concepts to the level of understanding available at each stage. How well they succeeded is a matter of debate, but I think they did well enough for my purposes. Why do I need to do all this work analyzing and expanding these sources' content? To form a good map, all the necessary information needs to be present, explicit, and direct. My sources don't really share my goal of building a complete mathematical edifice, so their information doesn't always follow this pattern. This was especially true of the pre-Common Core sources. Some of the information I wanted to know was missing, so as I read and tried to fill in my picture of math, I had to answer certain questions myself, such as what is a number? This was fun but took a lot of time, though in the case of defining numbers I was pleased with the results (see [[Math Relearning/Number Sense]]). Fortunately, the Common Core sources answered a lot more questions for me. But then as I began reading EngageNY, I thought it'd be helpful to spell out all the propositional concepts in each module so I could trace the progression of mathematical ideas in a clear and logical order. Many of these propositions were implicit in the source material, since the logical progression I had in mind took very small steps, similar to a proof. And statements in any work are rarely written as directly as I'd like. Spelling these out or rewriting them took only a moderate amount of time, but it still felt like too much considering the amount of uncertainty I felt about the result. More on that in the Notes section below. Like I said, confusion over math's interconnections has been my major problem. The density of math itself is bad enough, but it's even worse if you're learning math by reading material about how to teach it, which brings in extra, though possibly relevant, concepts about psychology. For example, knowing the mistakes students commonly make is helpful for highlighting various aspects of the correct understanding. But this is a roundabout way of gaining insight, so it takes time to sort out. ==== Format ==== If the source material were already in reviewable form, I could just read and reread it to study. But most documents aren't written to be studied just as they are, and the Progressions and curriculum were no exception. It became clear that even familiarizing myself with their explicit content would require some kind of notetaking. I was planning to wait till I read the curriculum to concentrate on the details, but as I read through the Progressions at a moderate, steady pace, I worried that I was going to miss or forget concepts that would help me understand later ones, and with good reason, since it happened even in the middle of the reading I was doing. Especially when I got to fractions, I found myself wanting to flip back to reread earlier explanations so I could put the pieces together in my mind. But when I did flip back, the content looked less like a network of beautifully interlinked concepts and more like a bewildering wall of text. This meant that if I ''were'' going to try to learn the details this way, I'd have to spend a lot of time re-deciphering and filtering the text to review. This, to me, highlights the need to visually design complicated material so its complexity is easier to trace at a glance. In other words, prose isn't always the best tool for describing math. So as I pushed myself along, I wondered how to think of the concepts in ways that would help me truly understand and remember them. This added uncertainty and a subtle stress to the project. === Notes === A good notetaking method is a central practice in learning, because it transforms your source material into a version you can (1) understand and (2) review. Hence, if you're having trouble taking notes, it's a central problem for your learning. Since I was only reading the Progressions to give me an idea of what a Common Core curriculum would cover and how it would explain the concepts, my few notes were limited to my reactions to the content. As I mentioned earlier, I took more serious notes when I began reading the EngageNY curriculum. But as I usually do when I'm taking notes, I ran into problems even there. I didn't know how complete or reviewable my notes were. Were they expressed clearly and consistently? I didn't know if I was recording information at the best level of granularity--where did I need to spell things out in detail, and where could I write something more general, wave my hands, and say, "I know what I mean"? And was I including all the information I wanted and not extra pieces I'd have to actively ignore or delete later? I didn't have a great way to decide. I was making up my math notetaking language as I went along, and I didn't know if it was adequate or where it would get too awkward for expressing what I wanted to say. I also didn't know if I'd be wasting time writing particular kinds of notes. Should I spell out algorithms? Write out definitions? If they were already stated clearly in my sources, would it waste more time to copy them or to flip through my documents to find them again for study? So I've had problems with not only my source material but even with the notes I've been taking to wrangle it. I want to end up with a map of mathematics I can study and use, so the statements that describe it need to be explicit and direct, and it needs to be complete. My sources cover a lot of that ground (and I love them for it), but compared to what I'm looking for, their content still contains gaps, and their prose format makes rapid reviewing difficult. But when I try to lay out this math map in my notes, I find that my idea of what the map should contain and how its contents should be described is unclear. I don't know if I'll find better sources, but I know I need a better way to take notes, and I think I have one. == Programming == Programming isn't normally done as a learning activity. It's usually done to create a product, a computer program, that will perform certain functions that the user can trigger to accomplish some result in a particular domain, such as using financial software for money management. If you wanted a product that facilitated learning, you could create, for example, a flashcard program for memorization. When developers do use the actual process of programming to learn, it's usually to learn some aspect of programming, such as a specific programming language, library, or technique. But you can also use programming to learn about a domain. Someone could write a money management program simply to teach themselves how money management works. Some authors write a book to teach themselves about a topic (and in fact, writing this project introduction has helped me work out how programming can aid learning). A programmer can do the same thing by writing a program. I see two levels of benefit that programming would bring to my math learning. Programming in general has characteristics that make it a fitting vehicle for learning, and this specific project comes with its own opportunities. === General benefits === Programming has three main abilities that assist learning: aiding thought, settling emotions, and granting freedom. These abilities derive from some of the fundamental traits of programming itself and of the culture surrounding it. I'll talk about these traits first and then the benefits they enable. ==== Basic characteristics ==== Programming has two main features that let it work as a learning approach. First, it's a linguistic activity that's broad enough to express practically anything you want to say. This means you can model almost anything you can think of with a computer program, and the description of this model in the form of code acts as its map. Programming's linguistic nature also comes with the ability to record these expressions for the computer to recall later. Second, it's executable, so the computer can act on your model in some way to produce some result. The execution of a computer program is based on logic, which comes with a number of benefits that I'll explore below, such as the ability to automatically check your work for accuracy. It's also what I'd call passive execution, because on its own the computer can't reason about its instructions and make decisions about them the way a human can, which means, among other things, you have to think more carefully about the instructions you're giving it. To highlight these two overarching features, you could call programming a means of executable expression. On top of the features of programming itself, the culture of software development has at least one feature that shapes programming into an effective tool for learning, and that is its concern for efficiency. In addition to writing fast programs that conserve computer memory, developers try to minimize the amount of time, effort, money, and customer good will they spend on fixing errors in their programs and creating new features. So they look for programming practices that will avoid introducing errors and make their code easier to work with. For instance, when their program needs to do the same thing in more than one place, instead of duplicating the code, they name parts of their code and simply refer to those parts by name. That way they only have to make changes to one copy of the code (because there is only one copy), so they don't have to worry whether they've changed the copies consistently. This attention to efficiency results in various patterns that can aid learning, such as the growth of interacting software objects that can serve as pieces of your domain model. These characteristics of programming and software development lead to the benefits of sharpening thought, allowing freedom of movement, and providing emotional security. ==== Crystallization ==== As a means of executable expression, programming sharpens thought. For me, this is the main attraction of programming as an approach to learning. It crystallizes an understanding of the subject matter from the vaporous notions you start with. It does this by narrowing focus, clarifying vagueness, and enforcing logic. ===== Focus ===== Programming narrows focus. In keeping with the developer's concern for efficiency, most of the time when you're writing a program, you're focused on functionality, instructing the computer to carry out the procedures that are part of the program, which will have at least somewhat defined parameters. You could, by contrast, tell the program to do a collection of unrelated things and decorate your code with irrelevant information, but the general expectation in software development is that your code will efficiently express instructions to carry out a fairly narrow range of related tasks. After you've been programming a while, you develop an intuitive sense of the kind of information in a situation that's relevant to creating functionality in a program, and specifically in the kind of program you want to create. It's like solving a word problem in math, or better, using math to solve problems in real life. You pick out the mathematically relevant information and put it together to find the information you're missing. So as I'm reading my source material, keeping my program in mind can tell me what information to include and what to ignore, at least until later. Math clearly benefits from a focus on functionality, since you could say half of mathematical activity is calculation, a purely algorithmic endeavor. The other half is creative problem solving, which is harder to condense into a specific procedure. So you can capture a lot of mathematical knowledge in a program, and a lot of the program's functionality will be a representation of that knowledge, the content you're out to learn. Aside from whatever you write in the documentation, the code represents the domain's content in a stripped-down form, so you don't have to wade through a lot of extra verbiage to get to the essential details. ===== Clarity ===== Programming clarifies vagueness. It does this by enabling expression, requiring explicitness, and fostering organization. ====== Expression ====== Programming's enabling of expression comes from its linguistic nature. To give shape to concepts, first you need a language, and a program is a language for describing a domain, in this case math. In programming you can create bundles of data or instructions in the form of variables, functions, classes, and so on, give the bundles names, and then use the names in other instructions. It's the programming equivalent of creating words and using them in sentences. The range of data and instructions a program can represent is very broad, so you can create whole languages this way. Since they have to be executed, to a certain extent these languages are rigorously defined, and they're called formal languages, as opposed to the natural languages people speak. They also tend to be more like grammars than fully fledged languages. A programming language is the skeleton of a language, and most of the actual words are created when you use it to write a specific program. ====== Explicitness ====== The explicitness requirement arises from the logical and passive nature of the computer's execution. Even apart from computer technology, any effective method of executing instructions will be based on logic, since the results would be unpredictable otherwise, and in that case you might as well not even have the instructions. But when humans are the executors, a lot of the instructions can be implicit, since people will fill in the gaps intuitively. This means that if the instructions are written poorly because the author actually hadn't worked out all the details, the person who carries them out can end up with a much better understanding of the procedure than the person who wrote them. The computer's executing abilities are much more helpless than a human's, and a programmer has to give it an explicit instruction for every single step of its procedures. Not every programmer needs to write all of these instructions, because a set of instructions can be saved in a library or module to be included in later programs, and these libraries are often shared among programmers. But within the realm of procedures that aren't already contained in a library, if the program is to fulfill its functions, then the programmer has to work out all the details themselves, which means they'll end up with an extensive understanding of the program's domain, and many holes in their initial understanding will be filled in. While creating an algorithm, you'll discover a lot of details you weren't expecting, such as pieces of data or whole side algorithms you didn't know you'd need. This will happen even when translating a perfectly adequate procedure written for humans into code for a computer. But to me digging up new information hidden in the source material is half the fun. ====== Organization ====== Organization groups items that are related and presents them in an order that helps the reader see their relationships. It's certainly possible and even common to write very disorganized "spaghetti code," but if you're following the principle of efficiency, you'll engage in development practices that will organize your code in ways that let it function as a conceptual map. You'll move code around to more appropriate locations, streamline inefficient or duplicate code, or rework whole algorithms, and concepts and patterns will emerge as you do. If you're using an object-oriented paradigm, for example, your data structures and algorithms will get grouped into objects with properties and behaviors, and these objects will relate to each other by using each other in their behaviors or as values for their properties. You may form layers of related functionality, such as in the model-view-controller pattern, where distinct sets of code handle the program's data, its user interface, and the interaction between the two. As you organize, your mental picture of the domain will improve. You'll also think specifically about readability factors such as using consistent naming conventions and using a consistent visual formatting style for your code, which will make the code easier to review. ===== Logic ===== Programming enforces logic. Instructions written for humans can contain not only gaps but logical inconsistencies. These can be annoying for the people carrying out the instructions, but they aren't necessarily show stoppers, because people can actively determine what the correct instructions are likely to be. A computer, with its passive execution, will simply follow the exact instructions you specified, and if they have logical problems, it'll give you an incorrect result or stop executing the program altogether, leaving you to figure out what went wrong. And as you figure it out, your understanding of the domain will sharpen. Programming's dependence on logic makes it a good choice for modeling math, since math is also tightly tied to logic. (In fact, looking at the breadth of topics mathematicians consider fair game, ranging from numbers to the grammar of natural languages, I wonder if math could be defined as the study of logical structures.) The translation from math to code can be relatively simple and direct. In fact, math is one of the primary uses for programming, and I think it's safe to say any kind of math people have wanted to do has already been represented on a computer by some programming language. ==== Freedom ==== In addition to sharpening thought, programming gives you the freedom to move through the domain's content in any order, which enables various patterns of coverage. Even code that does very little is still a valid, working program. Additional functionality can attach to a lot of different places in the code, which means there's a lot of freedom in the order of features you add, and in the case of my project this freedom means I can start my code simple, start anywhere in the curriculum, and choose when I address its topics and in how much detail. It gives me the power to follow the needs of my mind and my schedule while reaping the other benefits of programming. Two examples of coverage patterns are working backward and working breadth first. Working backward would mean starting with the math I need to know for a project and learning about the earlier math that would make sense of it and so on until I got to math I already know. Working breadth first would mean learning all the topics I want to cover at a superficial, procedural level and then passing through them a few more times, learning them at increasing levels of depth. I very well might follow these patterns. Just because I want to end up with a map and because the map-like Common Core material takes a depth-first, bottom-up approach doesn't mean I have to follow that outline, even though it's what I've had in mind till now. ==== Security ==== In addition to sharpening thought, programming also gives me a strong subjective sense of security, which is important for my ability to progress in a project. This security is different from the typical IT concerns about data theft or loss from things like hackers or hardware failures. It's the emotional assurance that writing my code isn't a waste of time. Generally speaking, if I write a program that's designed well and works correctly, the following things will be true: First, the code will be stored, so I won't lose it by forgetting (data loss by wetware failure!). This seems trivial, because it's true of every program or any other content that's saved to a file, but the semi-permanence of stored information is always a subtle but profound relief to me. It lets me stop worrying about the information and turning it over and over fruitlessly in my mind. That obsessiveness comes from the fear of losing ideas I feel are important. Second, since the programming will have performed its thought crystallizing functions and the resulting code will be reviewable, I'll feel that rewriting my sources' content in code form was worthwhile. And I don't have to wait till the end to feel the security from this factor. Since I have a decent idea of the concerns that result in good code, I have a clearer way to decide whether I'm wasting my time writing each line. But even the simple fact that each part of the code contributes to its functionality is inherently reassuring to me. Each part is worthwhile just because it has a purpose within the program, even if that purpose has little to do with learning. By contrast, I wasn't clear on how well a lot of my prose notes supported my learning goals or any goals at all, which sapped my motivation to write them. Third, because it's executable in a logical fashion and gives me rapid feedback I can use to verify it, my code will make sense because it works the way I expect. The only way I could independently verify my prose notes would be to have a math expert check them, which is slower, harder to repeat, and still more error prone than a computer. Fourth, as I described in the previous section, even when the code is incomplete, it's still worthwhile, because it has a solid potential to grow into code that does more. === Project benefits === In addition to programming's general benefits for learning, I can use this particular programming project to advance other projects of mine, both during and after my work on this one. ==== During ==== Coding a math implementation gives me an earlier chance to practice and explore certain areas that'll be useful to me in future projects. I like to kill multiple birds with one (cumbersome) stone. I'd get around to learning at least some of these anyway, but it'd happen much later if I excluded programming from all the time I'd be spending on math relearning. Since they have such broad applications for me, these explorations are as much the point of the project as learning math. First, I can learn some general programming tools and techniques I've had in mind for a while: mainly [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Git Git] and [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GitHub GitHub], [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Literate_programming literate programming], [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Test-driven_development test-driven development], [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Design_by_contract design by contract], and [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aspect-oriented_programming aspect-oriented programming]. It might slow me down too much to use them all for this project, but learning at least some of them should greatly benefit future projects, or at least give me an idea of if and when they're worth using. Second, I can use the project to explore the subject of knowledge representation, which is an aspect of artificial intelligence, which feeds into cognitive science. This project is basically an exercise in knowledge representation, so it's no stretch to study it in the process of writing the program. For a long time I've had the idea that content should be stated in what I call usable form, which means organizing it so I can quickly find the information that's relevant to my needs, such as arranging it in if-then tables or flowcharts. Full-blown knowledge representation would take usable form a step further and make the content executable. Finally, it'll let me explore the general concept of learning by programming, which is an idea I've had for years but never tried. This introductory essay is also part of this larger project. Since I haven't seen others discussing this approach to learning, for me the idea is an untested but very strong hunch. As I experiment, I'll observe what works and what doesn't, with the aim of developing general methods that will work across disciplines. ==== After ==== At the end, the project will give me code and documentation I can use for purposes other than its main one of giving me a typical American math education. First, the code can act as a skeleton for organizing math reflections that aren't easily translated into code, such as discussions on math education or the philosophy of math. Some of this will probably happen even as I write the documentation for the simulator itself, though I'll try not to let it distract me for long periods. Second, it can act as a library for use in programmatic math explorations that don't fit within the curriculum, rabbit trails off the main learning path. There are already math libraries that a programmer can use to run calculations, and they're programmed much better than this one will be, but maybe mine will be organized more conveniently for some purposes. Third, this project can act as a framework for learning projects in other subject areas. I'm picturing a multi-level framework containing a software framework, an information design framework, a learning process framework, and maybe others. A general notetaking app based on these models is a tempting future project. == Reservations == With a description of programming's characteristics and benefits under our belts, it's worthwhile to look at some objections someone might make to the notion of backing up in my math relearning project to take this new approach. Given my goal of learning a lot of math deeply and quickly, is it really a good idea? '''Won't you spend all your time programming and not get to other important learning activities?''' That's certainly a danger. I agree with [http://nautil.us/issue/40/learning/how-i-rewired-my-brain-to-become-fluent-in-math-rp Barbara Oakley] that fluency is a necessary part of math learning that can easily be crowded out by a preoccupation with conceptual understanding. Similarly, telling the computer how to do math is different from developing the skills to do it myself. I'm hoping that being aware of the problem will keep me motivated to work on my fluency. '''Won't the program leave out a lot of the information you're looking for--a lot of work for not enough result?''' It's true that it won't tell me everything I'd like to know, but since I want to know how to actually do math and not just what it means, it'll tell me at least half of what I want to know, and it'll give me a better starting point than prose notes for further learning and reflection. And with programming's focus on functionality, it might help me put aside questions I'd like to explore that aren't as important and would only slow me down. Enough conceptual understanding is good. Too much is a distraction. '''Won't the overhead of programming take too much time (design, infrastructure, debugging)?''' Maybe, but certain factors reduce the usual time sink: (1) The math I'll be programming is well defined, so I'll have less to figure out than in some other domains. (2) I'm trying not to be [http://www.codethinked.com/dont-be-clever clever]. (3) The interface will be simple. (4) Since the code isn't meant to be used, I can skimp on some of the plumbing if it's slowing me down too much. (5) Always remember [https://twitter.com/Pinboard/status/761656824202276864 the Programmers' Credo]: "we do these things not because they are easy, but because we thought they were going to be easy." '''Wouldn't another learning method take less time?''' Possibly, but programming can often accomplish the same results better, so I think it's worth the extra investment. Let's look at some other approaches I might take: * ''Teaching.'' Explaining things to a student does make them clearer and more memorable to the teacher. But this is essentially what I'm doing when I program. I'm teaching the computer. And in some ways the computer asks better questions than a human student because it needs every logical detail fed to it or else it gives the wrong result or crashes the program. * ''Problem solving.'' Programming is 90% problem solving. Much of the time it's problems related to the content, and the problems reveal a lack of clarity in my understanding that gradually resolves as I figure out how the computer should carry out its task. But my program won't give me real-world situations to apply math to, so I'll need to supplement my learning with more typical word problems from regular learning materials. * ''Diagrams.'' I would love to be able to represent math knowledge as a series of incremental diagrams that can be understood and reviewed with extreme ease. I hope I can do that someday. But I'd have to find or invent a visual language that could express everything adequately, whereas I'm familiar with programming already. Plus not many diagrams are executable, so they wouldn't carry the advantages of executability. Programs in visual programming languages are executable diagrams, but I don't know those languages, and I suspect they're not the kinds of diagrams I have in mind. Making more diagram types executable is on my future project list. * ''Pseudocode.'' It's true that if I wrote my program in pseudocode instead of real code, I could approach the explicitness of regular programming without needing so much of the overhead. But it also wouldn't give me the enforced clarity of actual execution. I might leave out important details or make errors in logic that I'd never notice. It's too easy to fudge with pseudocode. * ''Traditional classroom methods.'' Here I'm thinking of (haphazard) notetaking, drills, and prepared exercises, focusing on procedural knowledge and troubleshooting that with occasional conceptual understanding. Well, I'm in favor of drills and exercises. But the main point of this project is that programming tells me how to take notes. Taking notes helps you understand what you're learning and record it in reviewable form. I strongly suspect programming will give me a focused, disciplined way to do that, and the thought of going back to random notetaking fills me with mild despair. Programming versus prose notetaking is like the difference between driving on paved roads and off-roading. Both might get me to my destination, but I prefer roads. '''Shouldn't you just trust the process instead of trying some new, untested method that'll take extra work?''' If I knew the process was trustworthy, yes. If someone with the relevant experience could tell me that anyone with my goals, my time frame, and my type of mind will succeed with these traditional methods, then I might get myself to submit to them. But a lot of the problems I've described are really frustrations I had my whole school career across a variety of subjects, and even though I did well in school, I never really got a handle on the traditional study methods. I'd like to try something new. If I can't get it to work, then I'll know it's a dead end and have a good idea of the reasons, and that'll be valuable information. '''Do you really need to trace all these conceptual threads so completely?''' Probably not, but I can start simple and add more detail later until I'm satisfied. I suspect I'll feel able to move on with my studies before I've learned all the details that interest me, and maybe I'll be able to add the rest as a side project afterward. '''Doesn't starting over waste time?''' I have a few points to make on this one. * It doesn't feel like a waste. I want a complete map, and starting it from where I left off would give me a big gap or smudge at the lower levels. It'd be like telling a driver they have to off-road for the first part of their journey because the builders couldn't be bothered to pave that area. Sometimes I like to step back and look at the big picture, tracing through the whole outline of a subject to reassure myself that it all works and I know my way around. Gaps in my notes (the program) would make that harder. * The cost to starting over is low. I hadn't gotten very far, just taken a long time to do it. This time I'm not covering all that ground--no pre-K and no philosophizing about the fundamentals of math or the meaning of numbers. I'm not even trying to digest all the educational material. I'll be focusing on the algorithms and whatever concepts they require, so the program will cover less territory per grade. * All learning involves iteration, and it's better when the iterations place the content in different contexts. The program will cover some of the same ground but very differently from my first reading, which will help whatever learning I still need to do in that area. This whole project is an experiment to see if the idea of learning by programming can work. Will I learn math as a result? Will I finish the project? Will I even get past arithmetic? I don't know. But when the other options seem worse, not knowing how well something will work is no reason not to try it. And if a project is an experiment, any failure is a success because it gives you valuable information. If the project does work, it's an approach I and others can apply to many other subject areas. <disqus/> [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Complete]] 9bf972d3b6b5678024ba3e24345e31b0cf1739b2 277 276 2016-09-27T12:11:56Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added a point to the problem solving approach. wikitext text/x-wiki == Description == Math Student Simulator is an attempt to use the process of programming to learn certain aspects of math. It's a part of my math relearning project. I'm posting the code and its documentation on GitHub [https://github.com/thinkulum/math-student-sim here]. You can download and run it yourself for free. I'll update the GitHub content over time as the project progresses. Here on the wiki I'll be documenting some of the process of creating the program. The program will cover concept definitions and procedures from at least the [http://www.corestandards.org/Math/ Common Core standards]. If I get through all of those, I might add other areas of math. The structure of the program will be hierarachical. Complex concepts and procedures will be built from simpler ones. This is a key feature, because one of the main characteristics of math I want to explore is its interrelatedness. In the code for this program I'm striving for clarity, since I'll need to review it so I can learn. For the amount of thought it requires to create, code is distressingly easy to forget, and if you're not careful, it's easy to write it in such an obscure way that, when you reread it weeks after writing it, it takes a lot of work to figure out what it means and does. I expect at least three features to help with review: * I'll use generally recognized good coding practices, such as breaking the code up into small, descriptively named functions. * I'll have the program show its work as it's executing my mathematical commands. That way I can watch the hierarchy of math as it comes into play during a specific procedure. * I'll use literate programming to document my code so I can explain everything in excruciating detail while organizing and formatting my explanations clearly. Literate programming lets you write your program as essentially an article or book with the code interspersed. You then run a processing program that formats your documentation nicely for people to read and assembles the code from your document so that the computer can run it. Why do I think programming to learn math is a good idea? First let's look at what I've been trying to accomplish and the methods I've been using to achieve it, and then I'll talk about how programming could solve some of the problems I've been having with those methods. == Goals == My goals in doing my math relearning project are to relearn (1) standard math topics plus selected others (2) at an accelerated pace, (3) with enough fluency that I can work with math quickly and confidently, and (4) with a deep enough understanding that I can think flexibly about them to solve unfamiliar problems (and deep enough to keep me interested and to quench my unquenchable thirst for understanding). I expect to use math extensively in my future career (probably cognitive science) and in many of my personal projects, and I feel hindered until I can learn the math I need. == Subject matter == In several ways math is a uniquely challenging subject to learn: (1) It's almost entirely concerned with and ruled by logic, which makes its behavior very rigid, precise, and unforgiving, whereas most human minds are sloppy and hazy until they learn discipline. (2) To many people (including me) mathematical concepts feel empty and meaningless, and thus arbitrary, so they don't stick in the mind easily and can take a lot of effort to think about. (3) Math involves a large number of concepts and procedures that are highly interconnected, which can be confusing if you don't take the time to sort them out. This third factor has been my major problem so far in this project, as I'll explain below. == Current methods == Any learning, especially if, like math, it involves developing skills, will require several kinds of learning activities and multiple passes over the material so the information and skills can be processed into long-term memory. See [[A Framework and Agenda for Memory Improvement]] for more on that. But if a rapid pace of learning is one of your goals, you have to select your learning activities carefully so you learn adequately without wasting a lot of time. You also have to select your material's degree of breadth and depth carefully, since more of either will take a longer time to learn. What learning activities have I been trying so far? Mainly I've been reading books and other documents that explain math to teachers so they can pass on the understanding to their students. But since a lot of these documents don't explain things in quite the order and manner I'm looking for, I've been analyzing the content to articulate, separate, and trace the conceptual threads as they develop through the grades. Basically I've been expanding and shaping the content from my sources into a structure that I think will give me the kind of knowledge and skill I need. I've been writing my insights as I go. I did a pass over the whole K-12 curriculum to get an overview and then started over with pre-K to learn in detail. As I've come across procedures I'd like to perform with more fluency, I've come up with exercises I think would help me, since I don't need the kinds of exercises for young children the curriculum offers at the early levels. What kind of mathematical knowledge structure am I trying to create? It has two broad features: interconnectedness and incremental progression. The interconnectedness feature comes from (1) the idea that math is a set of logically interconnected concepts and procedures, and (2) the idea that our starting point in the development of mathematical thinking is math's relationship with the world, and (3) my goal of understanding math deeply in order to develop my mathematical intuition. This approach has a name: Teaching math in terms of its real-world meaning and its interrelationships is called conceptual math. Its opposite is procedural math, which teaches it primarily as a set of rote procedures. The second feature, incremental progression, means that ideally I'd like to find out how the whole edifice of mathematics might grow logically from the ground of human experiences and needs. Presumably that's more or less how it developed historically, though many of the details are lost to us. This goal means that each concept would be explained in terms of the more basic concepts that came before it as well as any experiences or needs that suggest the new concept or make it necessary. You'd try to avoid bringing in more advanced concepts to explain it, even if that means only explaining it to a very limited degree at first. Essentially I want a map, which is a common theme for me. If I need to navigate freely through a domain of knowledge or skill, I feel lost unless I have some kind of mental map that tells me what places are there, the borders of each place, what other places are accessible or inaccessible from it, and ways to get from one place to another. And if the map is in some concrete form so I don't have to rely completely on my shaky memory, I feel even better. Feeling lost looks like, for example, blanking on how to use a piece of knowledge, or worrying that I'll use it wrong because I know I've forgotten related pieces that would probably affect the application. It's not that feeling lost keeps me from knowing things or ever using what I know. I have impartial knowledge of all kinds of subjects, and I still get by. It just nags at me and distracts me with uncertainty, and it would be nice for once in my life to scratch the itch of wanting a well-organized body of knowledge when such a body is clearly available. === Source material === ==== Content ==== Where would I find such conceptual explanations of math? It turns out education researchers have spent decades coming up with them, and their findings have been condensed into resources I can access, such as Chapin and Johnson's <i>[http://www.worldcat.org/title/math-matters-understanding-the-math-you-teach-grades-k-8/oclc/63164894 Math Matters]</i>. However, I had trouble finding a building block approach to conceptual math until I looked into the Common Core Standards and their associated resources, primarily the [http://achievethecore.org/page/254/progressions-documents-for-the-common-core-state-standards-for-mathematics Progressions] and the [https://www.engageny.org/common-core-curriculum EngageNY curriculum]. While building up from basic concepts and experiences is the way children are taught math, adults who are being taught to teach math conceptually don't need things explained in such a stepwise fashion because they already have a broad knowledge of math and only need the concepts better integrated. So, for example, the early books I looked at thought nothing of analyzing place value in terms of exponents, even though children need to know something about place value years before they're ready to know anything about exponents. Common Core is focused on how to teach conceptual math to children rather than adults, so its developers were careful to limit their explanations of math concepts to the level of understanding available at each stage. How well they succeeded is a matter of debate, but I think they did well enough for my purposes. Why do I need to do all this work analyzing and expanding these sources' content? To form a good map, all the necessary information needs to be present, explicit, and direct. My sources don't really share my goal of building a complete mathematical edifice, so their information doesn't always follow this pattern. This was especially true of the pre-Common Core sources. Some of the information I wanted to know was missing, so as I read and tried to fill in my picture of math, I had to answer certain questions myself, such as what is a number? This was fun but took a lot of time, though in the case of defining numbers I was pleased with the results (see [[Math Relearning/Number Sense]]). Fortunately, the Common Core sources answered a lot more questions for me. But then as I began reading EngageNY, I thought it'd be helpful to spell out all the propositional concepts in each module so I could trace the progression of mathematical ideas in a clear and logical order. Many of these propositions were implicit in the source material, since the logical progression I had in mind took very small steps, similar to a proof. And statements in any work are rarely written as directly as I'd like. Spelling these out or rewriting them took only a moderate amount of time, but it still felt like too much considering the amount of uncertainty I felt about the result. More on that in the Notes section below. Like I said, confusion over math's interconnections has been my major problem. The density of math itself is bad enough, but it's even worse if you're learning math by reading material about how to teach it, which brings in extra, though possibly relevant, concepts about psychology. For example, knowing the mistakes students commonly make is helpful for highlighting various aspects of the correct understanding. But this is a roundabout way of gaining insight, so it takes time to sort out. ==== Format ==== If the source material were already in reviewable form, I could just read and reread it to study. But most documents aren't written to be studied just as they are, and the Progressions and curriculum were no exception. It became clear that even familiarizing myself with their explicit content would require some kind of notetaking. I was planning to wait till I read the curriculum to concentrate on the details, but as I read through the Progressions at a moderate, steady pace, I worried that I was going to miss or forget concepts that would help me understand later ones, and with good reason, since it happened even in the middle of the reading I was doing. Especially when I got to fractions, I found myself wanting to flip back to reread earlier explanations so I could put the pieces together in my mind. But when I did flip back, the content looked less like a network of beautifully interlinked concepts and more like a bewildering wall of text. This meant that if I ''were'' going to try to learn the details this way, I'd have to spend a lot of time re-deciphering and filtering the text to review. This, to me, highlights the need to visually design complicated material so its complexity is easier to trace at a glance. In other words, prose isn't always the best tool for describing math. So as I pushed myself along, I wondered how to think of the concepts in ways that would help me truly understand and remember them. This added uncertainty and a subtle stress to the project. === Notes === A good notetaking method is a central practice in learning, because it transforms your source material into a version you can (1) understand and (2) review. Hence, if you're having trouble taking notes, it's a central problem for your learning. Since I was only reading the Progressions to give me an idea of what a Common Core curriculum would cover and how it would explain the concepts, my few notes were limited to my reactions to the content. As I mentioned earlier, I took more serious notes when I began reading the EngageNY curriculum. But as I usually do when I'm taking notes, I ran into problems even there. I didn't know how complete or reviewable my notes were. Were they expressed clearly and consistently? I didn't know if I was recording information at the best level of granularity--where did I need to spell things out in detail, and where could I write something more general, wave my hands, and say, "I know what I mean"? And was I including all the information I wanted and not extra pieces I'd have to actively ignore or delete later? I didn't have a great way to decide. I was making up my math notetaking language as I went along, and I didn't know if it was adequate or where it would get too awkward for expressing what I wanted to say. I also didn't know if I'd be wasting time writing particular kinds of notes. Should I spell out algorithms? Write out definitions? If they were already stated clearly in my sources, would it waste more time to copy them or to flip through my documents to find them again for study? So I've had problems with not only my source material but even with the notes I've been taking to wrangle it. I want to end up with a map of mathematics I can study and use, so the statements that describe it need to be explicit and direct, and it needs to be complete. My sources cover a lot of that ground (and I love them for it), but compared to what I'm looking for, their content still contains gaps, and their prose format makes rapid reviewing difficult. But when I try to lay out this math map in my notes, I find that my idea of what the map should contain and how its contents should be described is unclear. I don't know if I'll find better sources, but I know I need a better way to take notes, and I think I have one. == Programming == Programming isn't normally done as a learning activity. It's usually done to create a product, a computer program, that will perform certain functions that the user can trigger to accomplish some result in a particular domain, such as using financial software for money management. If you wanted a product that facilitated learning, you could create, for example, a flashcard program for memorization. When developers do use the actual process of programming to learn, it's usually to learn some aspect of programming, such as a specific programming language, library, or technique. But you can also use programming to learn about a domain. Someone could write a money management program simply to teach themselves how money management works. Some authors write a book to teach themselves about a topic (and in fact, writing this project introduction has helped me work out how programming can aid learning). A programmer can do the same thing by writing a program. I see two levels of benefit that programming would bring to my math learning. Programming in general has characteristics that make it a fitting vehicle for learning, and this specific project comes with its own opportunities. === General benefits === Programming has three main abilities that assist learning: aiding thought, settling emotions, and granting freedom. These abilities derive from some of the fundamental traits of programming itself and of the culture surrounding it. I'll talk about these traits first and then the benefits they enable. ==== Basic characteristics ==== Programming has two main features that let it work as a learning approach. First, it's a linguistic activity that's broad enough to express practically anything you want to say. This means you can model almost anything you can think of with a computer program, and the description of this model in the form of code acts as its map. Programming's linguistic nature also comes with the ability to record these expressions for the computer to recall later. Second, it's executable, so the computer can act on your model in some way to produce some result. The execution of a computer program is based on logic, which comes with a number of benefits that I'll explore below, such as the ability to automatically check your work for accuracy. It's also what I'd call passive execution, because on its own the computer can't reason about its instructions and make decisions about them the way a human can, which means, among other things, you have to think more carefully about the instructions you're giving it. To highlight these two overarching features, you could call programming a means of executable expression. On top of the features of programming itself, the culture of software development has at least one feature that shapes programming into an effective tool for learning, and that is its concern for efficiency. In addition to writing fast programs that conserve computer memory, developers try to minimize the amount of time, effort, money, and customer good will they spend on fixing errors in their programs and creating new features. So they look for programming practices that will avoid introducing errors and make their code easier to work with. For instance, when their program needs to do the same thing in more than one place, instead of duplicating the code, they name parts of their code and simply refer to those parts by name. That way they only have to make changes to one copy of the code (because there is only one copy), so they don't have to worry whether they've changed the copies consistently. This attention to efficiency results in various patterns that can aid learning, such as the growth of interacting software objects that can serve as pieces of your domain model. These characteristics of programming and software development lead to the benefits of sharpening thought, allowing freedom of movement, and providing emotional security. ==== Crystallization ==== As a means of executable expression, programming sharpens thought. For me, this is the main attraction of programming as an approach to learning. It crystallizes an understanding of the subject matter from the vaporous notions you start with. It does this by narrowing focus, clarifying vagueness, and enforcing logic. ===== Focus ===== Programming narrows focus. In keeping with the developer's concern for efficiency, most of the time when you're writing a program, you're focused on functionality, instructing the computer to carry out the procedures that are part of the program, which will have at least somewhat defined parameters. You could, by contrast, tell the program to do a collection of unrelated things and decorate your code with irrelevant information, but the general expectation in software development is that your code will efficiently express instructions to carry out a fairly narrow range of related tasks. After you've been programming a while, you develop an intuitive sense of the kind of information in a situation that's relevant to creating functionality in a program, and specifically in the kind of program you want to create. It's like solving a word problem in math, or better, using math to solve problems in real life. You pick out the mathematically relevant information and put it together to find the information you're missing. So as I'm reading my source material, keeping my program in mind can tell me what information to include and what to ignore, at least until later. Math clearly benefits from a focus on functionality, since you could say half of mathematical activity is calculation, a purely algorithmic endeavor. The other half is creative problem solving, which is harder to condense into a specific procedure. So you can capture a lot of mathematical knowledge in a program, and a lot of the program's functionality will be a representation of that knowledge, the content you're out to learn. Aside from whatever you write in the documentation, the code represents the domain's content in a stripped-down form, so you don't have to wade through a lot of extra verbiage to get to the essential details. ===== Clarity ===== Programming clarifies vagueness. It does this by enabling expression, requiring explicitness, and fostering organization. ====== Expression ====== Programming's enabling of expression comes from its linguistic nature. To give shape to concepts, first you need a language, and a program is a language for describing a domain, in this case math. In programming you can create bundles of data or instructions in the form of variables, functions, classes, and so on, give the bundles names, and then use the names in other instructions. It's the programming equivalent of creating words and using them in sentences. The range of data and instructions a program can represent is very broad, so you can create whole languages this way. Since they have to be executed, to a certain extent these languages are rigorously defined, and they're called formal languages, as opposed to the natural languages people speak. They also tend to be more like grammars than fully fledged languages. A programming language is the skeleton of a language, and most of the actual words are created when you use it to write a specific program. ====== Explicitness ====== The explicitness requirement arises from the logical and passive nature of the computer's execution. Even apart from computer technology, any effective method of executing instructions will be based on logic, since the results would be unpredictable otherwise, and in that case you might as well not even have the instructions. But when humans are the executors, a lot of the instructions can be implicit, since people will fill in the gaps intuitively. This means that if the instructions are written poorly because the author actually hadn't worked out all the details, the person who carries them out can end up with a much better understanding of the procedure than the person who wrote them. The computer's executing abilities are much more helpless than a human's, and a programmer has to give it an explicit instruction for every single step of its procedures. Not every programmer needs to write all of these instructions, because a set of instructions can be saved in a library or module to be included in later programs, and these libraries are often shared among programmers. But within the realm of procedures that aren't already contained in a library, if the program is to fulfill its functions, then the programmer has to work out all the details themselves, which means they'll end up with an extensive understanding of the program's domain, and many holes in their initial understanding will be filled in. While creating an algorithm, you'll discover a lot of details you weren't expecting, such as pieces of data or whole side algorithms you didn't know you'd need. This will happen even when translating a perfectly adequate procedure written for humans into code for a computer. But to me digging up new information hidden in the source material is half the fun. ====== Organization ====== Organization groups items that are related and presents them in an order that helps the reader see their relationships. It's certainly possible and even common to write very disorganized "spaghetti code," but if you're following the principle of efficiency, you'll engage in development practices that will organize your code in ways that let it function as a conceptual map. You'll move code around to more appropriate locations, streamline inefficient or duplicate code, or rework whole algorithms, and concepts and patterns will emerge as you do. If you're using an object-oriented paradigm, for example, your data structures and algorithms will get grouped into objects with properties and behaviors, and these objects will relate to each other by using each other in their behaviors or as values for their properties. You may form layers of related functionality, such as in the model-view-controller pattern, where distinct sets of code handle the program's data, its user interface, and the interaction between the two. As you organize, your mental picture of the domain will improve. You'll also think specifically about readability factors such as using consistent naming conventions and using a consistent visual formatting style for your code, which will make the code easier to review. ===== Logic ===== Programming enforces logic. Instructions written for humans can contain not only gaps but logical inconsistencies. These can be annoying for the people carrying out the instructions, but they aren't necessarily show stoppers, because people can actively determine what the correct instructions are likely to be. A computer, with its passive execution, will simply follow the exact instructions you specified, and if they have logical problems, it'll give you an incorrect result or stop executing the program altogether, leaving you to figure out what went wrong. And as you figure it out, your understanding of the domain will sharpen. Programming's dependence on logic makes it a good choice for modeling math, since math is also tightly tied to logic. (In fact, looking at the breadth of topics mathematicians consider fair game, ranging from numbers to the grammar of natural languages, I wonder if math could be defined as the study of logical structures.) The translation from math to code can be relatively simple and direct. In fact, math is one of the primary uses for programming, and I think it's safe to say any kind of math people have wanted to do has already been represented on a computer by some programming language. ==== Freedom ==== In addition to sharpening thought, programming gives you the freedom to move through the domain's content in any order, which enables various patterns of coverage. Even code that does very little is still a valid, working program. Additional functionality can attach to a lot of different places in the code, which means there's a lot of freedom in the order of features you add, and in the case of my project this freedom means I can start my code simple, start anywhere in the curriculum, and choose when I address its topics and in how much detail. It gives me the power to follow the needs of my mind and my schedule while reaping the other benefits of programming. Two examples of coverage patterns are working backward and working breadth first. Working backward would mean starting with the math I need to know for a project and learning about the earlier math that would make sense of it and so on until I got to math I already know. Working breadth first would mean learning all the topics I want to cover at a superficial, procedural level and then passing through them a few more times, learning them at increasing levels of depth. I very well might follow these patterns. Just because I want to end up with a map and because the map-like Common Core material takes a depth-first, bottom-up approach doesn't mean I have to follow that outline, even though it's what I've had in mind till now. ==== Security ==== In addition to sharpening thought, programming also gives me a strong subjective sense of security, which is important for my ability to progress in a project. This security is different from the typical IT concerns about data theft or loss from things like hackers or hardware failures. It's the emotional assurance that writing my code isn't a waste of time. Generally speaking, if I write a program that's designed well and works correctly, the following things will be true: First, the code will be stored, so I won't lose it by forgetting (data loss by wetware failure!). This seems trivial, because it's true of every program or any other content that's saved to a file, but the semi-permanence of stored information is always a subtle but profound relief to me. It lets me stop worrying about the information and turning it over and over fruitlessly in my mind. That obsessiveness comes from the fear of losing ideas I feel are important. Second, since the programming will have performed its thought crystallizing functions and the resulting code will be reviewable, I'll feel that rewriting my sources' content in code form was worthwhile. And I don't have to wait till the end to feel the security from this factor. Since I have a decent idea of the concerns that result in good code, I have a clearer way to decide whether I'm wasting my time writing each line. But even the simple fact that each part of the code contributes to its functionality is inherently reassuring to me. Each part is worthwhile just because it has a purpose within the program, even if that purpose has little to do with learning. By contrast, I wasn't clear on how well a lot of my prose notes supported my learning goals or any goals at all, which sapped my motivation to write them. Third, because it's executable in a logical fashion and gives me rapid feedback I can use to verify it, my code will make sense because it works the way I expect. The only way I could independently verify my prose notes would be to have a math expert check them, which is slower, harder to repeat, and still more error prone than a computer. Fourth, as I described in the previous section, even when the code is incomplete, it's still worthwhile, because it has a solid potential to grow into code that does more. === Project benefits === In addition to programming's general benefits for learning, I can use this particular programming project to advance other projects of mine, both during and after my work on this one. ==== During ==== Coding a math implementation gives me an earlier chance to practice and explore certain areas that'll be useful to me in future projects. I like to kill multiple birds with one (cumbersome) stone. I'd get around to learning at least some of these anyway, but it'd happen much later if I excluded programming from all the time I'd be spending on math relearning. Since they have such broad applications for me, these explorations are as much the point of the project as learning math. First, I can learn some general programming tools and techniques I've had in mind for a while: mainly [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Git Git] and [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GitHub GitHub], [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Literate_programming literate programming], [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Test-driven_development test-driven development], [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Design_by_contract design by contract], and [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aspect-oriented_programming aspect-oriented programming]. It might slow me down too much to use them all for this project, but learning at least some of them should greatly benefit future projects, or at least give me an idea of if and when they're worth using. Second, I can use the project to explore the subject of knowledge representation, which is an aspect of artificial intelligence, which feeds into cognitive science. This project is basically an exercise in knowledge representation, so it's no stretch to study it in the process of writing the program. For a long time I've had the idea that content should be stated in what I call usable form, which means organizing it so I can quickly find the information that's relevant to my needs, such as arranging it in if-then tables or flowcharts. Full-blown knowledge representation would take usable form a step further and make the content executable. Finally, it'll let me explore the general concept of learning by programming, which is an idea I've had for years but never tried. This introductory essay is also part of this larger project. Since I haven't seen others discussing this approach to learning, for me the idea is an untested but very strong hunch. As I experiment, I'll observe what works and what doesn't, with the aim of developing general methods that will work across disciplines. ==== After ==== At the end, the project will give me code and documentation I can use for purposes other than its main one of giving me a typical American math education. First, the code can act as a skeleton for organizing math reflections that aren't easily translated into code, such as discussions on math education or the philosophy of math. Some of this will probably happen even as I write the documentation for the simulator itself, though I'll try not to let it distract me for long periods. Second, it can act as a library for use in programmatic math explorations that don't fit within the curriculum, rabbit trails off the main learning path. There are already math libraries that a programmer can use to run calculations, and they're programmed much better than this one will be, but maybe mine will be organized more conveniently for some purposes. Third, this project can act as a framework for learning projects in other subject areas. I'm picturing a multi-level framework containing a software framework, an information design framework, a learning process framework, and maybe others. A general notetaking app based on these models is a tempting future project. == Reservations == With a description of programming's characteristics and benefits under our belts, it's worthwhile to look at some objections someone might make to the notion of backing up in my math relearning project to take this new approach. Given my goal of learning a lot of math deeply and quickly, is it really a good idea? '''Won't you spend all your time programming and not get to other important learning activities?''' That's certainly a danger. I agree with [http://nautil.us/issue/40/learning/how-i-rewired-my-brain-to-become-fluent-in-math-rp Barbara Oakley] that fluency is a necessary part of math learning that can easily be crowded out by a preoccupation with conceptual understanding. Similarly, telling the computer how to do math is different from developing the skills to do it myself. I'm hoping that being aware of the problem will keep me motivated to work on my fluency. '''Won't the program leave out a lot of the information you're looking for--a lot of work for not enough result?''' It's true that it won't tell me everything I'd like to know, but since I want to know how to actually do math and not just what it means, it'll tell me at least half of what I want to know, and it'll give me a better starting point than prose notes for further learning and reflection. And with programming's focus on functionality, it might help me put aside questions I'd like to explore that aren't as important and would only slow me down. Enough conceptual understanding is good. Too much is a distraction. '''Won't the overhead of programming take too much time (design, infrastructure, debugging)?''' Maybe, but certain factors reduce the usual time sink: (1) The math I'll be programming is well defined, so I'll have less to figure out than in some other domains. (2) I'm trying not to be [http://www.codethinked.com/dont-be-clever clever]. (3) The interface will be simple. (4) Since the code isn't meant to be used, I can skimp on some of the plumbing if it's slowing me down too much. (5) Always remember [https://twitter.com/Pinboard/status/761656824202276864 the Programmers' Credo]: "we do these things not because they are easy, but because we thought they were going to be easy." '''Wouldn't another learning method take less time?''' Possibly, but programming can often accomplish the same results better, so I think it's worth the extra investment. Let's look at some other approaches I might take: * ''Teaching.'' Explaining things to a student does make them clearer and more memorable to the teacher. But this is essentially what I'm doing when I program. I'm teaching the computer. And in some ways the computer asks better questions than a human student because it needs every logical detail fed to it or else it gives the wrong result or crashes the program. * ''Problem solving.'' Problem solving is an excellent learning method, but on its own it wouldn't give me a map or even easily reviewable notes. Programming has problem solving covered anyway, because that's 90% of a programmer's work. Much of the time it's problems related to the content, and the problems reveal a lack of clarity in my understanding that gradually resolves as I figure out how the computer should carry out its task. But my program won't give me real-world situations to apply math to, so I'll need to supplement my learning with more typical word problems from regular learning materials. * ''Diagrams.'' I would love to be able to represent math knowledge as a series of incremental diagrams that can be understood and reviewed with extreme ease. I hope I can do that someday. But I'd have to find or invent a visual language that could express everything adequately, whereas I'm familiar with programming already. Plus not many diagrams are executable, so they wouldn't carry the advantages of executability. Programs in visual programming languages are executable diagrams, but I don't know those languages, and I suspect they're not the kinds of diagrams I have in mind. Making more diagram types executable is on my future project list. * ''Pseudocode.'' It's true that if I wrote my program in pseudocode instead of real code, I could approach the explicitness of regular programming without needing so much of the overhead. But it also wouldn't give me the enforced clarity of actual execution. I might leave out important details or make errors in logic that I'd never notice. It's too easy to fudge with pseudocode. * ''Traditional classroom methods.'' Here I'm thinking of (haphazard) notetaking, drills, and prepared exercises, focusing on procedural knowledge and troubleshooting that with occasional conceptual understanding. Well, I'm in favor of drills and exercises. But the main point of this project is that programming tells me how to take notes. Taking notes helps you understand what you're learning and record it in reviewable form. I strongly suspect programming will give me a focused, disciplined way to do that, and the thought of going back to random notetaking fills me with mild despair. Programming versus prose notetaking is like the difference between driving on paved roads and off-roading. Both might get me to my destination, but I prefer roads. '''Shouldn't you just trust the process instead of trying some new, untested method that'll take extra work?''' If I knew the process was trustworthy, yes. If someone with the relevant experience could tell me that anyone with my goals, my time frame, and my type of mind will succeed with these traditional methods, then I might get myself to submit to them. But a lot of the problems I've described are really frustrations I had my whole school career across a variety of subjects, and even though I did well in school, I never really got a handle on the traditional study methods. I'd like to try something new. If I can't get it to work, then I'll know it's a dead end and have a good idea of the reasons, and that'll be valuable information. '''Do you really need to trace all these conceptual threads so completely?''' Probably not, but I can start simple and add more detail later until I'm satisfied. I suspect I'll feel able to move on with my studies before I've learned all the details that interest me, and maybe I'll be able to add the rest as a side project afterward. '''Doesn't starting over waste time?''' I have a few points to make on this one. * It doesn't feel like a waste. I want a complete map, and starting it from where I left off would give me a big gap or smudge at the lower levels. It'd be like telling a driver they have to off-road for the first part of their journey because the builders couldn't be bothered to pave that area. Sometimes I like to step back and look at the big picture, tracing through the whole outline of a subject to reassure myself that it all works and I know my way around. Gaps in my notes (the program) would make that harder. * The cost to starting over is low. I hadn't gotten very far, just taken a long time to do it. This time I'm not covering all that ground--no pre-K and no philosophizing about the fundamentals of math or the meaning of numbers. I'm not even trying to digest all the educational material. I'll be focusing on the algorithms and whatever concepts they require, so the program will cover less territory per grade. * All learning involves iteration, and it's better when the iterations place the content in different contexts. The program will cover some of the same ground but very differently from my first reading, which will help whatever learning I still need to do in that area. This whole project is an experiment to see if the idea of learning by programming can work. Will I learn math as a result? Will I finish the project? Will I even get past arithmetic? I don't know. But when the other options seem worse, not knowing how well something will work is no reason not to try it. And if a project is an experiment, any failure is a success because it gives you valuable information. If the project does work, it's an approach I and others can apply to many other subject areas. <disqus/> [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Complete]] 9c9023179c838dd23fa11e58204bb0e7556a6a04 278 277 2016-09-27T12:13:44Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the Essays category. wikitext text/x-wiki == Description == Math Student Simulator is an attempt to use the process of programming to learn certain aspects of math. It's a part of my math relearning project. I'm posting the code and its documentation on GitHub [https://github.com/thinkulum/math-student-sim here]. You can download and run it yourself for free. I'll update the GitHub content over time as the project progresses. Here on the wiki I'll be documenting some of the process of creating the program. The program will cover concept definitions and procedures from at least the [http://www.corestandards.org/Math/ Common Core standards]. If I get through all of those, I might add other areas of math. The structure of the program will be hierarachical. Complex concepts and procedures will be built from simpler ones. This is a key feature, because one of the main characteristics of math I want to explore is its interrelatedness. In the code for this program I'm striving for clarity, since I'll need to review it so I can learn. For the amount of thought it requires to create, code is distressingly easy to forget, and if you're not careful, it's easy to write it in such an obscure way that, when you reread it weeks after writing it, it takes a lot of work to figure out what it means and does. I expect at least three features to help with review: * I'll use generally recognized good coding practices, such as breaking the code up into small, descriptively named functions. * I'll have the program show its work as it's executing my mathematical commands. That way I can watch the hierarchy of math as it comes into play during a specific procedure. * I'll use literate programming to document my code so I can explain everything in excruciating detail while organizing and formatting my explanations clearly. Literate programming lets you write your program as essentially an article or book with the code interspersed. You then run a processing program that formats your documentation nicely for people to read and assembles the code from your document so that the computer can run it. Why do I think programming to learn math is a good idea? First let's look at what I've been trying to accomplish and the methods I've been using to achieve it, and then I'll talk about how programming could solve some of the problems I've been having with those methods. == Goals == My goals in doing my math relearning project are to relearn (1) standard math topics plus selected others (2) at an accelerated pace, (3) with enough fluency that I can work with math quickly and confidently, and (4) with a deep enough understanding that I can think flexibly about them to solve unfamiliar problems (and deep enough to keep me interested and to quench my unquenchable thirst for understanding). I expect to use math extensively in my future career (probably cognitive science) and in many of my personal projects, and I feel hindered until I can learn the math I need. == Subject matter == In several ways math is a uniquely challenging subject to learn: (1) It's almost entirely concerned with and ruled by logic, which makes its behavior very rigid, precise, and unforgiving, whereas most human minds are sloppy and hazy until they learn discipline. (2) To many people (including me) mathematical concepts feel empty and meaningless, and thus arbitrary, so they don't stick in the mind easily and can take a lot of effort to think about. (3) Math involves a large number of concepts and procedures that are highly interconnected, which can be confusing if you don't take the time to sort them out. This third factor has been my major problem so far in this project, as I'll explain below. == Current methods == Any learning, especially if, like math, it involves developing skills, will require several kinds of learning activities and multiple passes over the material so the information and skills can be processed into long-term memory. See [[A Framework and Agenda for Memory Improvement]] for more on that. But if a rapid pace of learning is one of your goals, you have to select your learning activities carefully so you learn adequately without wasting a lot of time. You also have to select your material's degree of breadth and depth carefully, since more of either will take a longer time to learn. What learning activities have I been trying so far? Mainly I've been reading books and other documents that explain math to teachers so they can pass on the understanding to their students. But since a lot of these documents don't explain things in quite the order and manner I'm looking for, I've been analyzing the content to articulate, separate, and trace the conceptual threads as they develop through the grades. Basically I've been expanding and shaping the content from my sources into a structure that I think will give me the kind of knowledge and skill I need. I've been writing my insights as I go. I did a pass over the whole K-12 curriculum to get an overview and then started over with pre-K to learn in detail. As I've come across procedures I'd like to perform with more fluency, I've come up with exercises I think would help me, since I don't need the kinds of exercises for young children the curriculum offers at the early levels. What kind of mathematical knowledge structure am I trying to create? It has two broad features: interconnectedness and incremental progression. The interconnectedness feature comes from (1) the idea that math is a set of logically interconnected concepts and procedures, and (2) the idea that our starting point in the development of mathematical thinking is math's relationship with the world, and (3) my goal of understanding math deeply in order to develop my mathematical intuition. This approach has a name: Teaching math in terms of its real-world meaning and its interrelationships is called conceptual math. Its opposite is procedural math, which teaches it primarily as a set of rote procedures. The second feature, incremental progression, means that ideally I'd like to find out how the whole edifice of mathematics might grow logically from the ground of human experiences and needs. Presumably that's more or less how it developed historically, though many of the details are lost to us. This goal means that each concept would be explained in terms of the more basic concepts that came before it as well as any experiences or needs that suggest the new concept or make it necessary. You'd try to avoid bringing in more advanced concepts to explain it, even if that means only explaining it to a very limited degree at first. Essentially I want a map, which is a common theme for me. If I need to navigate freely through a domain of knowledge or skill, I feel lost unless I have some kind of mental map that tells me what places are there, the borders of each place, what other places are accessible or inaccessible from it, and ways to get from one place to another. And if the map is in some concrete form so I don't have to rely completely on my shaky memory, I feel even better. Feeling lost looks like, for example, blanking on how to use a piece of knowledge, or worrying that I'll use it wrong because I know I've forgotten related pieces that would probably affect the application. It's not that feeling lost keeps me from knowing things or ever using what I know. I have impartial knowledge of all kinds of subjects, and I still get by. It just nags at me and distracts me with uncertainty, and it would be nice for once in my life to scratch the itch of wanting a well-organized body of knowledge when such a body is clearly available. === Source material === ==== Content ==== Where would I find such conceptual explanations of math? It turns out education researchers have spent decades coming up with them, and their findings have been condensed into resources I can access, such as Chapin and Johnson's <i>[http://www.worldcat.org/title/math-matters-understanding-the-math-you-teach-grades-k-8/oclc/63164894 Math Matters]</i>. However, I had trouble finding a building block approach to conceptual math until I looked into the Common Core Standards and their associated resources, primarily the [http://achievethecore.org/page/254/progressions-documents-for-the-common-core-state-standards-for-mathematics Progressions] and the [https://www.engageny.org/common-core-curriculum EngageNY curriculum]. While building up from basic concepts and experiences is the way children are taught math, adults who are being taught to teach math conceptually don't need things explained in such a stepwise fashion because they already have a broad knowledge of math and only need the concepts better integrated. So, for example, the early books I looked at thought nothing of analyzing place value in terms of exponents, even though children need to know something about place value years before they're ready to know anything about exponents. Common Core is focused on how to teach conceptual math to children rather than adults, so its developers were careful to limit their explanations of math concepts to the level of understanding available at each stage. How well they succeeded is a matter of debate, but I think they did well enough for my purposes. Why do I need to do all this work analyzing and expanding these sources' content? To form a good map, all the necessary information needs to be present, explicit, and direct. My sources don't really share my goal of building a complete mathematical edifice, so their information doesn't always follow this pattern. This was especially true of the pre-Common Core sources. Some of the information I wanted to know was missing, so as I read and tried to fill in my picture of math, I had to answer certain questions myself, such as what is a number? This was fun but took a lot of time, though in the case of defining numbers I was pleased with the results (see [[Math Relearning/Number Sense]]). Fortunately, the Common Core sources answered a lot more questions for me. But then as I began reading EngageNY, I thought it'd be helpful to spell out all the propositional concepts in each module so I could trace the progression of mathematical ideas in a clear and logical order. Many of these propositions were implicit in the source material, since the logical progression I had in mind took very small steps, similar to a proof. And statements in any work are rarely written as directly as I'd like. Spelling these out or rewriting them took only a moderate amount of time, but it still felt like too much considering the amount of uncertainty I felt about the result. More on that in the Notes section below. Like I said, confusion over math's interconnections has been my major problem. The density of math itself is bad enough, but it's even worse if you're learning math by reading material about how to teach it, which brings in extra, though possibly relevant, concepts about psychology. For example, knowing the mistakes students commonly make is helpful for highlighting various aspects of the correct understanding. But this is a roundabout way of gaining insight, so it takes time to sort out. ==== Format ==== If the source material were already in reviewable form, I could just read and reread it to study. But most documents aren't written to be studied just as they are, and the Progressions and curriculum were no exception. It became clear that even familiarizing myself with their explicit content would require some kind of notetaking. I was planning to wait till I read the curriculum to concentrate on the details, but as I read through the Progressions at a moderate, steady pace, I worried that I was going to miss or forget concepts that would help me understand later ones, and with good reason, since it happened even in the middle of the reading I was doing. Especially when I got to fractions, I found myself wanting to flip back to reread earlier explanations so I could put the pieces together in my mind. But when I did flip back, the content looked less like a network of beautifully interlinked concepts and more like a bewildering wall of text. This meant that if I ''were'' going to try to learn the details this way, I'd have to spend a lot of time re-deciphering and filtering the text to review. This, to me, highlights the need to visually design complicated material so its complexity is easier to trace at a glance. In other words, prose isn't always the best tool for describing math. So as I pushed myself along, I wondered how to think of the concepts in ways that would help me truly understand and remember them. This added uncertainty and a subtle stress to the project. === Notes === A good notetaking method is a central practice in learning, because it transforms your source material into a version you can (1) understand and (2) review. Hence, if you're having trouble taking notes, it's a central problem for your learning. Since I was only reading the Progressions to give me an idea of what a Common Core curriculum would cover and how it would explain the concepts, my few notes were limited to my reactions to the content. As I mentioned earlier, I took more serious notes when I began reading the EngageNY curriculum. But as I usually do when I'm taking notes, I ran into problems even there. I didn't know how complete or reviewable my notes were. Were they expressed clearly and consistently? I didn't know if I was recording information at the best level of granularity--where did I need to spell things out in detail, and where could I write something more general, wave my hands, and say, "I know what I mean"? And was I including all the information I wanted and not extra pieces I'd have to actively ignore or delete later? I didn't have a great way to decide. I was making up my math notetaking language as I went along, and I didn't know if it was adequate or where it would get too awkward for expressing what I wanted to say. I also didn't know if I'd be wasting time writing particular kinds of notes. Should I spell out algorithms? Write out definitions? If they were already stated clearly in my sources, would it waste more time to copy them or to flip through my documents to find them again for study? So I've had problems with not only my source material but even with the notes I've been taking to wrangle it. I want to end up with a map of mathematics I can study and use, so the statements that describe it need to be explicit and direct, and it needs to be complete. My sources cover a lot of that ground (and I love them for it), but compared to what I'm looking for, their content still contains gaps, and their prose format makes rapid reviewing difficult. But when I try to lay out this math map in my notes, I find that my idea of what the map should contain and how its contents should be described is unclear. I don't know if I'll find better sources, but I know I need a better way to take notes, and I think I have one. == Programming == Programming isn't normally done as a learning activity. It's usually done to create a product, a computer program, that will perform certain functions that the user can trigger to accomplish some result in a particular domain, such as using financial software for money management. If you wanted a product that facilitated learning, you could create, for example, a flashcard program for memorization. When developers do use the actual process of programming to learn, it's usually to learn some aspect of programming, such as a specific programming language, library, or technique. But you can also use programming to learn about a domain. Someone could write a money management program simply to teach themselves how money management works. Some authors write a book to teach themselves about a topic (and in fact, writing this project introduction has helped me work out how programming can aid learning). A programmer can do the same thing by writing a program. I see two levels of benefit that programming would bring to my math learning. Programming in general has characteristics that make it a fitting vehicle for learning, and this specific project comes with its own opportunities. === General benefits === Programming has three main abilities that assist learning: aiding thought, settling emotions, and granting freedom. These abilities derive from some of the fundamental traits of programming itself and of the culture surrounding it. I'll talk about these traits first and then the benefits they enable. ==== Basic characteristics ==== Programming has two main features that let it work as a learning approach. First, it's a linguistic activity that's broad enough to express practically anything you want to say. This means you can model almost anything you can think of with a computer program, and the description of this model in the form of code acts as its map. Programming's linguistic nature also comes with the ability to record these expressions for the computer to recall later. Second, it's executable, so the computer can act on your model in some way to produce some result. The execution of a computer program is based on logic, which comes with a number of benefits that I'll explore below, such as the ability to automatically check your work for accuracy. It's also what I'd call passive execution, because on its own the computer can't reason about its instructions and make decisions about them the way a human can, which means, among other things, you have to think more carefully about the instructions you're giving it. To highlight these two overarching features, you could call programming a means of executable expression. On top of the features of programming itself, the culture of software development has at least one feature that shapes programming into an effective tool for learning, and that is its concern for efficiency. In addition to writing fast programs that conserve computer memory, developers try to minimize the amount of time, effort, money, and customer good will they spend on fixing errors in their programs and creating new features. So they look for programming practices that will avoid introducing errors and make their code easier to work with. For instance, when their program needs to do the same thing in more than one place, instead of duplicating the code, they name parts of their code and simply refer to those parts by name. That way they only have to make changes to one copy of the code (because there is only one copy), so they don't have to worry whether they've changed the copies consistently. This attention to efficiency results in various patterns that can aid learning, such as the growth of interacting software objects that can serve as pieces of your domain model. These characteristics of programming and software development lead to the benefits of sharpening thought, allowing freedom of movement, and providing emotional security. ==== Crystallization ==== As a means of executable expression, programming sharpens thought. For me, this is the main attraction of programming as an approach to learning. It crystallizes an understanding of the subject matter from the vaporous notions you start with. It does this by narrowing focus, clarifying vagueness, and enforcing logic. ===== Focus ===== Programming narrows focus. In keeping with the developer's concern for efficiency, most of the time when you're writing a program, you're focused on functionality, instructing the computer to carry out the procedures that are part of the program, which will have at least somewhat defined parameters. You could, by contrast, tell the program to do a collection of unrelated things and decorate your code with irrelevant information, but the general expectation in software development is that your code will efficiently express instructions to carry out a fairly narrow range of related tasks. After you've been programming a while, you develop an intuitive sense of the kind of information in a situation that's relevant to creating functionality in a program, and specifically in the kind of program you want to create. It's like solving a word problem in math, or better, using math to solve problems in real life. You pick out the mathematically relevant information and put it together to find the information you're missing. So as I'm reading my source material, keeping my program in mind can tell me what information to include and what to ignore, at least until later. Math clearly benefits from a focus on functionality, since you could say half of mathematical activity is calculation, a purely algorithmic endeavor. The other half is creative problem solving, which is harder to condense into a specific procedure. So you can capture a lot of mathematical knowledge in a program, and a lot of the program's functionality will be a representation of that knowledge, the content you're out to learn. Aside from whatever you write in the documentation, the code represents the domain's content in a stripped-down form, so you don't have to wade through a lot of extra verbiage to get to the essential details. ===== Clarity ===== Programming clarifies vagueness. It does this by enabling expression, requiring explicitness, and fostering organization. ====== Expression ====== Programming's enabling of expression comes from its linguistic nature. To give shape to concepts, first you need a language, and a program is a language for describing a domain, in this case math. In programming you can create bundles of data or instructions in the form of variables, functions, classes, and so on, give the bundles names, and then use the names in other instructions. It's the programming equivalent of creating words and using them in sentences. The range of data and instructions a program can represent is very broad, so you can create whole languages this way. Since they have to be executed, to a certain extent these languages are rigorously defined, and they're called formal languages, as opposed to the natural languages people speak. They also tend to be more like grammars than fully fledged languages. A programming language is the skeleton of a language, and most of the actual words are created when you use it to write a specific program. ====== Explicitness ====== The explicitness requirement arises from the logical and passive nature of the computer's execution. Even apart from computer technology, any effective method of executing instructions will be based on logic, since the results would be unpredictable otherwise, and in that case you might as well not even have the instructions. But when humans are the executors, a lot of the instructions can be implicit, since people will fill in the gaps intuitively. This means that if the instructions are written poorly because the author actually hadn't worked out all the details, the person who carries them out can end up with a much better understanding of the procedure than the person who wrote them. The computer's executing abilities are much more helpless than a human's, and a programmer has to give it an explicit instruction for every single step of its procedures. Not every programmer needs to write all of these instructions, because a set of instructions can be saved in a library or module to be included in later programs, and these libraries are often shared among programmers. But within the realm of procedures that aren't already contained in a library, if the program is to fulfill its functions, then the programmer has to work out all the details themselves, which means they'll end up with an extensive understanding of the program's domain, and many holes in their initial understanding will be filled in. While creating an algorithm, you'll discover a lot of details you weren't expecting, such as pieces of data or whole side algorithms you didn't know you'd need. This will happen even when translating a perfectly adequate procedure written for humans into code for a computer. But to me digging up new information hidden in the source material is half the fun. ====== Organization ====== Organization groups items that are related and presents them in an order that helps the reader see their relationships. It's certainly possible and even common to write very disorganized "spaghetti code," but if you're following the principle of efficiency, you'll engage in development practices that will organize your code in ways that let it function as a conceptual map. You'll move code around to more appropriate locations, streamline inefficient or duplicate code, or rework whole algorithms, and concepts and patterns will emerge as you do. If you're using an object-oriented paradigm, for example, your data structures and algorithms will get grouped into objects with properties and behaviors, and these objects will relate to each other by using each other in their behaviors or as values for their properties. You may form layers of related functionality, such as in the model-view-controller pattern, where distinct sets of code handle the program's data, its user interface, and the interaction between the two. As you organize, your mental picture of the domain will improve. You'll also think specifically about readability factors such as using consistent naming conventions and using a consistent visual formatting style for your code, which will make the code easier to review. ===== Logic ===== Programming enforces logic. Instructions written for humans can contain not only gaps but logical inconsistencies. These can be annoying for the people carrying out the instructions, but they aren't necessarily show stoppers, because people can actively determine what the correct instructions are likely to be. A computer, with its passive execution, will simply follow the exact instructions you specified, and if they have logical problems, it'll give you an incorrect result or stop executing the program altogether, leaving you to figure out what went wrong. And as you figure it out, your understanding of the domain will sharpen. Programming's dependence on logic makes it a good choice for modeling math, since math is also tightly tied to logic. (In fact, looking at the breadth of topics mathematicians consider fair game, ranging from numbers to the grammar of natural languages, I wonder if math could be defined as the study of logical structures.) The translation from math to code can be relatively simple and direct. In fact, math is one of the primary uses for programming, and I think it's safe to say any kind of math people have wanted to do has already been represented on a computer by some programming language. ==== Freedom ==== In addition to sharpening thought, programming gives you the freedom to move through the domain's content in any order, which enables various patterns of coverage. Even code that does very little is still a valid, working program. Additional functionality can attach to a lot of different places in the code, which means there's a lot of freedom in the order of features you add, and in the case of my project this freedom means I can start my code simple, start anywhere in the curriculum, and choose when I address its topics and in how much detail. It gives me the power to follow the needs of my mind and my schedule while reaping the other benefits of programming. Two examples of coverage patterns are working backward and working breadth first. Working backward would mean starting with the math I need to know for a project and learning about the earlier math that would make sense of it and so on until I got to math I already know. Working breadth first would mean learning all the topics I want to cover at a superficial, procedural level and then passing through them a few more times, learning them at increasing levels of depth. I very well might follow these patterns. Just because I want to end up with a map and because the map-like Common Core material takes a depth-first, bottom-up approach doesn't mean I have to follow that outline, even though it's what I've had in mind till now. ==== Security ==== In addition to sharpening thought, programming also gives me a strong subjective sense of security, which is important for my ability to progress in a project. This security is different from the typical IT concerns about data theft or loss from things like hackers or hardware failures. It's the emotional assurance that writing my code isn't a waste of time. Generally speaking, if I write a program that's designed well and works correctly, the following things will be true: First, the code will be stored, so I won't lose it by forgetting (data loss by wetware failure!). This seems trivial, because it's true of every program or any other content that's saved to a file, but the semi-permanence of stored information is always a subtle but profound relief to me. It lets me stop worrying about the information and turning it over and over fruitlessly in my mind. That obsessiveness comes from the fear of losing ideas I feel are important. Second, since the programming will have performed its thought crystallizing functions and the resulting code will be reviewable, I'll feel that rewriting my sources' content in code form was worthwhile. And I don't have to wait till the end to feel the security from this factor. Since I have a decent idea of the concerns that result in good code, I have a clearer way to decide whether I'm wasting my time writing each line. But even the simple fact that each part of the code contributes to its functionality is inherently reassuring to me. Each part is worthwhile just because it has a purpose within the program, even if that purpose has little to do with learning. By contrast, I wasn't clear on how well a lot of my prose notes supported my learning goals or any goals at all, which sapped my motivation to write them. Third, because it's executable in a logical fashion and gives me rapid feedback I can use to verify it, my code will make sense because it works the way I expect. The only way I could independently verify my prose notes would be to have a math expert check them, which is slower, harder to repeat, and still more error prone than a computer. Fourth, as I described in the previous section, even when the code is incomplete, it's still worthwhile, because it has a solid potential to grow into code that does more. === Project benefits === In addition to programming's general benefits for learning, I can use this particular programming project to advance other projects of mine, both during and after my work on this one. ==== During ==== Coding a math implementation gives me an earlier chance to practice and explore certain areas that'll be useful to me in future projects. I like to kill multiple birds with one (cumbersome) stone. I'd get around to learning at least some of these anyway, but it'd happen much later if I excluded programming from all the time I'd be spending on math relearning. Since they have such broad applications for me, these explorations are as much the point of the project as learning math. First, I can learn some general programming tools and techniques I've had in mind for a while: mainly [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Git Git] and [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GitHub GitHub], [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Literate_programming literate programming], [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Test-driven_development test-driven development], [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Design_by_contract design by contract], and [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aspect-oriented_programming aspect-oriented programming]. It might slow me down too much to use them all for this project, but learning at least some of them should greatly benefit future projects, or at least give me an idea of if and when they're worth using. Second, I can use the project to explore the subject of knowledge representation, which is an aspect of artificial intelligence, which feeds into cognitive science. This project is basically an exercise in knowledge representation, so it's no stretch to study it in the process of writing the program. For a long time I've had the idea that content should be stated in what I call usable form, which means organizing it so I can quickly find the information that's relevant to my needs, such as arranging it in if-then tables or flowcharts. Full-blown knowledge representation would take usable form a step further and make the content executable. Finally, it'll let me explore the general concept of learning by programming, which is an idea I've had for years but never tried. This introductory essay is also part of this larger project. Since I haven't seen others discussing this approach to learning, for me the idea is an untested but very strong hunch. As I experiment, I'll observe what works and what doesn't, with the aim of developing general methods that will work across disciplines. ==== After ==== At the end, the project will give me code and documentation I can use for purposes other than its main one of giving me a typical American math education. First, the code can act as a skeleton for organizing math reflections that aren't easily translated into code, such as discussions on math education or the philosophy of math. Some of this will probably happen even as I write the documentation for the simulator itself, though I'll try not to let it distract me for long periods. Second, it can act as a library for use in programmatic math explorations that don't fit within the curriculum, rabbit trails off the main learning path. There are already math libraries that a programmer can use to run calculations, and they're programmed much better than this one will be, but maybe mine will be organized more conveniently for some purposes. Third, this project can act as a framework for learning projects in other subject areas. I'm picturing a multi-level framework containing a software framework, an information design framework, a learning process framework, and maybe others. A general notetaking app based on these models is a tempting future project. == Reservations == With a description of programming's characteristics and benefits under our belts, it's worthwhile to look at some objections someone might make to the notion of backing up in my math relearning project to take this new approach. Given my goal of learning a lot of math deeply and quickly, is it really a good idea? '''Won't you spend all your time programming and not get to other important learning activities?''' That's certainly a danger. I agree with [http://nautil.us/issue/40/learning/how-i-rewired-my-brain-to-become-fluent-in-math-rp Barbara Oakley] that fluency is a necessary part of math learning that can easily be crowded out by a preoccupation with conceptual understanding. Similarly, telling the computer how to do math is different from developing the skills to do it myself. I'm hoping that being aware of the problem will keep me motivated to work on my fluency. '''Won't the program leave out a lot of the information you're looking for--a lot of work for not enough result?''' It's true that it won't tell me everything I'd like to know, but since I want to know how to actually do math and not just what it means, it'll tell me at least half of what I want to know, and it'll give me a better starting point than prose notes for further learning and reflection. And with programming's focus on functionality, it might help me put aside questions I'd like to explore that aren't as important and would only slow me down. Enough conceptual understanding is good. Too much is a distraction. '''Won't the overhead of programming take too much time (design, infrastructure, debugging)?''' Maybe, but certain factors reduce the usual time sink: (1) The math I'll be programming is well defined, so I'll have less to figure out than in some other domains. (2) I'm trying not to be [http://www.codethinked.com/dont-be-clever clever]. (3) The interface will be simple. (4) Since the code isn't meant to be used, I can skimp on some of the plumbing if it's slowing me down too much. (5) Always remember [https://twitter.com/Pinboard/status/761656824202276864 the Programmers' Credo]: "we do these things not because they are easy, but because we thought they were going to be easy." '''Wouldn't another learning method take less time?''' Possibly, but programming can often accomplish the same results better, so I think it's worth the extra investment. Let's look at some other approaches I might take: * ''Teaching.'' Explaining things to a student does make them clearer and more memorable to the teacher. But this is essentially what I'm doing when I program. I'm teaching the computer. And in some ways the computer asks better questions than a human student because it needs every logical detail fed to it or else it gives the wrong result or crashes the program. * ''Problem solving.'' Problem solving is an excellent learning method, but on its own it wouldn't give me a map or even easily reviewable notes. Programming has problem solving covered anyway, because that's 90% of a programmer's work. Much of the time it's problems related to the content, and the problems reveal a lack of clarity in my understanding that gradually resolves as I figure out how the computer should carry out its task. But my program won't give me real-world situations to apply math to, so I'll need to supplement my learning with more typical word problems from regular learning materials. * ''Diagrams.'' I would love to be able to represent math knowledge as a series of incremental diagrams that can be understood and reviewed with extreme ease. I hope I can do that someday. But I'd have to find or invent a visual language that could express everything adequately, whereas I'm familiar with programming already. Plus not many diagrams are executable, so they wouldn't carry the advantages of executability. Programs in visual programming languages are executable diagrams, but I don't know those languages, and I suspect they're not the kinds of diagrams I have in mind. Making more diagram types executable is on my future project list. * ''Pseudocode.'' It's true that if I wrote my program in pseudocode instead of real code, I could approach the explicitness of regular programming without needing so much of the overhead. But it also wouldn't give me the enforced clarity of actual execution. I might leave out important details or make errors in logic that I'd never notice. It's too easy to fudge with pseudocode. * ''Traditional classroom methods.'' Here I'm thinking of (haphazard) notetaking, drills, and prepared exercises, focusing on procedural knowledge and troubleshooting that with occasional conceptual understanding. Well, I'm in favor of drills and exercises. But the main point of this project is that programming tells me how to take notes. Taking notes helps you understand what you're learning and record it in reviewable form. I strongly suspect programming will give me a focused, disciplined way to do that, and the thought of going back to random notetaking fills me with mild despair. Programming versus prose notetaking is like the difference between driving on paved roads and off-roading. Both might get me to my destination, but I prefer roads. '''Shouldn't you just trust the process instead of trying some new, untested method that'll take extra work?''' If I knew the process was trustworthy, yes. If someone with the relevant experience could tell me that anyone with my goals, my time frame, and my type of mind will succeed with these traditional methods, then I might get myself to submit to them. But a lot of the problems I've described are really frustrations I had my whole school career across a variety of subjects, and even though I did well in school, I never really got a handle on the traditional study methods. I'd like to try something new. If I can't get it to work, then I'll know it's a dead end and have a good idea of the reasons, and that'll be valuable information. '''Do you really need to trace all these conceptual threads so completely?''' Probably not, but I can start simple and add more detail later until I'm satisfied. I suspect I'll feel able to move on with my studies before I've learned all the details that interest me, and maybe I'll be able to add the rest as a side project afterward. '''Doesn't starting over waste time?''' I have a few points to make on this one. * It doesn't feel like a waste. I want a complete map, and starting it from where I left off would give me a big gap or smudge at the lower levels. It'd be like telling a driver they have to off-road for the first part of their journey because the builders couldn't be bothered to pave that area. Sometimes I like to step back and look at the big picture, tracing through the whole outline of a subject to reassure myself that it all works and I know my way around. Gaps in my notes (the program) would make that harder. * The cost to starting over is low. I hadn't gotten very far, just taken a long time to do it. This time I'm not covering all that ground--no pre-K and no philosophizing about the fundamentals of math or the meaning of numbers. I'm not even trying to digest all the educational material. I'll be focusing on the algorithms and whatever concepts they require, so the program will cover less territory per grade. * All learning involves iteration, and it's better when the iterations place the content in different contexts. The program will cover some of the same ground but very differently from my first reading, which will help whatever learning I still need to do in that area. This whole project is an experiment to see if the idea of learning by programming can work. Will I learn math as a result? Will I finish the project? Will I even get past arithmetic? I don't know. But when the other options seem worse, not knowing how well something will work is no reason not to try it. And if a project is an experiment, any failure is a success because it gives you valuable information. If the project does work, it's an approach I and others can apply to many other subject areas. <disqus/> [[Category:Math Relearning]] [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Complete]] 7301ae0c9742d725216bc78fe973bf8de1de4b64 0 103 279 2016-10-04T05:06:39Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the article. wikitext text/x-wiki == Definition == ''Superbook'' is my term for a broad, fuzzy, subjective category of books that use various techniques to add dimensions to their parent genre or format, preferably in dynamic, imaginative ways. In this article I'll list examples and techniques, and hopefully over time I can refine and crystallize my definition. The word ''superbook'' has been used for a lot of other things already, so I might try to find another term, but that's what I have for now. === Normal books === When defining something, it's helpful to contrast it with other, similar things. Here are some qualities of books I'd think of as normal, which can serve as a baseline for noticing the traits of works that might be superbooks. Think of a typical novel, and you'll see what I have in mind as a normal book. * '''Textual''' - It might help to define the baseline narrowly, so I'm going to say a normal book contains only text. * '''Flat''' - The normal book is bound in traditional codex form with flat, thin, single-layer pages you can easily turn. * '''Linear''' - This prototype of a normal book relates its contents as a single train of thought that runs straightforwardly from the book's beginning to its end. * '''Self-contained''' - A normal book is primarily concerned with its stated topic, whether that's the events of an invented story or an analysis of real-world affairs, and it pipes content directly from the author to the readers. "Self-contained" in this sense isn't the same as standalone, so a normal book can be part of a series. * '''Static''' - Once it's packaged as a book and delivered to the reader, the content doesn't change. It can have new editions, but each edition stays the same. To count as a superbook it's not enough to vary from only one of these qualities; you'd need to depart from this list in particular ways, probably complex ones. But the list gives me some guidelines for thinking about the differences. === Effects === I primarily recognize superbooks by their effects on me. I'll touch on these in the three areas of thoughts, feelings, and actions. I feel a sense of wonder, curiosity, and excitement. I think about the possible ideas and scenarios the book's content suggests. And I act to explore the possibilities in ways beyond simply running my eyes down each page and flipping to the next one. There's a sense in which any book could act as a superbook if it has these effects on someone, even the most conventional of novels or the driest of reference manuals. It's important to know that you can find inspiration in surprising places. It keeps your eyes open and keeps you exploring to find it. But in the interests of defining a category of books that tend to inspire me in particular ways, I don't want to make the category too broad, so I wouldn't solely rely on these effects to define it. Superbooks produce these effects because they have certain physical, conceptual, or stylistic features. == Examples == Since I'm working out the superbook category by feel, I might remove some of these examples in the future because my sense of the category has shifted away from them. Within the category I find that some types of books are closer to the center of my idea for it, and others are closer to the edges because they embody the idea less fully. === Works === This section is for miscellaneous examples. I ended up finding categories for the ones I put here originally. === Genres and formats === A genre or format of superbooks adds a dimension to others it emerges from or could be compared to. Some of these are categories rather than recognized genres or formats. ==== Gamebooks ==== ==== Puzzle books ==== * Maze ==== Creativity prompts ==== These are books that are specifically meant to spark the reader's imagination and motivate them to create content of some kind. ===== Writing prompts ===== Some of books of writing prompts are written for professional writers, and others are meant for children or casual writers. In either case their purpose is to exercise the imagination, hone writing skills, or help the reader move past writer's block. * Harris Burdick ===== Doodle books ===== This kind of book has been around for decades, but the genre doesn't seem to have a common name. I'm using the name of one author's series. The general idea is that each page contains part of a drawing, and the reader is supposed to complete it creatively. ==== Experimental fiction ==== ===== Epistolary novels ===== ===== Metafiction ===== Metafiction is a set of techniques a work of fiction uses to call attention to the fact that it's a work of fiction. A common example is breaking the fourth wall, where a character in the work speaks directly to the audience. For me these techniques put metafiction into the superbook category because breaking fiction's conventions draws my attention to them, changes my perspective, and opens conceptual doors. It makes me wonder what other hidden features fiction has and how else we could play with them to reveal other ideas and depths of meaning. It makes me feel that the book is special and magical, that there's more happening there than in a normal book. * Animated Thumbtack ==== Movable books ==== Movable book is an umbrella term library catalogers use that covers a range of formats. Some of these are closer to the center of my superbook idea than others. The overall idea is that movable books depart from the flatness feature of normal books. Their pages are structured or bound differently, or they have parts other than normal pages that the reader can interact with. * http://www.movablebooksociety.org/ * http://www.loc.gov/aba/cyac/toys.html ===== Split page books ===== * Graham Oakley ===== Vinyl sticker books ===== ==== Interactive ebooks ==== === Boundary cases === I'm not sure if these examples fit my idea of a superbook. ==== Pop-up books ==== ==== Graphic novels ==== ==== Flip books ==== ==== Enhanced print books ==== ==== Activity books ==== ==== Picture books ==== ==== Study guides ==== == Techniques == * Reader participation - invite the reader to complete or enhance their content. [[Category:Arts]] [[Category:Seeds]] [[Category:Developing]] c9fe2f0730591665e47128d06e6d37b18c44bae0 0 104 280 2016-11-07T21:08:50Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the article. wikitext text/x-wiki This article is a tour of the topics of my website, which are my main interests in life. This website is a repository for my projects, and my projects encompass most of my life. So a tour of the site is also a tour of my life. Now why would I think you'd be interested in such a thing? ... So I'm writing this tour to give you a handle on the seemingly random sprawl of my site and to provide you some entry points for beginning to read. It might also give you new ways of thinking about your own life. But I'm also writing it to do the same things for myself, because my life is complicated even for me, and writing is how I make sense of things. == Goals == I like to think of life as a journey, so a tour of my website is a description of my journey. What are the destinations of my life's journey?<ref>When describing a journey, you have a few possible starting points (since a tour is also a journey). Let's focus on three, the vehicle, the departure point, and the destinations. The vehicle is an appealing starting point because then you get the sense that you know your means of getting anywhere at all. The departure point is also a logical place to start, since that's where you are first. But while it can sometimes spark the imagination, a vehicle can feel purposeless if you don't know your motivation for choosing it. A departure point also needs a context if you're going to feel its description has a point. A few different contexts could give it some interest, such as comparing it to someone else's circumstances or highlighting the factors I'm trying to move away from, which would tell you why I'm traveling in the first place. But a destination is a nice nexus of both answers and questions (where am I headed, and why there?), so I like to start by at least glancing at my destinations and the terrain between here and there. Then I'll also know what my vehicle will need to handle.</ref> This question can mean "Where will I end up?" or "Where am I trying to go?" I don't know where I'll end up, so I'll follow the second meaning. Unfortunately, my goals in life are kind of murky, but the ones I can see form a sort of hierarchy. I quibble with myself over the details, but it looks something like this: * Live a satisfying life. ** Be good. *** Figure out the right things to do. *** Get myself to do them. **** Fix myself. **** Love God. **** Love people. ** Enjoy life. *** Live comfortably. **** Fix myself. **** Gather resources. **** Avoid or cope with trouble. *** Learn things. *** Make things. *** Consume things. *** Socialize. Some of these goals might need some explanation. One thing to notice is that some of them are cross-cutting, applying to more than one of the others. Namely these are learning things ("Learn things" and "Figure out ..."), fixing myself, and connecting with people ("Love people" and "Socialize"). I'll explore these interconnections as I explain the goals in more detail. I tie everything together with the idea of being satisfied. People sometimes assert that everyone is fundamentally looking for happiness, and I basically agree, but the claim is a little too simple. Sometimes what you're looking for isn't euphoria or even contentment, since people are sometimes drawn to the act of hurting themselves. I think satisfaction is what they're after, the settledness that comes, for example, with feeling that justice has been served or with a sense of control. Satisfaction isn't our only pursuit, since people also want stronger forms of pleasure, which you could summarize as happiness, but I think satisfaction is our minimum pursuit and underlies happiness. So really my ultimate goal is to be at least satisfied or maybe to be as satisfied as possible, which would encompass the pleasant emotions you might describe as happiness. Enjoying life, another goal in my hierarchy, sounds the same as pursuing happiness or satisfaction, but here I have in mind the more typical idea of happiness as a fairly pure experience of enjoyment that comes from pleasant activities or surroundings. Being good can often be painful. Enjoying life is mostly just nice. The first step in being good is figuring out what it entails. I don't even necessarily care what that is; I just want to aim for it. Goodness as a general value is what I care about. "Getting myself" to do the things I find out are right means I know I'm a divided person. I don't necessarily want to do them at first, but I want to want to; or I might feel conflicted about doing them; or I intend to do them but have poor follow through. "Getting myself" points to the first item under it, fixing myself. Somehow I need to be transformed from a divided person to a unified one. Some Christians would take exception to the idea of fixing ''myself'' because they see humans as incapable of spiritual self-repair. God has to do it. My statement of that goal is partly just shorthand for getting fixed, in whatever way that happens. But it also points to the active part of getting fixed, since even in Christian theology people have some responsibility in their transformation. I would also argue that even passive states, such as waiting, count as actions, unless they happen involuntarily, such as being rendered unconscious. Since this is a list of goals, active phrasing is appropriate. Next I make some assumptions about what I'll find when I arrive at an understanding of goodness: loving God and loving people. These might change as I learn more, but for now as a Christian, it seems safe to adopt Jesus' top two commands. Living comfortably is mostly about the prerequisites to enjoying life. Fixing myself is about eliminating the ways I sabotage my own happiness, in addition to the ways I block my own goodness. Gathering resources covers money but also other resources such as time and health. The trouble I have in mind in the third goal is mostly external, circumstantial trouble, as opposed to the psychological trouble I might encounter within myself, which fall under the goal of fixing myself. The remaining goals are the activities I enjoy, and the "things" in each case is fairly broad. Learning isn't just the way I fix problems; it's something I do for fun. So yes, I'm a big nerd. This means the topics I want to learn about go beyond what I need to know. Consuming things includes food and media, so I combined meanings of the word ''consume'' there. And finally, even though I'm very introverted, I still like hanging out with people sometimes, and I even like listening to their problems and encouraging them if I can. It's fortunate that I can simply enjoy doing good sometimes rather than seeing it all as a chore. == Projects == When I need to get serious about reaching a goal, I make a project out of it. I can't expect to make progress without one, because if it stays in the back of my mind, I'm usually not motivated or prepared enough to work toward it in the nooks and crannies of my time. I have to bring the goal front and center, make concrete plans, and set aside time and attention to work on it. So since my goals and interests are so many, I end up with a lot of projects, or at least a lot of project ideas. Over time I've gotten better at carrying them out, but I'm not always great at choosing which ones to pursue, and placing them in the context of my overall goals should help me prioritize them. So in addition to guiding my readers, that's the other purpose of this overview. Organizing a discussion of my projects is a little tricky. One option is to try to match them to my goals and follow the outline I gave for those. But some projects might address more than one goal. Another option is to group them by subject area. Some projects span more than one subject, so that's not a simple solution either. But since that's how I typically think about my projects, I'll follow that route until it becomes too unwieldy. My aim is to draw out the connections between topics, projects, and goals clearly enough that I could fairly easily reorganize the discussion along different lines. My choices of projects are shaped by my history, circumstances, beliefs, interests, and abilities, so as I discuss the nature and purpose of each project, I'll include those factors where they seem significant. === Religion === If any religion is true, it's the most important thing in life. It encompasses enormous issues. Following it faithfully orients one's ethics during life, empowers one's pursuit of faithful behavior, and determines the quality of one's life after death, which in most religions lasts forever, even if preceded by a few more iterations of earthly life. Religious beliefs can greatly encourage people when they face hardship, and consistent ethical behavior can be a tremendous force for positive change in the world. On top of all this, most religions are concerned with the relationship between the Ultimate and the world, and the truth of any of these religions would carry with it a sense of gravity about honoring this relationship and getting its performance right. And for my own purposes, the true religion would directly and majorly impact my goal to be good and might have a bearing on enjoying life. Obviously I'm speaking in general and idealistic terms in that paragraph. Some skeptics would raise some strong objections to my glowing review of religion, and students of comparative religion would probably note that my description is influenced by my Christian vantage point. But I think what I've said is true enough to support my main contention, that a true religion would be highly important. This claim of religion's importance brings with it a host of questions that are worth investigating: (1) Which religion, if any, is true? (2) What does it teach? (3) How do we follow its teachings? (4) How do we promote it? (5) How do we find out these answers? (6) If no religion is true, how does that affect the concerns religion addresses? I want to cast my investigative net broadly, but for a while most of my projects will revolve around Christianity and naturalism, for the following reasons: (1) By far Christianity is the religion I've spent the most time on, and I've made decent headway into answering these questions in relation to it. (2) I'm still a follower of Christianity, so these answers are important to me. (3) In the modern world of scientific progress, naturalism is Christianity's main philosophical challenger and competitor, and it's the one that most tempts me away. The main religious competitor for me is Buddhism, since it's highly compatible with atheism, so that'll probably be the next one I tackle. ==== Apologetics ==== Questions: What is true about the spiritual realm or ultimate reality? How much of a particular religion is true? How do we know? Since I already adhere to Christianity, why would I ask these questions rather than simply asserting Christianity's truth and getting on with things? To answer that I have to give you a little personal history lesson. I grew up as a Christian, specifically a conservative evangelical. I committed my life to Christ at age 7, and a few years later my faith somehow went from a background fact of my life to being its most important feature. The shift showed up mainly as an enthusiasm for Contemporary Christian Music, Christian talk radio, and evangelism. This was one-on-one evangelism with friends rather than traveling door-to-door or speaking to crowds. Why evangelism? I attribute it to certain helping instincts. As someone who grew up in the church and had little contact with families in other religions, I took Christianity for granted, and I viewed Christian faith as a part of human development. As a child you started out ignorant and rebellious, but your proper destiny was eternal life in God's kingdom, and so giving your life to Christ was the stage of growth that put you on that path. Some people needed extra help to reach that stage, and that was the role of evangelism. I wanted to be part of it. More than simply doing evangelism, my researcher and educator tendencies were in full force even back in junior high, because my free time was taken up with the project of assembling a book on how to do evangelism. I say assembling because it mostly consisted of quotes from other evangelism books. I was very methodical about my evangelism research, progressing through the issues involved in a specific order. Part of learning evangelism is learning the kinds of responses you'll get from people and how to deal with them. Some of the toughest are responses from people who are firmly entrenched in other belief systems. In my research I decided to start with the one I saw as the opposite of Christianity, the worldview that believed nothing Christianity taught--naturalism. So I set about trying to prove God's existence. To build the strongest case I could, I decided the best strategy would be to build the strongest case I could for atheism and then refute it. This began a long investigation into apologetics, which is a defense of some position, in this case Christianity. It lasted till the middle of high school, when my attention was drawn away to psychology and spirituality. I didn't end up studying apologetics as thoroughly as I'd planned, but I came to the tentative conclusion that most traditional arguments for God either didn't work (moral, ontological) or didn't prove very much (cosmological). I still held out hope for the fine-tuning argument. I'd barely touched the arguments for the Bible and for Jesus, but I'd targeted Jesus' resurrection as the most important of those issues. Through my college years I kept an eye on apologetics, mostly in the antics of Internet skeptics and their debates with Internet apologists. Then came graduate school for biblical exegesis, where I learned about how both conservative evangelical and critical scholars study the Bible. This was related to apologetics in that while these two groups went about interpreting the Bible, they were also debating the veracity of its contents. From all this higher education I came to another conclusion, that there are at least two levels of skeptics: (1) the ignorant ones who are prejudiced against Christianity in a simple-minded way and (2) the professionals who know the issues involved and are more measured and nuanced in their criticism. The second of these groups I could respect, and while evangelical scholars were no slouches, I began to wonder if the critical scholars had a point. And maybe some atheist philosophers too. All of that is to say that my investigations into Christian apologetics transformed from an attempt to defend Christianity in high school to an attempt to evaluate it after grad school. But my research hasn't reached the level of seriousness I had at the beginning, partly because I have so many more interests to pursue now, so my questions have mostly been on hold. Hence, I still have them as questions, and apologetics remains as a project. ==== Exegesis ==== Questions: For a religion with scriptures, how do we properly interpret them? ==== Theology ==== Questions: What does this religion teach? How are these teachings derived? What sects are there within the religion? How do we decide between them? ==== Spirituality ==== Questions: How are we to relate to ultimate reality? What are the goals of spirituality? How do we reach them? ==== Evangelism ==== Questions: Should we try to propagate this religion? What are the best ways to do that? === Philosophy === === Social science === === The arts === === STEM === === Weirdness === === Life maintenance === === People === == References == <references/> <disqus/> [[Category:Site]] [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Developing]] 5d5b407c60b019e3204dbd2221a7ce761d3554dd 281 280 2016-11-14T06:44:42Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added more to the Projects intro and to individual projects. wikitext text/x-wiki This article is a tour of the topics of my website, which are my main interests in life. This website is a repository for my projects, and my projects encompass most of my life. So a tour of the site is also a tour of my life. Now why would I think you'd be interested in such a thing? ... So I'm writing this tour to give you a handle on the seemingly random sprawl of my site and to provide you some entry points for beginning to read. It might also give you new ways of thinking about your own life. But I'm also writing it to do the same things for myself, because my life is complicated even for me, and writing is how I make sense of things. == Goals == I like to think of life as a journey, so a tour of my website is a description of my journey. What are the destinations of my life's journey?<ref>When describing a journey, you have a few possible starting points (since a tour is also a journey). Let's focus on three, the vehicle, the departure point, and the destinations. The vehicle is an appealing starting point because then you get the sense that you know your means of getting anywhere at all. The departure point is also a logical place to start, since that's where you are first. But while it can sometimes spark the imagination, a vehicle can feel purposeless if you don't know your motivation for choosing it. A departure point also needs a context if you're going to feel its description has a point. A few different contexts could give it some interest, such as comparing it to someone else's circumstances or highlighting the factors I'm trying to move away from, which would tell you why I'm traveling in the first place. But a destination is a nice nexus of both answers and questions (where am I headed, and why there?), so I like to start by at least glancing at my destinations and the terrain between here and there. Then I'll also know what my vehicle will need to handle.</ref> This question can mean "Where will I end up?" or "Where am I trying to go?" I don't know where I'll end up, so I'll follow the second meaning. Unfortunately, my goals in life are kind of murky, but the ones I can see form a sort of hierarchy. I quibble with myself over the details, but it looks something like this: * Live a satisfying life. ** Be good. *** Figure out the right things to do. *** Get myself to do them. **** Fix myself. **** Love God. **** Love people. ** Enjoy life. *** Live comfortably. **** Fix myself. **** Gather resources. **** Avoid or cope with trouble. *** Learn things. *** Make things. *** Consume things. *** Socialize. Some of these goals might need some explanation. One thing to notice is that some of them are cross-cutting, applying to more than one of the others. Namely these are learning things ("Learn things" and "Figure out ..."), fixing myself, and connecting with people ("Love people" and "Socialize"). I'll explore these interconnections as I explain the goals in more detail. I tie everything together with the idea of being satisfied. People sometimes assert that everyone is fundamentally looking for happiness, and I basically agree, but the claim is a little too simple. Sometimes what you're looking for isn't euphoria or even contentment, since people are sometimes drawn to the act of hurting themselves. I think satisfaction is what they're after, the settledness that comes, for example, with feeling that justice has been served or with a sense of control. Satisfaction isn't our only pursuit, since people also want stronger forms of pleasure, which you could summarize as happiness, but I think satisfaction is our minimum pursuit and underlies happiness. So really my ultimate goal is to be at least satisfied or maybe to be as satisfied as possible, which would encompass the pleasant emotions you might describe as happiness. Enjoying life, another goal in my hierarchy, sounds the same as pursuing happiness or satisfaction, but here I have in mind the more typical idea of happiness as a fairly pure experience of enjoyment that comes from pleasant activities or surroundings. Being good can often be painful. Enjoying life is mostly just nice. The first step in being good is figuring out what it entails. I don't even necessarily care what that is; I just want to aim for it. Goodness as a general value is what I care about. "Getting myself" to do the things I find out are right means I know I'm a divided person. I don't necessarily want to do them at first, but I want to want to; or I might feel conflicted about doing them; or I intend to do them but have poor follow through. "Getting myself" points to the first item under it, fixing myself. Somehow I need to be transformed from a divided person to a unified one. Some Christians would take exception to the idea of fixing ''myself'' because they see humans as incapable of spiritual self-repair. God has to do it. My statement of that goal is partly just shorthand for getting fixed, in whatever way that happens. But it also points to the active part of getting fixed, since even in Christian theology people have some responsibility in their transformation. I would also argue that even passive states, such as waiting, count as actions, unless they happen involuntarily, such as being rendered unconscious. Since this is a list of goals, active phrasing is appropriate. Next I make some assumptions about what I'll find when I arrive at an understanding of goodness: loving God and loving people. These might change as I learn more, but for now as a Christian, it seems safe to adopt Jesus' top two commands. Living comfortably is mostly about the prerequisites to enjoying life. Fixing myself is about eliminating the ways I sabotage my own happiness, in addition to the ways I block my own goodness. Gathering resources covers money but also other resources such as time and health. The trouble I have in mind in the third goal is mostly external, circumstantial trouble, as opposed to the psychological trouble I might encounter within myself, which fall under the goal of fixing myself. The remaining goals are the activities I enjoy, and the "things" in each case is fairly broad. Learning isn't just the way I fix problems; it's something I do for fun. So yes, I'm a big nerd. This means the topics I want to learn about go beyond what I need to know. Consuming things includes food and media, so I combined meanings of the word ''consume'' there. And finally, even though I'm very introverted, I still like hanging out with people sometimes, and I even like listening to their problems and encouraging them if I can. It's fortunate that I can simply enjoy doing good sometimes rather than seeing it all as a chore. == Projects == When I need to get serious about reaching a goal, I make a project out of it. I can't expect to make progress without one, because if it stays in the back of my mind, I'm usually not motivated or prepared enough to work toward it in the nooks and crannies of my time. I have to bring the goal front and center, make concrete plans, and set aside time and attention to work on it. So since my goals and interests are so many, I end up with a lot of projects, or at least a lot of project ideas. Over time I've gotten better at carrying them out, but I'm not always great at choosing which ones to pursue, and placing them in the context of my overall goals should help me prioritize them. So in addition to guiding my readers, that's the other purpose of this overview. Organizing a discussion of my projects is a little tricky. One option is to try to match them to my goals and follow the outline I gave for those. But some projects might address more than one goal. Another option is to group them by subject area. Some projects span more than one subject, so that's not a simple solution either. But since that's how I typically think about my projects, I'll follow that route until it becomes too unwieldy. My aim is to draw out the connections between topics, projects, and goals clearly enough that I could fairly easily reorganize the discussion along different lines. Some of my projects apply to several or all of my goals, such as "how to think" and "how to pursue goals." Some subject areas cross-cut others, such as politics (philosophy, social science) and food (arts, life maintenance). The area of weirdness is a collection of topics gathered from the other areas but with a weird spin on them, such as pseudoscience and conspiracy theories. Conspiracy theories are usually a weird take on history, but they also tend to leak into most of the other weird topics--if I believe something weird and the experts don't, they're conspiring against the public to keep it a secret! I feel that these connections among topics and goals are important and that my map would be incomplete without them. My projects have different levels of generality. Some are specific questions. Some are just topics I want to learn about. I know they're important or at least interesting to me, but I don't know enough about them to narrow down my questions. There are some general patterns to my subgoals. One is a learning-doing pattern: Figure out how to accomplish the goal, and then do it. There's often a problem-solving element: Solve, avoid, or accept problems that arise in myself or my environment. So I might revise my general goal outline to leave these out so we can just infer them and make the list more compact. Related to the pattern observation, my goals and projects are characterized by different types of actions. Some are more about learning, some about making, social interaction, and so on. One topic can apply to multiple goals or action types. For example, I both make and consume music. For some of my project ideas, a specific purpose hasn't emerged. I want to do them based on a strong feeling that they're important. In these cases I assume the feeling comes from some connection with my concerns that my subconscious has made that I haven't uncovered yet. If the project is a general one to study a topic, multiple applications might emerge. Some projects are more relevant to my website than others. For example, I'll be writing about a lot of the topics I research. I won't be writing about all the socializing I do or posting a diet log. Some projects are prerequisites to others. For example, philosophical topics tend to form the conceptual basis for topics in other areas or even for other philosophical topics. And math is involved in a lot of other topics. Some projects are much more important to me than others. The important ones come to mind a lot, or they apply more directly to my purposes, or they're prerequisites to other important projects or to many projects. I have so many project ideas it's hard to remember them all, so it's hard to list them, especially when they can be organized in different ways. To help me collect them, at least the important ones, I'll make several lists based on the factors I've observed in this discussion. Some factors will bring a project to mind easier than others, and projects will often naturally fall into particular categories. My choices of projects are shaped by my history, circumstances, beliefs, interests, and abilities, so as I discuss the nature and purpose of each project, I'll include those factors where they seem significant. Hierarchical topics: Cross-cutting topics: * Cognition * Psychotherapy * Politics * Technology Action types: * Learning * Making * Interacting * Consuming * Coping Cross-cutting actions: === Religion === If any religion is true, it's the most important thing in life. It encompasses enormous issues. Following it faithfully orients one's ethics during life, empowers one's pursuit of faithful behavior, and determines the quality of one's life after death, which in most religions lasts forever, even if preceded by a few more iterations of earthly life. Religious beliefs can greatly encourage people when they face hardship, and consistent ethical behavior can be a tremendous force for positive change in the world. On top of all this, most religions are concerned with the relationship between the Ultimate and the world, and the truth of any of these religions would carry with it a sense of gravity about honoring this relationship and getting its performance right. And for my own purposes, the true religion would directly and majorly impact my goal to be good and might have a bearing on enjoying life. Obviously I'm speaking in general and idealistic terms in that paragraph. Some skeptics would raise some strong objections to my glowing review of religion, and students of comparative religion would probably note that my description is influenced by my Christian vantage point. But I think what I've said is true enough to support my main contention, that a true religion would be highly important. This claim of religion's importance brings with it a host of questions that are worth investigating: (1) Which religion, if any, is true? (2) What does it teach? (3) How do we follow its teachings? (4) How do we promote it? (5) How do we find out these answers? (6) If no religion is true, how does that affect the concerns religion addresses? I want to cast my investigative net broadly, but for a while most of my projects will revolve around Christianity and naturalism, for the following reasons: (1) By far Christianity is the religion I've spent the most time on, and I've made decent headway into answering these questions in relation to it. (2) I'm still a follower of Christianity, so these answers are important to me. (3) In the modern world of scientific progress, naturalism is Christianity's main philosophical challenger and competitor, and it's the one that most tempts me away. The main religious competitor for me is Buddhism, since it's highly compatible with atheism, so that'll probably be the next one I tackle. ==== Apologetics ==== Questions: What is true about the spiritual realm or ultimate reality? How much of a particular religion is true? How do we know? Purposes: Determine if a belief system is worth following. Assumptions: A belief system is worth following if and only if it's true. A religion's truth can be determined on the basis of evaluating its common or basic tenets. Since I already adhere to Christianity, why would I ask these questions rather than simply asserting Christianity's truth and getting on with things? To answer that I have to give you a little personal history lesson. I grew up as a Christian, specifically a conservative evangelical. I committed my life to Christ at age 7, and a few years later my faith somehow went from a background fact of my life to being its most important feature. The shift showed up mainly as an enthusiasm for Contemporary Christian Music, Christian talk radio, and evangelism. This was one-on-one evangelism with friends rather than traveling door-to-door or speaking to crowds. Why evangelism? I attribute it to certain helping instincts. As someone who grew up in the church and had little contact with families in other religions, I took Christianity for granted, and I viewed Christian faith as a part of human development. As a child you started out ignorant and rebellious, but your proper destiny was eternal life in God's kingdom, and so giving your life to Christ was the stage of growth that put you on that path. Some people needed extra help to reach that stage, and that was the role of evangelism. I wanted to be part of it. More than simply doing evangelism, my researcher and educator tendencies were in full force even back in junior high, because my free time was taken up with the project of assembling a book on how to do evangelism. I say assembling because it mostly consisted of quotes from other evangelism books. I was very methodical about my evangelism research, progressing through the issues involved in a specific order. Part of learning evangelism is learning the kinds of responses you'll get from people and how to deal with them. Some of the toughest are responses from people who are firmly entrenched in other belief systems. In my research I decided to start with the one I saw as the opposite of Christianity, the worldview that believed nothing Christianity taught--naturalism. So I set about trying to prove God's existence. To build the strongest case I could, I decided the best strategy would be to build the strongest case I could for atheism and then refute it. This began a long investigation into apologetics, which is a defense of some position, in this case Christianity. It lasted till the middle of high school, when my attention was drawn away to psychology and spirituality. I didn't end up studying apologetics as thoroughly as I'd planned, but I came to the tentative conclusion that most traditional arguments for God either didn't work (moral, ontological) or didn't prove very much (cosmological). I still held out hope for the fine-tuning argument. I'd barely touched the arguments for the Bible and for Jesus, but I'd targeted Jesus' resurrection as the most important of those issues. Through my college years I kept an eye on apologetics, mostly in the antics of Internet skeptics and their debates with Internet apologists. Then came graduate school for biblical exegesis, where I learned about how both conservative evangelical and critical scholars study the Bible. This was related to apologetics in that while these two groups went about interpreting the Bible, they were also debating the veracity of its contents. From all this higher education I came to another conclusion, that there are at least two levels of skeptics: (1) the ignorant ones who are prejudiced against Christianity in a simple-minded way and (2) the professionals who know the issues involved and are more measured and nuanced in their criticism. The second of these groups I could respect, and while evangelical scholars were no slouches, I began to wonder if the critical scholars had a point. And maybe some atheist philosophers too. All of that is to say that my investigations into Christian apologetics transformed from an attempt to defend Christianity in high school to an attempt to evaluate it after grad school. But my research hasn't reached the level of seriousness I had at the beginning, partly because I have so many more interests to pursue now, so my questions have mostly been on hold. Hence, I still have them as questions, and apologetics remains as a project. ==== Exegesis ==== Questions: For a religion with authoritative texts, how do we properly interpret them? Purposes: Establish a method for settling the meaning of the text as a basis for deriving theology from it. Assumptions: Texts are the only or primary source of theology for the religion. Theology is the type of concept that can be derived like a scientific theory or mathematical theorem. ==== Theology ==== Questions: What does this religion teach? How are these teachings derived? What sects are there within the religion? How do we decide between them? Purposes: Determine what to believe. Form a basis for practicing the religion. Assumptions: The religion teaches that it's important to hold certain beliefs. The religion's practices are based on certain truths about the spiritual world or ultimate reality. ==== Spirituality ==== Questions: How are we to relate to ultimate reality? What are the goals of spirituality? How do we reach them? Purposes: Derive benefits from spiritual practice. Access experiential evidence for the belief system. Assumptions: Humans somehow relate to ultimate reality. Practice is an important part of the belief system. Proper practice is possible to some degree. Practicing the religion is beneficial. ==== Evangelism ==== Questions: Should we try to propagate this religion? What are the best ways to do that? Purposes: Fulfill one of the duties of the belief system. Improve individuals' lives by introducing them to the belief system's benefits. Improve the world's condition by spreading the benefits of following the belief system. Assumptions: Spreading the religion is one of its duties. Practicing the religion is beneficial. === Philosophy === ==== Epistemology ==== Questions: What is truth? How do we find it? How do we know when we've reached it? Purposes: Form the basis for methods of finding truth and evaluating claims. Find truth so decisions can be based on it. Assumptions: Decisions should be based on truth. These questions are answerable by reasoning. ==== Metaphysics ==== Questions: What is the nature of the fundamental features of the world (being, time, mind, etc.)? Purposes: Form a basis for ethics. Form a basis for epistemology. Feel more at home in the universe by understanding it. Assumptions: Ethics and epistemology should be based on metaphysics. These questions can be answered by reasoning. Understanding the universe will improve our state of mind. ==== Ethics ==== Questions: How can ethics be derived? What ethical truths are there? Purposes: Form a basis for proper actions. Assumptions: These questions can be answered by reasoning. Proper action is, can be, or should be based on ethical theory. ==== Politics ==== Questions: What are the best ways to organize and operate a society? Purposes: On a governmental level, increase the well-being of whole societies. On a citizen level, decide on beneficial political action. Assumptions: Societies can and should be organized and operated. ==== Aesthetics ==== Questions: What are the ideal aims of the arts? What is the nature of these aims? Purposes: Form a basis for creating, appreciating, and evaluating art. Assumptions: These questions can be answered by reasoning. Art has aims. === Social science === ==== Psychology ==== ===== Cognitive ===== Questions: How do people think? How do they make decisions? How do they learn? How do they achieve goals? Purposes: Inform cognitive science. Assumptions: ===== Personality ===== Questions: What patterns of thought and behavior do people display? What categories, if any, can people be grouped into on that basis? Purposes: Make sense of people's behavior and differences. Improve communication and cooperation. Assumptions: ===== Social ===== ===== Psychotherapy ===== Questions: What's wrong with people? How can people be helped to overcome their problems and develop psychologically? Purposes: Assumptions: ===== Neuropsychology ===== Questions: How does neuroscience inform our understanding of mental processes? Purposes: Inform cognitive science. Inform psychotherapy. Assumptions: ==== Sociology ==== ===== Identity ===== ===== Class ===== Questions: What does class conflict look like in the 21st century? What are its causes? What works to resolve it? Purposes: Assumptions: ==== Anthropology ==== Questions: Purposes: Inform the study of religion. Inform the philosophy of ethics, epistemology, and metaphysics. Assumptions: ==== History ==== Questions: How did certain things get the way they are? What historical parallels help us deal with current situations? How can history be taught clearly and compellingly? Purposes: Make better decisions. Assumptions: ==== Linguistics ==== ===== Semiotics ===== ==== Business ==== Questions: What are the best ways for a group of people to organize and operate to achieve their aims? Purposes: Assumptions: ===== Marketing ===== Questions: How can a message be communicated persuasively to a large audience? Purposes: Assumptions: === The arts === ==== Audio ==== ===== Music ===== ==== Text ==== ==== Images ==== ==== Video ==== ==== Comics ==== ==== Games ==== === STEM === ==== Computers ==== ==== Science ==== ==== Technology ==== ==== Mathematics ==== === Weirdness === === Life maintenance === ==== Food ==== === People === == Footnotes == <references/> <disqus/> [[Category:Site]] [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Developing]] 69d88d78f211ed440f15ffcd88474a5aa879c375 0 44 282 120 2017-02-12T18:05:05Z Andy Culbertson 1 Changed the category to Barbara Sher. wikitext text/x-wiki Version 1.0, 5-12-07 In addition to the inspiring stories, perspective-altering advice, Life Design Models, and career possibilities Barbara Sher serves her readers, ''Refuse to Choose'' also contains about forty tools that Scanners can put to work when they need a little organization or motivation. These tools are listed in an index in the back. Unfortunately, in spite of the creative names she has given them, I had a hard time remembering when I should use each tool. Hence, I have added descriptions of the circumstances in which each tool would be helpful, based on Barbara’s discussions. {| class="wikitable sortable toptextcells" |- ! If ! Then You Need The ! See Page(s) |- | You don’t finish what you start because you don’t have a clear sense of direction | 15-Month Goal Calendar (use it with the Rotating Priorities Board) | 152 |- | You have many interests that you’d like to explore deeply, but you don’t have time | 20 or 30 Three-Ring Binders | 84, 157–158, 174, 253 |- | You have ideas you want to put into action, but you’re anxious about it and/or you have trouble keeping in mind what you need to do | Appointment Planner (use it with the Success Team) | 95 |- | # You’re disorganized and spend too much time getting the materials together for your projects, or # You find that you’ve neglected your projects for a while and you miss them | Avocation Station (use it with the Setup) | 153–156 |- | You think about your ideas but don’t get around to doing anything about them | Backward Planning Flowchart (use it with the Real Deadline) | 91–95, 97, 98 |- | You are interested in practically everything and you want to study each of those things deeply, but that’s impossible, so you don’t do any of it | Big List | 77–79 |- | You feel you can’t pursue your interests because it would be irresponsible | “Busting Open Either/Or Thinking” Game | 127–128 |- | # You’re trying to decide on a (temporary) career, or # You want to explore a variety of new fields or jobs | Career Tryout | 56–57, 207 |- | Ideas enter and leave your mind too quickly without being written down, so you forget them, can’t show them to anybody, can’t do anything with them, and start to forget who you are | Catalog of Ideas with Potential | 244–245 |- | You have an idea for a project | Da Vinci Write-Up (use it with the Scanner Daybook or the 20 or 30 Three-Ring Binders) | 11–17, 110, 243–244 |- | You live two lives, and you want to keep your gear for your other life in one place while you’re waiting to get to it | Destination Steamer Trunks | 139–140 |- | You’re doing a project you intend to finish, and you need a little pressure to keep you going | Down-to-the-Wire Tear-Off Calendar | 251 |- | You want to find out what your interests have in common so you can find a job that matches that theme | “Everything I Don’t Want” List | 216–217 |- | You can’t fit all your interests into one job (and maybe you don’t want to be pressured to do those things anyway), yet you still need to pay the bills | Good Enough Job | 60, 136–137, 143, 159, 233–235, 264 |- | You can’t keep track of your ideas or follow up on your interests | Interest Index Binder | 83–84 |- | # You need to test your Setups, or # You have neglected your projects and you miss them | Kitchen Timer (use it with the Avocation Station) | 155 |- | You want to find a career that can use all your experiences, or you’d like to find a theme to your interests, but you tend to get lazy about writing | Letters from the Field (use it with the Web E-mail Account) | 189–190, 225 |- | You need to adjust your environment, schedule, and/or career to give you the ability to pursue all your interests | Life Design Model | 128–129 |- | You finish a project, either completely or via a Scanner’s Finish, and especially if you aren’t used to appreciating your own wonderful mind or you think you never accomplish anything | Life’s Work Bookshelf | 112–113, 210, 236–237, 252 |- | You’ve started a lot of projects you haven’t finished and your home is cluttered with them, and you’re embarrassed by it | Living Quarters Map | 17–19 |- | You’re afraid of committing to a job long term because you know you’ll get bored with it | LTTL (Learn, Try, Teach, Leave) System | 58–59, 169–171 |- | You have a lot of stress and anxiety because you’re so busy all the time | Micro Nervous Breakdown | 66–67 |- | You keep accumulating a variety of skills and experiences, but it would look bad to put them all on your résumé | Never-Ending Résumé | 188 |- | # You’re very busy and you want to capture your ideas while you’re out and about, and especially if # You need to take a break now and then to think about something else | Portable Dream Deck (use it with the Alternating Current Life Design Model or just by itself) | 69, 167 |- | You finish a project, either completely or via a Scanner’s Finish, and you want a creative way to display it | Private Museum | 237 |- | You have interests that are too 3-D to put in a binder | Project Box | 157 |- | You need some accountability to keep you moving toward your goal | Real Deadline | 91, 94, 95, 97, 99, 250–252 |- | You can’t decide if your idea is a good or bad one just by thinking about it | Reality Research | 97–99 |- | # You feel guilty about jumping from one thing to another, especially if you don’t finish your projects, # You want to design a life that will fit your particular interests, or # You want to know how far to pursue an interest, especially if you’re afraid you have too many | Rewards and Durations | 29–36, 38, 79–81, 103, 117 |- | You’re juggling several projects, and your interest level for each one is unpredictable, so you don’t know how to prioritize them from day to day | Rotating Priorities Board (use it with the 15-Month Goal Calendar) | 152–153 |- | # You feel ashamed of the way you dabble in many different subjects, and you avoid getting involved in new subjects because you have too many interests and projects already, especially if you haven’t finished the ones you’re working on, # You tend to get ideas and then lose them, # You’re doing a Scanner exercise from ''Refuse to Choose!'' or taking notes on something Scanner related, # You’ve been neglecting or undervaluing certain sides of you, # You want to understand what interests you, what causes you to lose interest, and the way your mind works, # You want to capture the excitement you feel when coming up with a project, # You want to preserve your ideas for posterity, # You’ve been too busy to come up with any projects or to let your mind wander, # You just want to have fun in Scanner fashion, # You want to find a theme to your interests, or # You’re returning to Scanner mode after doing your Best Work | Scanner Daybook (use it with the Da Vinci Write-Up) | 11–20, 24–25, 33, 36, 57, 68, 77–79, 105, 109, 110, 140, 155, 156, 165, 167, 198, 209, 213, 225, 244–245, 252 |- | You have several projects you want to work on, but you can’t organize your time well enough to juggle them | Scanner Planner (use it with the School Day Life Design Model) | 146–148 |- | You have a project that you feel bad about not finishing, but you’re not interested enough to keep working on it | Scanner’s Finish (use it with the Life’s Work Bookshelf) | 111–112, 210 |- | You’re really busy and have only two minutes here and there to work on your projects | Setup | 69–70, 153 |- | # You finish a project (typically something you’ve made) and you want to show off the results, or # You need some accountability to keep you moving toward your goal | Show-and-Tell Party | 237–238, 250–251 |- | You want to learn and do a lot of different things, and you think informal learning would work better than college classes | Soiree | 230–231 |- | You learn something that calms your Scanner Panic | Sticky Notes | 47 |- | You need accountability and moral support to keep you moving toward your goal | Success Team | 92, 94–95, 99 |- | You keep accumulating a variety of skills and experiences, but it would look bad to put them all on your résumé | Three Scanner Résumés | 266–267 |- | You’re afraid you’ll never get to do everything you want to do | Wall Calendar Poster | 45–47, 138–139, 140 |- | You need a convenient place from which to write your Letters from the Field | Web E-mail Account (use it with the Letters from the Field) | 189–190, 225 |- | You think you haven’t accomplished much in your life | “What Have I Done So Far?” List | 24–25 |} [[Category:Barbara Sher]] 530698c1c64407e3ec63b2d64452147ddfa4f387 0 43 283 123 2017-02-12T18:05:45Z Andy Culbertson 1 Changed the category to Barbara Sher. wikitext text/x-wiki Version 1.0, 4-29-07 Sher, Barbara. [http://www.amazon.com/Refuse-Choose-Revolutionary-Program-Everything/dp/1594863032/ Refuse to Choose! A Revolutionary Program for Doing Everything That You Love]. Emmaus, PA: Rodale, 2006. (also available in [http://www.amazon.com/Refuse-Choose-Interests-Passions-Hobbies/dp/1594866260/ paperback] with a different subtitle) === Summary === Scanners. You probably know some. Scanners are people who have many interests and a strong desire to pursue them all, and in many cases they try, flitting from one job or project to the next. In a society in which people are defined by their careers, this characteristic puts them in tension with the people around them, who want to know why they can’t just pick an occupation, stick with it, and make something of themselves! Barbara Sher, a Scanner herself, identified this group of people in her work as a life coach. She recognized that they shared gifts that were more valued in earlier periods of history than they are now, and so their tremendous potential is left untapped because modern culture provides them no guide for making the most of their talents. Thus, her task in this book was to define what a Scanner is, explain why it’s okay to be one, and give Scanners a manual for achieving the goal that sets these people apart—to do everything in life that they love. Along the way she identifies roadblocks and offers creative tools for sidestepping them. The book is divided into two parts. The first part deals with the question of what a Scanner is and the basic problems that any Scanner might face: Scanners tend to feel that they’re deficient because they seem so scattered. They’re often afraid that they’ll waste their lives. Many fear that committing to a job will keep them from following their interests. Some are just too busy for extra pursuits. Some feel so overwhelmed by their interests that they can’t begin to follow any of them. Some are too intimidated by their projects to start anything. And some begin lots of things and never finish them. The second part divides Scanners into nine types organized into two broad categories—Cyclical Scanners and Sequential Scanners. Cyclical Scanners have a limited number of interests that they return to repeatedly, while Sequential Scanners move from one interest to another and leave the old ones behind. Within each category Sher sorts the types by how often they switch interests. Each type gets a chapter, which discusses the distinguishing traits of that type; its unique motivations; and the life design models, careers, and tools that will allow Scanners of this type to do everything that they love. Life design models are comprehensive ways of organizing your time, tasks, and environment that naturally fit your goals and styles of working. In a word, this book is terrific. Barbara Sher’s writing is engaging, her descriptions true to life, her advice comprehensive and practical, and her outlook inspiring. The book could serve as a model for other self-help works. I have no real criticisms, only a few clarifications and issues for further discussion. Sher has a website with a forum for just such discussions at [http://www.barbarasher.com/ www.barbarasher.com]. This isn’t really a review, since I was too impatient to tidy it up much. The following is more a collection of notes I took on my reactions and reflections while reading the book. === Good things === Sher’s writing style is personal and engaging. Like many self-help authors, she addresses the reader directly and reveals her principles through stories. In her case they are largely accounts of her experiences as a life coach or other conversations she’s had with Scanners. But what makes Sher’s book so compelling is her blend of profound optimism and intense practicality. She believes unwaveringly in the goodness and potential in being a Scanner, in spite of all appearances and obstacles, and this is because she’s seen what Scanners can do and has a comprehensive plan for making it work. One Scanner, Ella, told Barbara about a story she heard when she was young called ''Rusty in Orchestraville'', “about a little boy who couldn’t make up his mind which instrument he wanted to learn, and so he ended up not playing anything and couldn’t be part of the orchestra.” Barbara replied, “In my experience, Rusty becomes a famous conductor. He needed to study all the instruments, because his instrument is the whole orchestra” (35). I’m not sure Ella’s recounting accurately captures the message of the story (see the description [http://www.317x.com/albums/l/alanlivingston/card.html here]), but Barbara’s version is an apt image for the role of Scanners in the world. Another is, “You have the eyes to see what many people miss” (43). She responds to the conventional wisdom about “buckling down” and devoting your life to one thing by demonstrating that it just isn’t true, noting trends in modern society as well as examples of successful Scanners throughout history (xiii–xiv, 115–116, and chapter 4). She has ''tons'' of ideas for getting things done, and they seem like they could really work, because they’re based on her years of experience talking and working with dozens of Scanner clients, friends, and acquaintances. An example of a good idea that struck me: “Sometimes you simply take an armful of books home from the library and read the introductions, the final chapters, and the index at the back. I get insights into very complex books I’d never be able to read all the way through” (236). I did this kind of thing once sort of by accident, and it was an effective way to get an idea of the subject. It would be worth being more intentional about the technique. This book will open your mind to possibilities (and jobs) you never knew existed (see pp. 254ff). For example, you could get a job as an expediter. They do all the tedious, bureaucratic things that their bosses don’t have time for, and sometimes they have to wait in line for hours to do it, which gives them plenty of time for Scannery things like reading (265). She asks a lot of good, probing questions. For example, to help Wanderers tie their random interests together, she has them ask during any activity that attracts them, “What element, if it were missing, would have made my exploration uninteresting?” (213). She is very thorough in her advice. She anticipates a large variety of problems that Scanners will encounter when trying to become more productive and offers many practical techniques for overcoming them, and she even recognizes when a particular tool won’t do the whole job. For example, in chapter 7 she introduces the Backward Planning Flowchart tool for identifying the steps toward reaching a goal, but then she notes that identifying these achievable steps won’t necessarily make the goal seem easier to reach. It might actually make the goal more intimidating! There can be a huge psychological leap between planning and acting. So you need to identify what mental obstacles are still holding you back and look for other tools that will help you through them, many of which she provides in other parts of the book. “Almost no one stays at one career ‘forever’ anymore” (50). One person I talked to about this point said that some fields suffer because people leave their jobs so quickly, and she was thinking specifically of public education. With a high turnover rate, there’s no consistency, and it’s hard to get things done within the field. I think this problem can be avoided in many cases with things like the LTTL system—Learn, Try, Teach, Leave (58–59). I love this idea, by the way, such a tidy way to be temporary. As long as the important policies and plans of an organization stay constant, the people can change, as long as each new person is competent. At certain points Sher brings up practical caveats to her “do what you want” philosophy, such as the fact that you sometimes do have to finish things even when you’ve gotten bored with them. Then she gives tools for dealing with that too (113–115), though “when it comes to your own projects, who cares?” (36). And even though she’s spent the whole book saying things like, “Start everything. And don’t bother to finish ''any'' of it” (110), she closes with an epilogue on the idea that “As enthusiastic as you may be about every passion, an active mind doesn’t get refreshment from producing nothing. Scanners actually grow tired when they’re underused. So you’ll have to give hard work another look, because inside you there are highly original works waiting to be brought into the world. Nothing will do that but starting and finishing at least one of them—or all of them, one at a time” (249). The point of this book isn’t that Scanners are just fine exactly as they are. They do need to be reshaped a bit, but the general thrust and contour of their life is all right. They have a valuable and truly different core. It just needs to be disciplined a little—''but'' in ways that are most natural for a Scanner while still being effective. (243) Throughout the whole book the key productive finishing skill for Scanners is the ability to pass on what their minds have collected in some way, through either writing, speaking, or creating. It’s not ''really'' okay ''just'' to learn or experience. (243) === Issues to discuss === ==== The Definition of a Scanner ==== She quotes a Scanner: “If I have to slow down or use only one part of me at a time, I become bored, worse than bored—I feel like a part of me is dying on the vine” (28). I think this is what makes the difference between Scanners and other people. When describing the essence of a Scanner and contrasting them with Divers, it’s not enough to say that Scanners can’t have fewer interests or restrict themselves to one. For all we know, they may just be intractably undisciplined. But this part of my experience as a Scanner suggests that there’s something more going on. It’s the profound sense of withering when I’m deprived of my projects that makes me think all these interests are ''vital'' to me and that they’re not just whims I can’t resist. ==== The Goodness of Scannerhood ==== Barbara talks about the relief that Scanners felt once she began identifying them as such. “The realization that their behavior was different—because they were actually genetically different—explained so much that it was accepted right away” (xv). This genetic difference hasn’t been proven, but it certainly seems genetic anyway. That by itself doesn’t mean the genetic difference is a ''good'' one. Being a Scanner could be a congenital disability or character flaw, like having anger management problems. We have to evaluate Scannerhood based on its ''effects''. This, of course, she does throughout the book. Scanners are multitalented people who have a lot to offer the world ''because they are Scanners''. They do have some disadvantages, but these can be overcome by the use of all these great tools. Scanners do need some discipline; they need to be shaped, but not fundamentally changed. Their contribution to the world is not hindered by the fact that they pursue many interests. “To be honest, the elated reaction of people who realized they were Scanners came to me as a surprise at first. I had no idea that simply knowing there was a name for them would cause such a complete turnaround in their outlook and feeling of self-worth” (24). Again, not enough to prove it’s good. Part of their relief was probably from the name itself. It sounds like a personality type. If instead she said, “You have Scanneritis,” they might not be so happy, because that sounds like a disease to be cured. Of course, she does say in the next sentence, “Now I’ve seen over and over what amazing things a Scanner can do with nothing more than simple permission to be herself.” ==== Rewards and Durations ==== “When you lose interest in something, you must always consider the possibility that you’ve gotten what you came for; you have completed your mission. … That’s why you lose interest: not because you’re flawed or lazy or unable to focus, but because you’re finished” (31). “The reason you stop when you do: You got what you came for” (103). I think there’s a difference between what my emotions came for and what my mind came for. Sometimes I get bored with what I’m doing because I’m tired of working, and sometimes I’m just tired of looking at the same project after so long, though I think those are a more temporary and superficial type of boredom. But these projects are important to me on a larger level, so I want to finish them. Usually this is either because later projects are intended to be built on them or because they fulfill some deep purpose I have for my life. It’s if I ''gave up'' on them that I’d feel a loss of meaning. So what if what you came for isn’t enough? What if your feelings of excitement enjoy discovery but your sense of civic duty likes giving back what you’ve learned, but you lose steam simply because it’s hard work and takes a long time? What’s the tool for ''that''? But while feelings can’t indiscriminately be a good clue to Rewards, I think there’s merit to Barbara’s approach. There’s a certain kind of deeper boredom that can be a good clue. The clue comes when continuing the project isn’t just tiresome but actually ''feels pointless'', as Barbara mentions a few paragraphs before: “It was the riveting experience of confronting something he’d never imagined before. That was the only part he really cared about. What followed felt pointless.” Another caveat is that often I leave a project simply because I get distracted by other projects. I might still be perfectly interested in picking it back up if I thought about it, but often I don’t think about it. I wonder if this fits into Durations and Rewards or if it’s a separate issue, probably the latter. “When you’re getting your Reward from any activity, you always feel happy, absorbed, energetic. And when you are satisfied, or the Reward diminishes, you get bored. It’s as natural as sitting down to eat when you’re hungry and leaving when you’re full” (32). Hmm, when I’m done eating I feel satisfied, not bored. If I kept eating after that I might feel unpleasant, though perhaps not bored, unless I was just tired of tasting the same food. Hard work doesn’t always make me feel happy, absorbed, and energetic, but surely it’s important for many projects. I guess if you’re just trying to discover what makes you tick, those happy feelings are good ones. Satisfaction could also be a good clue, but that implies having reached a goal or at least a saturation point. Sometimes it happens on its own, and then using it as a clue would only require paying attention. Sometimes it requires having a goal to reach. But if you don’t have a good sense of your Rewards, maybe you’re not yet in a position to set the right goals. Maybe part of this exercise should be to evaluate the project goals you do set and your motivations for them. Are you, for example, just trying to fulfill someone else’s expectations? Just trying to be complete? Once you reach your goal, what then? would be another good question. In one example, Barbara relates a conversation with Meg, who wished she had stuck with Spanish, even though it bored her after a year, because then she’d be somewhere by now, such as being a teacher. But when Barbara pressed her, Meg admitted that would bore her too (214). Paying attention to your happy feelings is also good for identifying the kinds of projects that would let you just play, which is something Sher thinks Scanners should be allowed to do. Many of the common Rewards (33–34) are true for me in degrees. Maybe a five-point Likert scale would be good here. ==== Scanners and School ==== What does a Scanner major in? Barbara talks about what she did (“I gave up and took an easy major, anthropology … and with some disappointment, I went for the grades-and-graduation thing like everyone else.” [xii]), but what would she have done had she known all about being a Scanner back then? ==== Cathy Goodwin’s Review ==== I am not a career counselor, but Cathy Goodwin is, and she has [http://www.amazon.com/gp/discussionboard/discussion.html/ref=cm_rdp_st_rd/002-7195016-9929633?ie=UTF8&amp;ASIN=1594866260&amp;store=yourstore&amp;cdThread=TxJ98AUVMQFE8H&amp;reviewID=R3KTCC78R4ZL5Y&amp;displayType=ReviewDetail reviewed] Sher’s book on Amazon. Her review is not as glowing as mine, but it is probably more realistic. [[Category:Barbara Sher]] 90f6b8970ccc58401d0f009a0a5d00a5282b52db 14 105 284 2017-02-12T18:06:03Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the category. wikitext text/x-wiki [[Category:Productivity]] 08eaf6506545d642d56610a362f177ff30bd8c14 0 106 285 2017-03-20T05:56:51Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the article. wikitext text/x-wiki == Introduction == For most of my coding life, I have been the only user of my programs. I wrote them to aid my work or personal life, and only rarely did anyone else even see my code or watch it run. This wasn't on purpose. It just turned out that way. In my current job I do belong to a small development team, but our programs are still only for in-house use, so the only needs we have to consider are our own. This situation is starting to change. My programming projects are becoming more relevant to the outside world, and I want to share some of them as open source. This means I'm needing to reshape some of my programming practices and learn some areas of software development I've had the luxury of ignoring all these years. I haven't completely ignored these areas, though. I pick up on them here and there as I read about how other people code or see them in the software I use. Knowing that I'll probably need to know about them someday, I've kept a list. And now the time has come for me to fill in the details. I'm filling in the details here in this guide for two reasons. First, as I learn, writing helps me clarify my thoughts and keep them flowing. And second, posting my writing might help other people. So if you're like me and you've programmed mainly for yourself--what I call private coding--and you're starting to share your work with others--public coding--then maybe what I've learned so far can grease some of your own planning. This project consists of my reading other developers' advice, examining their code, deciding what to adopt and how to adapt it to my needs and preferences, and creating templates, procedures, reference materials, and anything else that might help me code well for a public user base. To give you an idea of my background, I've worked for the past 15 or so years in the publishing industry doing mostly text processing and some web development. The languages I'm most familiar with are Perl, Python, XSLT, and some JavaScript, with a smattering of PHP and VBA. I've spent almost all my time in Windows. I hope to branch out into at least Linux in the future, if only to expand my mind. This guide will be oriented toward Python for now, but I imagine a lot of its suggestions apply to other languages too. Since this guide is a place for me to learn, I welcome feedback, and I'm always open to arguments that my choices could be improved or suggestions for things I've missed. This is an early iteration of the guide, so it's incomplete, and a lot of it is only sketched out. == General coding guides == These are resources with advice on many aspects of writing good code. The ones I haven't read are on my to-read list. I'll probably be adding others. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Code_Complete Code Complete - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Art_of_Unix_Programming The Art of Unix Programming - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perl_Best_Practices Perl Best Practices - Wikipedia] Another resource that overlaps with this guide but covers more on the project management end of OSS is [http://producingoss.com/ Producing Open Source Software]. == Code examples == To show how I'm implementing these ideas in my own code, I'll refer to [https://github.com/thinkulum my GitHub repositories] throughout the guide, mainly my Code Console project, which lets me create and manage projects using templates. Here are projects that show up in lists of high quality code, so I'll examine some of them and include any relevant discoveries in the guide. All the projects I'm listing for now are in Python. * [https://launchpad.net/bzr Bazaar] * [https://github.com/boto/boto3 boto3] * [https://github.com/django/django Django] * [https://github.com/pallets/flask Flask] * [https://github.com/gevent/gevent gevent] * [https://www.mercurial-scm.org/downloads Mercurial] * [https://github.com/nltk/nltk NLTK] * [https://github.com/Pylons/pyramid Pyramid] * [https://github.com/reddit/reddit reddit] * [https://github.com/kennethreitz/requests Requests] * [https://github.com/zzzeek/sqlalchemy SQLAlchemy] * [https://github.com/kennethreitz/tablib Tablib] * [https://github.com/tornadoweb/tornado Tornado] * [http://trac.edgewall.org/browser/trunk/trac trac] * [https://github.com/twisted/twisted Twisted] * [https://github.com/rg3/youtube-dl youtube-dl] In addition to these, I keep a mental list of software with features I might want to emulate, even if I don't plan to study their code very thoroughly: * [https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Mozilla/Developer_guide/Source_Code Firefox] - automatic updating; possibly its add-on architecture, if it ever settles down * [https://wordpress.org/download/source/ WordPress] - plugin hooks == Software development methodology == I'll start with some general principles that direct my thinking about software development in general. These are the ideas behind agile development practices. [https://www.agilealliance.org/agile101/ Agile software development] is a paradigm that was created to answer waterfall development, the approach of planning all the features of a piece of software in advance, an effort that often ends up wasted because the customer's needs change in the middle of the project, so the software has to be redesigned. So agile development was intended to prevent overplanning. But using any development methodology will help prevent the opposite problem, which is a complete ''lack'' of structure and discipline. This results in a code organization scheme called a [http://www.laputan.org/mud/ big ball of mud]. I don't think my programs were complete mud, but the fact that I was the only one seeing or using my code let me get by with a lot of slacking. Slacking does keep you from working too hard, but it fails to prevent other kinds of problems. Agile software development seems like a good middle ground. Agile development encompasses a lot of principles and practices, and it has a lot of varieties, but for me at this point, its most important practices are incremental development, test-driven development, and refactoring. === Incremental development === [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iterative_and_incremental_development Incremental development] is the approach of adding a few features per release rather than developing the whole program at once. It lets users begin using the software earlier, and it lets the feature roadmap change without wasting much development effort on the original design. It's different from iterative development, but they normally go together, so I'm use incremental as shorthand for both. If you're a developer working on your own, the habit of small, frequent releases also can add accountability to the development process. It'll at least hold you accountable to work on the project, since other people will notice when the releases stop coming. It might even encourage you to code each feature well. A short release cycle does mean there's less time to get the code right, but there's also less time to procrastinate on getting it to work, and if you implement good programming practices, you'll waste less of that time debugging. Small, frequent releases can also help the developer avoid procrastination, since the tasks for a small release feel more achievable, similar to writing a [http://volokh.com/posts/1182282037.shtml zeroth draft] of a manuscript. There's little concern for polish, so a zeroth draft has fewer requirements to worry about, and therefore it's more likely to get written. A related practice is to deliberately trim your feature list for each release, captured in the [http://wiki.c2.com/?ExtremeProgramming Extreme Programming] practice [http://wiki.c2.com/?YouArentGonnaNeedIt You Aren't Gonna Need It]. One practice that's helping me think in terms of incremental development is using [http://scottchacon.com/2011/08/31/github-flow.html GitHub flow] as my version control workflow. In GitHub flow the master branch is reserved for deployable code, so anything I'm actively developing goes into a topically named branch off of master. Once the code related to that branch is ready for deployment, I merge that branch back into master. This procedure gets me to plan in terms of small clusters of features. I'll talk more about version control in the next main section. === Test-driven development === * [https://martinfowler.com/bliki/TestDrivenDevelopment.html TestDrivenDevelopment - Martin Fowler] * [http://agiledata.org/essays/tdd.html Introduction to Test Driven Development (TDD) - Agile Data] * [https://www.facebook.com/notes/kent-beck/rip-tdd/750840194948847/ RIP TDD - Kent Beck - Facebook] To get myself into the habit of writing tests first, I'm including it as a subtask for each function I note in my task manager (I use [https://nirvanahq.com/ Nirvana], an app designed with [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Getting_Things_Done GTD] in mind). I have a template for these subtasks, which I copy into the description of the tasks. At the moment the template looks like this: <pre> - Document - Test - Code - Commit </pre> Really I'll move back and forth between documenting, testing, and coding, but I'll check them off when I've completed the first instance of each of those subtasks for that function. === Refactoring === * [https://martinfowler.com/books/refactoring.html Refactoring - Martin Fowler] I don't have a specific refactoring procedure in place. I just do it when I notice the need. I'm hoping to study Fowler's book and learn to think in terms of the structures that refactoring creates. That way I can create them as I code and reduce the need to refactor. == Version control == * [http://guides.beanstalkapp.com/version-control/intro-to-version-control.html An introduction to version control - Beanstalk Guides] I'm hosting my projects on GitHub (see the Distribution section), which means I'm using Git as my version control system. (Before that I was using Subversion via TortoiseSVN, which I still use for some non-GitHub projects.) I learned how to use Git from ''Git Essentials'' by Ferdinando Santacroce, and I try to follow its advice. For a reference I use ''Git Pocket Guide'' by Richard Silverman. Rather than typing all the Git commands myself, I'm lazy and use the GUI tool [https://www.gitkraken.com/ GitKraken]. As I said above, I use the GitHub flow workflow to organize my commits. GitHub has as [https://guides.github.com/introduction/flow/ guide] for it. == Coding style == * [https://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-0008/ PEP 8 -- Style Guide for Python Code - Python.org] I've picked up my coding style from various sources, including ''Perl Best Practices'', but PEP 8 is a good starting point that's specifically geared toward Python. == Project structure == * [http://docs.python-guide.org/en/latest/writing/structure/ Structuring Your Project - The Hitchhiker's Guide to Python] * [https://learnpythonthehardway.org/book/ex46.html Exercise 46: A Project Skeleton - Learn Python the Hard Way] I make a directory on my local machine named whatever I'm using for the GitHub URL (e.g., math-student-sim), and I create this structure inside it: <pre> docs/ <package>/ tests/ app.py LICENSE.md MANIFEST.in README.md setup.py </pre> My package name is usually the project name without the hyphens (e.g., mathstudentsim). I'll fill in more of the details in later sections. == Distribution == To distribute your code you need somewhere to host it, and I've chosen GitHub, since it's the one I hear the most about. * [http://kbroman.org/github_tutorial/ git/github guide - Karl Broman] == Installation == I haven't completely wrapped my mind around Python code distribution and installation, but for now I'm relying on people downloading the source from GitHub and running the setup script. Here are some more details on some of the issues that came up for me in the project structure guides above. * [https://docs.python.org/3/distutils/setupscript.html Writing the Setup Script - Distributing Python Modules (Legacy version)] * [https://caremad.io/posts/2013/07/setup-vs-requirement/ setup.py vs requirements.txt - caremad] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/7923509/how-to-include-docs-directory-in-python-distribution How to include docs directory in python distribution - Stack Overflow] == Metadata == Users of your project will need certain information about it, and you'll need to keep this information somewhere. For Python modules this is in the setup script. * [https://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-0345/ PEP 345 -- Metadata for Python Software Packages 1.2 - Python.org] === Version numbers === * [https://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-0396/ PEP 396 -- Module Version Numbers - Python.org] * [http://semver.org/ Semantic Versioning] * [https://git-scm.com/book/en/v2/Git-Basics-Tagging Git Basics - Tagging - Git] * [https://help.github.com/articles/creating-releases/ Creating Releases - GitHub Help] I'm just following the guidelines in those articles. === License === * [http://choosealicense.com/ Choose an open source license] I've picked MIT as my default to give people freedom to use the code however they want and because I don't expect to have patents to license. == Tests == Based on the advice in ''Learn Python the Hard Way'', I've chosen nose as a test management tool, but since the [http://nose.readthedocs.io/en/latest/ future of nose] is uncertain, I'm using [https://github.com/nose-devs/nose2 nose2]. == User interface == === Command line === To make my projects usable quickly, I'm starting most of them with a command line interface. * [https://wiki.python.org/moin/CmdModule CmdModule - The Python Wiki] * [https://docs.python.org/3/library/cmd.html cmd - The Python Standard Library] I'm placing the commands in cli.py within the package. [More sections to come] <disqus/> [[Category:Programming]] [[Category:Essay]] [[Category:Developing]] 57731ba859b9b0e7904bde8d4b92a407cd9dbdc8 291 285 2017-04-04T06:24:36Z Andy Culbertson 1 In "Code examples," replaced the Code Console with promises of cookiecutter templates and Sublime snippets. Added a link on installing from GitHub with pip. Added the Documentation section. wikitext text/x-wiki == Introduction == For most of my coding life, I have been the only user of my programs. I wrote them to aid my work or personal life, and only rarely did anyone else even see my code or watch it run. This wasn't on purpose. It just turned out that way. In my current job I do belong to a small development team, but our programs are still only for in-house use, so the only needs we have to consider are our own. This situation is starting to change. My programming projects are becoming more relevant to the outside world, and I want to share some of them as open source. This means I'm needing to reshape some of my programming practices and learn some areas of software development I've had the luxury of ignoring all these years. I haven't completely ignored these areas, though. I pick up on them here and there as I read about how other people code or see them in the software I use. Knowing that I'll probably need to know about them someday, I've kept a list. And now the time has come for me to fill in the details. I'm filling in the details here in this guide for two reasons. First, as I learn, writing helps me clarify my thoughts and keep them flowing. And second, posting my writing might help other people. So if you're like me and you've programmed mainly for yourself--what I call private coding--and you're starting to share your work with others--public coding--then maybe what I've learned so far can grease some of your own planning. This project consists of my reading other developers' advice, examining their code, deciding what to adopt and how to adapt it to my needs and preferences, and creating templates, procedures, reference materials, and anything else that might help me code well for a public user base. To give you an idea of my background, I've worked for the past 15 or so years in the publishing industry doing mostly text processing and some web development. The languages I'm most familiar with are Perl, Python, XSLT, and some JavaScript, with a smattering of PHP and VBA. I've spent almost all my time in Windows. I hope to branch out into at least Linux in the future, if only to expand my mind. This guide will be oriented toward Python for now, but I imagine a lot of its suggestions apply to other languages too. Since this guide is a place for me to learn, I welcome feedback, and I'm always open to arguments that my choices could be improved or suggestions for things I've missed. This is an early iteration of the guide, so it's incomplete, and a lot of it is only sketched out. == General coding guides == These are resources with advice on many aspects of writing good code. The ones I haven't read are on my to-read list. I'll probably be adding others. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Code_Complete Code Complete - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Art_of_Unix_Programming The Art of Unix Programming - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perl_Best_Practices Perl Best Practices - Wikipedia] Another resource that overlaps with this guide but covers more on the project management end of OSS is [http://producingoss.com/ Producing Open Source Software]. == Code examples == To show how I'm implementing these ideas in my own code, I'll refer to [https://github.com/thinkulum my GitHub repositories] throughout the guide, mainly my templates for [https://github.com/audreyr/cookiecutter cookiecutter], a Python app that creates project skeletons for any language, and my snippets for [https://www.sublimetext.com/ Sublime Text 2], the text editor I use. Snippets are templates Sublime inserts wherever you type the corresponding trigger strings. Here are projects that show up in lists of high quality code, so I'll examine some of them and include any relevant discoveries in the guide. All the projects I'm listing for now are in Python. * [https://launchpad.net/bzr Bazaar] * [https://github.com/boto/boto3 boto3] * [https://github.com/django/django Django] * [https://github.com/pallets/flask Flask] * [https://github.com/gevent/gevent gevent] * [https://www.mercurial-scm.org/downloads Mercurial] * [https://github.com/nltk/nltk NLTK] * [https://github.com/Pylons/pyramid Pyramid] * [https://github.com/reddit/reddit reddit] * [https://github.com/kennethreitz/requests Requests] * [https://github.com/zzzeek/sqlalchemy SQLAlchemy] * [https://github.com/kennethreitz/tablib Tablib] * [https://github.com/tornadoweb/tornado Tornado] * [http://trac.edgewall.org/browser/trunk/trac trac] * [https://github.com/twisted/twisted Twisted] * [https://github.com/rg3/youtube-dl youtube-dl] In addition to these, I keep a mental list of software with features I might want to emulate, even if I don't plan to study their code very thoroughly: * [https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Mozilla/Developer_guide/Source_Code Firefox] - automatic updating; possibly its add-on architecture, if it ever settles down * [https://wordpress.org/download/source/ WordPress] - plugin hooks == Software development methodology == I'll start with some general principles that direct my thinking about software development in general. These are the ideas behind agile development practices. [https://www.agilealliance.org/agile101/ Agile software development] is a paradigm that was created to answer waterfall development, the approach of planning all the features of a piece of software in advance, an effort that often ends up wasted because the customer's needs change in the middle of the project, so the software has to be redesigned. So agile development was intended to prevent overplanning. But using any development methodology will help prevent the opposite problem, which is a complete ''lack'' of structure and discipline. This results in a code organization scheme called a [http://www.laputan.org/mud/ big ball of mud]. I don't think my programs were complete mud, but the fact that I was the only one seeing or using my code let me get by with a lot of slacking. Slacking does keep you from working too hard, but it fails to prevent other kinds of problems. Agile software development seems like a good middle ground. Agile development encompasses a lot of principles and practices, and it has a lot of varieties, but for me at this point, its most important practices are incremental development, test-driven development, and refactoring. === Incremental development === [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iterative_and_incremental_development Incremental development] is the approach of adding a few features per release rather than developing the whole program at once. It lets users begin using the software earlier, and it lets the feature roadmap change without wasting much development effort on the original design. It's different from iterative development, but they normally go together, so I'm use incremental as shorthand for both. If you're a developer working on your own, the habit of small, frequent releases also can add accountability to the development process. It'll at least hold you accountable to work on the project, since other people will notice when the releases stop coming. It might even encourage you to code each feature well. A short release cycle does mean there's less time to get the code right, but there's also less time to procrastinate on getting it to work, and if you implement good programming practices, you'll waste less of that time debugging. Small, frequent releases can also help the developer avoid procrastination, since the tasks for a small release feel more achievable, similar to writing a [http://volokh.com/posts/1182282037.shtml zeroth draft] of a manuscript. There's little concern for polish, so a zeroth draft has fewer requirements to worry about, and therefore it's more likely to get written. A related practice is to deliberately trim your feature list for each release, captured in the [http://wiki.c2.com/?ExtremeProgramming Extreme Programming] practice [http://wiki.c2.com/?YouArentGonnaNeedIt You Aren't Gonna Need It]. One practice that's helping me think in terms of incremental development is using [http://scottchacon.com/2011/08/31/github-flow.html GitHub flow] as my version control workflow. In GitHub flow the master branch is reserved for deployable code, so anything I'm actively developing goes into a topically named branch off of master. Once the code related to that branch is ready for deployment, I merge that branch back into master. This procedure gets me to plan in terms of small clusters of features. I'll talk more about version control in the next main section. === Test-driven development === * [https://martinfowler.com/bliki/TestDrivenDevelopment.html TestDrivenDevelopment - Martin Fowler] * [http://agiledata.org/essays/tdd.html Introduction to Test Driven Development (TDD) - Agile Data] * [https://www.facebook.com/notes/kent-beck/rip-tdd/750840194948847/ RIP TDD - Kent Beck - Facebook] To get myself into the habit of writing tests first, I'm including it as a subtask for each function I note in my task manager (I use [https://nirvanahq.com/ Nirvana], an app designed with [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Getting_Things_Done GTD] in mind). I have a template for these subtasks, which I copy into the description of the tasks. At the moment the template looks like this: <pre> - Document - Test - Code - Commit </pre> Really I'll move back and forth between documenting, testing, and coding, but I'll check them off when I've completed the first instance of each of those subtasks for that function. === Refactoring === * [https://martinfowler.com/books/refactoring.html Refactoring - Martin Fowler] I don't have a specific refactoring procedure in place. I just do it when I notice the need. I'm hoping to study Fowler's book and learn to think in terms of the structures that refactoring creates. That way I can create them as I code and reduce the need to refactor. == Version control == * [http://guides.beanstalkapp.com/version-control/intro-to-version-control.html An introduction to version control - Beanstalk Guides] I'm hosting my projects on GitHub (see the Distribution section), which means I'm using Git as my version control system. (Before that I was using Subversion via TortoiseSVN, which I still use for some non-GitHub projects.) I learned how to use Git from ''Git Essentials'' by Ferdinando Santacroce, and I try to follow its advice. For a reference I use ''Git Pocket Guide'' by Richard Silverman. Rather than typing all the Git commands myself, I'm lazy and use the GUI tool [https://www.gitkraken.com/ GitKraken]. As I said above, I use the GitHub flow workflow to organize my commits. GitHub has as [https://guides.github.com/introduction/flow/ guide] for it. == Coding style == * [https://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-0008/ PEP 8 -- Style Guide for Python Code - Python.org] I've picked up my coding style from various sources, including ''Perl Best Practices'', but PEP 8 is a good starting point that's specifically geared toward Python. == Project structure == * [http://docs.python-guide.org/en/latest/writing/structure/ Structuring Your Project - The Hitchhiker's Guide to Python] * [https://learnpythonthehardway.org/book/ex46.html Exercise 46: A Project Skeleton - Learn Python the Hard Way] I make a directory on my local machine named whatever I'm using for the GitHub URL (e.g., math-student-sim), and I create this structure inside it: <pre> docs/ <package>/ tests/ app.py LICENSE.md MANIFEST.in README.md setup.py </pre> My package name is usually the project name without the hyphens (e.g., mathstudentsim). I'll fill in more of the details in later sections. == Distribution == To distribute your code you need somewhere to host it, and I've chosen GitHub, since it's the one I hear the most about. * [http://kbroman.org/github_tutorial/ git/github guide - Karl Broman] == Installation == I haven't completely wrapped my mind around Python code distribution and installation, but for now I'm relying on people downloading the source from GitHub and running the setup script. Here are some more details on some of the issues that came up for me in the project structure guides above. * [https://docs.python.org/3/distutils/setupscript.html Writing the Setup Script - Distributing Python Modules (Legacy version)] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/9949420/how-to-configure-setup-py-to-have-pip-install-from-github-master How to configure setup.py to have pip install from GitHub master? - Stack Overflow] * [https://caremad.io/posts/2013/07/setup-vs-requirement/ setup.py vs requirements.txt - caremad] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/7923509/how-to-include-docs-directory-in-python-distribution How to include docs directory in python distribution - Stack Overflow] == Metadata == Users of your project will need certain information about it, and you'll need to keep this information somewhere. For Python modules this is in the setup script. * [https://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-0345/ PEP 345 -- Metadata for Python Software Packages 1.2 - Python.org] === Version numbers === * [https://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-0396/ PEP 396 -- Module Version Numbers - Python.org] * [http://semver.org/ Semantic Versioning] * [https://git-scm.com/book/en/v2/Git-Basics-Tagging Git Basics - Tagging - Git] * [https://help.github.com/articles/creating-releases/ Creating Releases - GitHub Help] I'm just following the guidelines in those articles. === License === * [http://choosealicense.com/ Choose an open source license] I've picked MIT as my default to give people freedom to use the code however they want and because I don't expect to have patents to license. == Tests == Based on the advice in ''Learn Python the Hard Way'', I've chosen nose as a test management tool, but since the [http://nose.readthedocs.io/en/latest/ future of nose] is uncertain, I'm using [https://github.com/nose-devs/nose2 nose2]. == User interface == === Command line === To make my projects usable quickly, I'm starting most of them with a command line interface. * [https://wiki.python.org/moin/CmdModule CmdModule - The Python Wiki] * [https://docs.python.org/3/library/cmd.html cmd - The Python Standard Library] I'm placing the commands in <code>cli.py</code> within the package. == Documentation == When you're coding for yourself, it's easy to forget about documentation, since you know how your code works and how to use it, and if you forget, you can reread it and figure it out. Deciphering your own code annoying, but possibly less annoying than writing documentation. Usually when I'm in my lazy, non-documenting mode, I comment pieces of the code during especially painful rereadings. I'd like to be nicer than that to people who aren't me. Documentation comes in several different kinds, based on its location, format, and intended audience. It might help to think of documentation as falling into two basic genres: cookbooks and references. References tell you how the project works, and cookbooks tell you how to navigate through the project to reach particular objectives. Tutorials, for example, are a type of cookbook. Audiences fall into about three main categories: end users, API users who are developers using the code to write plugins or outside apps, and project developers. As an overview, here's my take on the purpose and audience of documentation types you might find in Python projects, though most aren't limited to Python. Afterward I'll list links that discuss each type in more detail. * '''README''' - In a document in the root directory of the project. A cookbook that tells users and developers the basics of working with the project. * '''Docstrings''' - Mostly at the top of a function. A reference that tells API users how to use the function. * '''Command line help''' - In the docstrings of command handling functions and at the top of a script. A reference that tells the user how to use the script and its command. * '''Comments''' - Interspersed among lines of code. A reference that tells project developers what the code does and why. * '''Code conventions'' - Elements of coding style aimed at communicating the code's intentions. A reference that tells project developers and API users what the code does. Some developers try to substitute this technique for comments. * '''Project documentation''' - In documents separate from the code. A cookbook and reference that gives users and developers thorough information for working with the project. * '''Literate programming''' - Interspersed among chunks of code. A reference that gives developers detailed explanations of the reasoning behind the code. This type of documentation isn't common, but it could be a good idea for some projects. === General advice === * [http://docs.python-guide.org/en/latest/writing/documentation/ Documentation - The Hitchhiker's Guide to Python] - Covers a lot of these documentation types. * [https://docs.python.org/devguide/documenting.html Documenting Python - Python Developer's Guide - Python.org] - A style guide for the Python source code, which could be adopted for other projects. === README === Here are some example READMEs that have helped me plan mine: * [https://gist.github.com/jxson/1784669 jxson/README.md] * [https://gist.github.com/PurpleBooth/109311bb0361f32d87a2 PurpleBooth/README-Template.md] * [https://gist.github.com/zenorocha/4526327 zenorocha/README.md] Here are some other lists of READMEs: * [https://changelog.com/posts/a-beginners-guide-to-creating-a-readme A Beginner's Guide to Creating a README] * [https://github.com/matiassingers/awesome-readme matiassingers/awesome-readme] * [https://github.com/repat/README-template repat/README-template] The initial README I came up with is [https://github.com/thinkulum/math-student-sim/blob/master/README.md here]. === Docstrings === Here are discussions of what to put in a docstring: * [https://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-0257/ PEP 257 -- Docstring Conventions - Python.org] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/3898572/what-is-the-standard-python-docstring-format What is the standard Python docstring format? - Stack Overflow] My snippets for functions and modules will include docstring outlines. Then you need a tool to present the docstrings to the reader. I'm going with Sphinx, since Python developers seem to prefer it. Since it formats more than just docstrings, I've put its links in the "Project documentation" section below. === Command line help === Traditional command-line programs are run from the OS command line, and their help statement is called a usage message. On Unix-like OSes they may also have a man (manual) page. I'll talk about man pages in the "Project documentation" section. Python has the <code>cmd</code> module for creating a command-line interpreter within your program, and each of your program's commands can also have a help message, contained in the command function's docstring. My snippets for scripts and command functions will include outlines for usage and help messages. ==== Usage message ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Usage_message Usage message - Wikipedia] * [http://courses.cms.caltech.edu/cs11/material/general/usage.html How to write usage statements - CS 11 - Caltech] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/17314872/shell-scripts-conventions-to-write-usage-text-for-parameters Shell scripts: conventions to write usage text for parameters? - Stack Overflow] * [https://github.com/docopt/docopt docopt (Python implementation)] - A library that checks the user's command line arguments by parsing the script's usage message. Even if you're not using docopt, it gives you a convenient set of conventions for formatting usage messages. * [https://docs.python.org/3/library/argparse.html argparse - Python.org] - Moves in the opposite direction from docopt, generating a usage message from a specification. ==== Command help ==== I haven't found any conventions for <code>cmd</code> help text, and the examples I've seen have been free-form descriptions. Maybe it would make sense to treat each command as a separate program and use usage message conventions for its help. === Comments === [TODO] === Code conventions === [TODO] === Project documentation === [TODO] === Literate programming === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Literate_programming Literate programming - Wikipedia] * [http://akkartik.name/post/literate-programming Literate programming: Knuth is doing it wrong - Kartik Agaram] Python tools: * [https://sourceforge.net/projects/pywebtool/ pyWeb] - After glancing at a few, I chose pyWeb as probably the closest to what I was looking for. * [http://mpastell.com/pweave/ Pweave] - A feature-rich tool I might try at some point. My first attempt at literate programming is my [https://github.com/thinkulum/math-student-sim Math Student Simulator]. See the README for basic details on writing and processing the source files. [More sections to come] <disqus/> [[Category:Programming]] [[Category:Essay]] [[Category:Developing]] 10333f9655a7e1d347e28c17726b3c20199e0da9 292 291 2017-04-04T06:28:47Z Andy Culbertson 1 Fixed some bold formatting. wikitext text/x-wiki == Introduction == For most of my coding life, I have been the only user of my programs. I wrote them to aid my work or personal life, and only rarely did anyone else even see my code or watch it run. This wasn't on purpose. It just turned out that way. In my current job I do belong to a small development team, but our programs are still only for in-house use, so the only needs we have to consider are our own. This situation is starting to change. My programming projects are becoming more relevant to the outside world, and I want to share some of them as open source. This means I'm needing to reshape some of my programming practices and learn some areas of software development I've had the luxury of ignoring all these years. I haven't completely ignored these areas, though. I pick up on them here and there as I read about how other people code or see them in the software I use. Knowing that I'll probably need to know about them someday, I've kept a list. And now the time has come for me to fill in the details. I'm filling in the details here in this guide for two reasons. First, as I learn, writing helps me clarify my thoughts and keep them flowing. And second, posting my writing might help other people. So if you're like me and you've programmed mainly for yourself--what I call private coding--and you're starting to share your work with others--public coding--then maybe what I've learned so far can grease some of your own planning. This project consists of my reading other developers' advice, examining their code, deciding what to adopt and how to adapt it to my needs and preferences, and creating templates, procedures, reference materials, and anything else that might help me code well for a public user base. To give you an idea of my background, I've worked for the past 15 or so years in the publishing industry doing mostly text processing and some web development. The languages I'm most familiar with are Perl, Python, XSLT, and some JavaScript, with a smattering of PHP and VBA. I've spent almost all my time in Windows. I hope to branch out into at least Linux in the future, if only to expand my mind. This guide will be oriented toward Python for now, but I imagine a lot of its suggestions apply to other languages too. Since this guide is a place for me to learn, I welcome feedback, and I'm always open to arguments that my choices could be improved or suggestions for things I've missed. This is an early iteration of the guide, so it's incomplete, and a lot of it is only sketched out. == General coding guides == These are resources with advice on many aspects of writing good code. The ones I haven't read are on my to-read list. I'll probably be adding others. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Code_Complete Code Complete - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Art_of_Unix_Programming The Art of Unix Programming - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perl_Best_Practices Perl Best Practices - Wikipedia] Another resource that overlaps with this guide but covers more on the project management end of OSS is [http://producingoss.com/ Producing Open Source Software]. == Code examples == To show how I'm implementing these ideas in my own code, I'll refer to [https://github.com/thinkulum my GitHub repositories] throughout the guide, mainly my templates for [https://github.com/audreyr/cookiecutter cookiecutter], a Python app that creates project skeletons for any language, and my snippets for [https://www.sublimetext.com/ Sublime Text 2], the text editor I use. Snippets are templates Sublime inserts wherever you type the corresponding trigger strings. Here are projects that show up in lists of high quality code, so I'll examine some of them and include any relevant discoveries in the guide. All the projects I'm listing for now are in Python. * [https://launchpad.net/bzr Bazaar] * [https://github.com/boto/boto3 boto3] * [https://github.com/django/django Django] * [https://github.com/pallets/flask Flask] * [https://github.com/gevent/gevent gevent] * [https://www.mercurial-scm.org/downloads Mercurial] * [https://github.com/nltk/nltk NLTK] * [https://github.com/Pylons/pyramid Pyramid] * [https://github.com/reddit/reddit reddit] * [https://github.com/kennethreitz/requests Requests] * [https://github.com/zzzeek/sqlalchemy SQLAlchemy] * [https://github.com/kennethreitz/tablib Tablib] * [https://github.com/tornadoweb/tornado Tornado] * [http://trac.edgewall.org/browser/trunk/trac trac] * [https://github.com/twisted/twisted Twisted] * [https://github.com/rg3/youtube-dl youtube-dl] In addition to these, I keep a mental list of software with features I might want to emulate, even if I don't plan to study their code very thoroughly: * [https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Mozilla/Developer_guide/Source_Code Firefox] - automatic updating; possibly its add-on architecture, if it ever settles down * [https://wordpress.org/download/source/ WordPress] - plugin hooks == Software development methodology == I'll start with some general principles that direct my thinking about software development in general. These are the ideas behind agile development practices. [https://www.agilealliance.org/agile101/ Agile software development] is a paradigm that was created to answer waterfall development, the approach of planning all the features of a piece of software in advance, an effort that often ends up wasted because the customer's needs change in the middle of the project, so the software has to be redesigned. So agile development was intended to prevent overplanning. But using any development methodology will help prevent the opposite problem, which is a complete ''lack'' of structure and discipline. This results in a code organization scheme called a [http://www.laputan.org/mud/ big ball of mud]. I don't think my programs were complete mud, but the fact that I was the only one seeing or using my code let me get by with a lot of slacking. Slacking does keep you from working too hard, but it fails to prevent other kinds of problems. Agile software development seems like a good middle ground. Agile development encompasses a lot of principles and practices, and it has a lot of varieties, but for me at this point, its most important practices are incremental development, test-driven development, and refactoring. === Incremental development === [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iterative_and_incremental_development Incremental development] is the approach of adding a few features per release rather than developing the whole program at once. It lets users begin using the software earlier, and it lets the feature roadmap change without wasting much development effort on the original design. It's different from iterative development, but they normally go together, so I'm use incremental as shorthand for both. If you're a developer working on your own, the habit of small, frequent releases also can add accountability to the development process. It'll at least hold you accountable to work on the project, since other people will notice when the releases stop coming. It might even encourage you to code each feature well. A short release cycle does mean there's less time to get the code right, but there's also less time to procrastinate on getting it to work, and if you implement good programming practices, you'll waste less of that time debugging. Small, frequent releases can also help the developer avoid procrastination, since the tasks for a small release feel more achievable, similar to writing a [http://volokh.com/posts/1182282037.shtml zeroth draft] of a manuscript. There's little concern for polish, so a zeroth draft has fewer requirements to worry about, and therefore it's more likely to get written. A related practice is to deliberately trim your feature list for each release, captured in the [http://wiki.c2.com/?ExtremeProgramming Extreme Programming] practice [http://wiki.c2.com/?YouArentGonnaNeedIt You Aren't Gonna Need It]. One practice that's helping me think in terms of incremental development is using [http://scottchacon.com/2011/08/31/github-flow.html GitHub flow] as my version control workflow. In GitHub flow the master branch is reserved for deployable code, so anything I'm actively developing goes into a topically named branch off of master. Once the code related to that branch is ready for deployment, I merge that branch back into master. This procedure gets me to plan in terms of small clusters of features. I'll talk more about version control in the next main section. === Test-driven development === * [https://martinfowler.com/bliki/TestDrivenDevelopment.html TestDrivenDevelopment - Martin Fowler] * [http://agiledata.org/essays/tdd.html Introduction to Test Driven Development (TDD) - Agile Data] * [https://www.facebook.com/notes/kent-beck/rip-tdd/750840194948847/ RIP TDD - Kent Beck - Facebook] To get myself into the habit of writing tests first, I'm including it as a subtask for each function I note in my task manager (I use [https://nirvanahq.com/ Nirvana], an app designed with [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Getting_Things_Done GTD] in mind). I have a template for these subtasks, which I copy into the description of the tasks. At the moment the template looks like this: <pre> - Document - Test - Code - Commit </pre> Really I'll move back and forth between documenting, testing, and coding, but I'll check them off when I've completed the first instance of each of those subtasks for that function. === Refactoring === * [https://martinfowler.com/books/refactoring.html Refactoring - Martin Fowler] I don't have a specific refactoring procedure in place. I just do it when I notice the need. I'm hoping to study Fowler's book and learn to think in terms of the structures that refactoring creates. That way I can create them as I code and reduce the need to refactor. == Version control == * [http://guides.beanstalkapp.com/version-control/intro-to-version-control.html An introduction to version control - Beanstalk Guides] I'm hosting my projects on GitHub (see the Distribution section), which means I'm using Git as my version control system. (Before that I was using Subversion via TortoiseSVN, which I still use for some non-GitHub projects.) I learned how to use Git from ''Git Essentials'' by Ferdinando Santacroce, and I try to follow its advice. For a reference I use ''Git Pocket Guide'' by Richard Silverman. Rather than typing all the Git commands myself, I'm lazy and use the GUI tool [https://www.gitkraken.com/ GitKraken]. As I said above, I use the GitHub flow workflow to organize my commits. GitHub has as [https://guides.github.com/introduction/flow/ guide] for it. == Coding style == * [https://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-0008/ PEP 8 -- Style Guide for Python Code - Python.org] I've picked up my coding style from various sources, including ''Perl Best Practices'', but PEP 8 is a good starting point that's specifically geared toward Python. == Project structure == * [http://docs.python-guide.org/en/latest/writing/structure/ Structuring Your Project - The Hitchhiker's Guide to Python] * [https://learnpythonthehardway.org/book/ex46.html Exercise 46: A Project Skeleton - Learn Python the Hard Way] I make a directory on my local machine named whatever I'm using for the GitHub URL (e.g., math-student-sim), and I create this structure inside it: <pre> docs/ <package>/ tests/ app.py LICENSE.md MANIFEST.in README.md setup.py </pre> My package name is usually the project name without the hyphens (e.g., mathstudentsim). I'll fill in more of the details in later sections. == Distribution == To distribute your code you need somewhere to host it, and I've chosen GitHub, since it's the one I hear the most about. * [http://kbroman.org/github_tutorial/ git/github guide - Karl Broman] == Installation == I haven't completely wrapped my mind around Python code distribution and installation, but for now I'm relying on people downloading the source from GitHub and running the setup script. Here are some more details on some of the issues that came up for me in the project structure guides above. * [https://docs.python.org/3/distutils/setupscript.html Writing the Setup Script - Distributing Python Modules (Legacy version)] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/9949420/how-to-configure-setup-py-to-have-pip-install-from-github-master How to configure setup.py to have pip install from GitHub master? - Stack Overflow] * [https://caremad.io/posts/2013/07/setup-vs-requirement/ setup.py vs requirements.txt - caremad] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/7923509/how-to-include-docs-directory-in-python-distribution How to include docs directory in python distribution - Stack Overflow] == Metadata == Users of your project will need certain information about it, and you'll need to keep this information somewhere. For Python modules this is in the setup script. * [https://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-0345/ PEP 345 -- Metadata for Python Software Packages 1.2 - Python.org] === Version numbers === * [https://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-0396/ PEP 396 -- Module Version Numbers - Python.org] * [http://semver.org/ Semantic Versioning] * [https://git-scm.com/book/en/v2/Git-Basics-Tagging Git Basics - Tagging - Git] * [https://help.github.com/articles/creating-releases/ Creating Releases - GitHub Help] I'm just following the guidelines in those articles. === License === * [http://choosealicense.com/ Choose an open source license] I've picked MIT as my default to give people freedom to use the code however they want and because I don't expect to have patents to license. == Tests == Based on the advice in ''Learn Python the Hard Way'', I've chosen nose as a test management tool, but since the [http://nose.readthedocs.io/en/latest/ future of nose] is uncertain, I'm using [https://github.com/nose-devs/nose2 nose2]. == User interface == === Command line === To make my projects usable quickly, I'm starting most of them with a command line interface. * [https://wiki.python.org/moin/CmdModule CmdModule - The Python Wiki] * [https://docs.python.org/3/library/cmd.html cmd - The Python Standard Library] I'm placing the commands in <code>cli.py</code> within the package. == Documentation == When you're coding for yourself, it's easy to forget about documentation, since you know how your code works and how to use it, and if you forget, you can reread it and figure it out. Deciphering your own code annoying, but possibly less annoying than writing documentation. Usually when I'm in my lazy, non-documenting mode, I comment pieces of the code during especially painful rereadings. I'd like to be nicer than that to people who aren't me. Documentation comes in several different kinds, based on its location, format, and intended audience. It might help to think of documentation as falling into two basic genres: cookbooks and references. References tell you how the project works, and cookbooks tell you how to navigate through the project to reach particular objectives. Tutorials, for example, are a type of cookbook. Audiences fall into about three main categories: end users, API users who are developers using the code to write plugins or outside apps, and project developers. As an overview, here's my take on the purpose and audience of documentation types you might find in Python projects, though most aren't limited to Python. Afterward I'll list links that discuss each type in more detail. * '''README''' - In a document in the root directory of the project. A cookbook that tells users and developers the basics of working with the project. * '''Docstrings''' - Mostly at the top of a function. A reference that tells API users how to use the function. * '''Command line help''' - In the docstrings of command handling functions and at the top of a script. A reference that tells the user how to use the script and its command. * '''Comments''' - Interspersed among lines of code. A reference that tells project developers what the code does and why. * '''Code conventions''' - Elements of coding style aimed at communicating the code's intentions. A reference that tells project developers and API users what the code does. Some developers try to substitute this technique for comments. * '''Project documentation''' - In documents separate from the code. A cookbook and reference that gives users and developers thorough information for working with the project. * '''Literate programming''' - Interspersed among chunks of code. A reference that gives developers detailed explanations of the reasoning behind the code. This type of documentation isn't common, but it could be a good idea for some projects. === General advice === * [http://docs.python-guide.org/en/latest/writing/documentation/ Documentation - The Hitchhiker's Guide to Python] - Covers a lot of these documentation types. * [https://docs.python.org/devguide/documenting.html Documenting Python - Python Developer's Guide - Python.org] - A style guide for the Python source code, which could be adopted for other projects. === README === Here are some example READMEs that have helped me plan mine: * [https://gist.github.com/jxson/1784669 jxson/README.md] * [https://gist.github.com/PurpleBooth/109311bb0361f32d87a2 PurpleBooth/README-Template.md] * [https://gist.github.com/zenorocha/4526327 zenorocha/README.md] Here are some other lists of READMEs: * [https://changelog.com/posts/a-beginners-guide-to-creating-a-readme A Beginner's Guide to Creating a README] * [https://github.com/matiassingers/awesome-readme matiassingers/awesome-readme] * [https://github.com/repat/README-template repat/README-template] The initial README I came up with is [https://github.com/thinkulum/math-student-sim/blob/master/README.md here]. === Docstrings === Here are discussions of what to put in a docstring: * [https://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-0257/ PEP 257 -- Docstring Conventions - Python.org] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/3898572/what-is-the-standard-python-docstring-format What is the standard Python docstring format? - Stack Overflow] My snippets for functions and modules will include docstring outlines. Then you need a tool to present the docstrings to the reader. I'm going with Sphinx, since Python developers seem to prefer it. Since it formats more than just docstrings, I've put its links in the "Project documentation" section below. === Command line help === Traditional command-line programs are run from the OS command line, and their help statement is called a usage message. On Unix-like OSes they may also have a man (manual) page. I'll talk about man pages in the "Project documentation" section. Python has the <code>cmd</code> module for creating a command-line interpreter within your program, and each of your program's commands can also have a help message, contained in the command function's docstring. My snippets for scripts and command functions will include outlines for usage and help messages. ==== Usage message ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Usage_message Usage message - Wikipedia] * [http://courses.cms.caltech.edu/cs11/material/general/usage.html How to write usage statements - CS 11 - Caltech] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/17314872/shell-scripts-conventions-to-write-usage-text-for-parameters Shell scripts: conventions to write usage text for parameters? - Stack Overflow] * [https://github.com/docopt/docopt docopt (Python implementation)] - A library that checks the user's command line arguments by parsing the script's usage message. Even if you're not using docopt, it gives you a convenient set of conventions for formatting usage messages. * [https://docs.python.org/3/library/argparse.html argparse - Python.org] - Moves in the opposite direction from docopt, generating a usage message from a specification. ==== Command help ==== I haven't found any conventions for <code>cmd</code> help text, and the examples I've seen have been free-form descriptions. Maybe it would make sense to treat each command as a separate program and use usage message conventions for its help. === Comments === [TODO] === Code conventions === [TODO] === Project documentation === [TODO] === Literate programming === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Literate_programming Literate programming - Wikipedia] * [http://akkartik.name/post/literate-programming Literate programming: Knuth is doing it wrong - Kartik Agaram] Python tools: * [https://sourceforge.net/projects/pywebtool/ pyWeb] - After glancing at a few, I chose pyWeb as probably the closest to what I was looking for. * [http://mpastell.com/pweave/ Pweave] - A feature-rich tool I might try at some point. My first attempt at literate programming is my [https://github.com/thinkulum/math-student-sim Math Student Simulator]. See the README for basic details on writing and processing the source files. [More sections to come] <disqus/> [[Category:Programming]] [[Category:Essay]] [[Category:Developing]] 42131e51c69400c3815b3aa27a7d7a1e055026c5 295 292 2017-04-06T04:42:44Z Andy Culbertson 1 Fixed the Essays category. wikitext text/x-wiki == Introduction == For most of my coding life, I have been the only user of my programs. I wrote them to aid my work or personal life, and only rarely did anyone else even see my code or watch it run. This wasn't on purpose. It just turned out that way. In my current job I do belong to a small development team, but our programs are still only for in-house use, so the only needs we have to consider are our own. This situation is starting to change. My programming projects are becoming more relevant to the outside world, and I want to share some of them as open source. This means I'm needing to reshape some of my programming practices and learn some areas of software development I've had the luxury of ignoring all these years. I haven't completely ignored these areas, though. I pick up on them here and there as I read about how other people code or see them in the software I use. Knowing that I'll probably need to know about them someday, I've kept a list. And now the time has come for me to fill in the details. I'm filling in the details here in this guide for two reasons. First, as I learn, writing helps me clarify my thoughts and keep them flowing. And second, posting my writing might help other people. So if you're like me and you've programmed mainly for yourself--what I call private coding--and you're starting to share your work with others--public coding--then maybe what I've learned so far can grease some of your own planning. This project consists of my reading other developers' advice, examining their code, deciding what to adopt and how to adapt it to my needs and preferences, and creating templates, procedures, reference materials, and anything else that might help me code well for a public user base. To give you an idea of my background, I've worked for the past 15 or so years in the publishing industry doing mostly text processing and some web development. The languages I'm most familiar with are Perl, Python, XSLT, and some JavaScript, with a smattering of PHP and VBA. I've spent almost all my time in Windows. I hope to branch out into at least Linux in the future, if only to expand my mind. This guide will be oriented toward Python for now, but I imagine a lot of its suggestions apply to other languages too. Since this guide is a place for me to learn, I welcome feedback, and I'm always open to arguments that my choices could be improved or suggestions for things I've missed. This is an early iteration of the guide, so it's incomplete, and a lot of it is only sketched out. == General coding guides == These are resources with advice on many aspects of writing good code. The ones I haven't read are on my to-read list. I'll probably be adding others. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Code_Complete Code Complete - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Art_of_Unix_Programming The Art of Unix Programming - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perl_Best_Practices Perl Best Practices - Wikipedia] Another resource that overlaps with this guide but covers more on the project management end of OSS is [http://producingoss.com/ Producing Open Source Software]. == Code examples == To show how I'm implementing these ideas in my own code, I'll refer to [https://github.com/thinkulum my GitHub repositories] throughout the guide, mainly my templates for [https://github.com/audreyr/cookiecutter cookiecutter], a Python app that creates project skeletons for any language, and my snippets for [https://www.sublimetext.com/ Sublime Text 2], the text editor I use. Snippets are templates Sublime inserts wherever you type the corresponding trigger strings. Here are projects that show up in lists of high quality code, so I'll examine some of them and include any relevant discoveries in the guide. All the projects I'm listing for now are in Python. * [https://launchpad.net/bzr Bazaar] * [https://github.com/boto/boto3 boto3] * [https://github.com/django/django Django] * [https://github.com/pallets/flask Flask] * [https://github.com/gevent/gevent gevent] * [https://www.mercurial-scm.org/downloads Mercurial] * [https://github.com/nltk/nltk NLTK] * [https://github.com/Pylons/pyramid Pyramid] * [https://github.com/reddit/reddit reddit] * [https://github.com/kennethreitz/requests Requests] * [https://github.com/zzzeek/sqlalchemy SQLAlchemy] * [https://github.com/kennethreitz/tablib Tablib] * [https://github.com/tornadoweb/tornado Tornado] * [http://trac.edgewall.org/browser/trunk/trac trac] * [https://github.com/twisted/twisted Twisted] * [https://github.com/rg3/youtube-dl youtube-dl] In addition to these, I keep a mental list of software with features I might want to emulate, even if I don't plan to study their code very thoroughly: * [https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Mozilla/Developer_guide/Source_Code Firefox] - automatic updating; possibly its add-on architecture, if it ever settles down * [https://wordpress.org/download/source/ WordPress] - plugin hooks == Software development methodology == I'll start with some general principles that direct my thinking about software development in general. These are the ideas behind agile development practices. [https://www.agilealliance.org/agile101/ Agile software development] is a paradigm that was created to answer waterfall development, the approach of planning all the features of a piece of software in advance, an effort that often ends up wasted because the customer's needs change in the middle of the project, so the software has to be redesigned. So agile development was intended to prevent overplanning. But using any development methodology will help prevent the opposite problem, which is a complete ''lack'' of structure and discipline. This results in a code organization scheme called a [http://www.laputan.org/mud/ big ball of mud]. I don't think my programs were complete mud, but the fact that I was the only one seeing or using my code let me get by with a lot of slacking. Slacking does keep you from working too hard, but it fails to prevent other kinds of problems. Agile software development seems like a good middle ground. Agile development encompasses a lot of principles and practices, and it has a lot of varieties, but for me at this point, its most important practices are incremental development, test-driven development, and refactoring. === Incremental development === [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iterative_and_incremental_development Incremental development] is the approach of adding a few features per release rather than developing the whole program at once. It lets users begin using the software earlier, and it lets the feature roadmap change without wasting much development effort on the original design. It's different from iterative development, but they normally go together, so I'm use incremental as shorthand for both. If you're a developer working on your own, the habit of small, frequent releases also can add accountability to the development process. It'll at least hold you accountable to work on the project, since other people will notice when the releases stop coming. It might even encourage you to code each feature well. A short release cycle does mean there's less time to get the code right, but there's also less time to procrastinate on getting it to work, and if you implement good programming practices, you'll waste less of that time debugging. Small, frequent releases can also help the developer avoid procrastination, since the tasks for a small release feel more achievable, similar to writing a [http://volokh.com/posts/1182282037.shtml zeroth draft] of a manuscript. There's little concern for polish, so a zeroth draft has fewer requirements to worry about, and therefore it's more likely to get written. A related practice is to deliberately trim your feature list for each release, captured in the [http://wiki.c2.com/?ExtremeProgramming Extreme Programming] practice [http://wiki.c2.com/?YouArentGonnaNeedIt You Aren't Gonna Need It]. One practice that's helping me think in terms of incremental development is using [http://scottchacon.com/2011/08/31/github-flow.html GitHub flow] as my version control workflow. In GitHub flow the master branch is reserved for deployable code, so anything I'm actively developing goes into a topically named branch off of master. Once the code related to that branch is ready for deployment, I merge that branch back into master. This procedure gets me to plan in terms of small clusters of features. I'll talk more about version control in the next main section. === Test-driven development === * [https://martinfowler.com/bliki/TestDrivenDevelopment.html TestDrivenDevelopment - Martin Fowler] * [http://agiledata.org/essays/tdd.html Introduction to Test Driven Development (TDD) - Agile Data] * [https://www.facebook.com/notes/kent-beck/rip-tdd/750840194948847/ RIP TDD - Kent Beck - Facebook] To get myself into the habit of writing tests first, I'm including it as a subtask for each function I note in my task manager (I use [https://nirvanahq.com/ Nirvana], an app designed with [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Getting_Things_Done GTD] in mind). I have a template for these subtasks, which I copy into the description of the tasks. At the moment the template looks like this: <pre> - Document - Test - Code - Commit </pre> Really I'll move back and forth between documenting, testing, and coding, but I'll check them off when I've completed the first instance of each of those subtasks for that function. === Refactoring === * [https://martinfowler.com/books/refactoring.html Refactoring - Martin Fowler] I don't have a specific refactoring procedure in place. I just do it when I notice the need. I'm hoping to study Fowler's book and learn to think in terms of the structures that refactoring creates. That way I can create them as I code and reduce the need to refactor. == Version control == * [http://guides.beanstalkapp.com/version-control/intro-to-version-control.html An introduction to version control - Beanstalk Guides] I'm hosting my projects on GitHub (see the Distribution section), which means I'm using Git as my version control system. (Before that I was using Subversion via TortoiseSVN, which I still use for some non-GitHub projects.) I learned how to use Git from ''Git Essentials'' by Ferdinando Santacroce, and I try to follow its advice. For a reference I use ''Git Pocket Guide'' by Richard Silverman. Rather than typing all the Git commands myself, I'm lazy and use the GUI tool [https://www.gitkraken.com/ GitKraken]. As I said above, I use the GitHub flow workflow to organize my commits. GitHub has as [https://guides.github.com/introduction/flow/ guide] for it. == Coding style == * [https://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-0008/ PEP 8 -- Style Guide for Python Code - Python.org] I've picked up my coding style from various sources, including ''Perl Best Practices'', but PEP 8 is a good starting point that's specifically geared toward Python. == Project structure == * [http://docs.python-guide.org/en/latest/writing/structure/ Structuring Your Project - The Hitchhiker's Guide to Python] * [https://learnpythonthehardway.org/book/ex46.html Exercise 46: A Project Skeleton - Learn Python the Hard Way] I make a directory on my local machine named whatever I'm using for the GitHub URL (e.g., math-student-sim), and I create this structure inside it: <pre> docs/ <package>/ tests/ app.py LICENSE.md MANIFEST.in README.md setup.py </pre> My package name is usually the project name without the hyphens (e.g., mathstudentsim). I'll fill in more of the details in later sections. == Distribution == To distribute your code you need somewhere to host it, and I've chosen GitHub, since it's the one I hear the most about. * [http://kbroman.org/github_tutorial/ git/github guide - Karl Broman] == Installation == I haven't completely wrapped my mind around Python code distribution and installation, but for now I'm relying on people downloading the source from GitHub and running the setup script. Here are some more details on some of the issues that came up for me in the project structure guides above. * [https://docs.python.org/3/distutils/setupscript.html Writing the Setup Script - Distributing Python Modules (Legacy version)] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/9949420/how-to-configure-setup-py-to-have-pip-install-from-github-master How to configure setup.py to have pip install from GitHub master? - Stack Overflow] * [https://caremad.io/posts/2013/07/setup-vs-requirement/ setup.py vs requirements.txt - caremad] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/7923509/how-to-include-docs-directory-in-python-distribution How to include docs directory in python distribution - Stack Overflow] == Metadata == Users of your project will need certain information about it, and you'll need to keep this information somewhere. For Python modules this is in the setup script. * [https://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-0345/ PEP 345 -- Metadata for Python Software Packages 1.2 - Python.org] === Version numbers === * [https://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-0396/ PEP 396 -- Module Version Numbers - Python.org] * [http://semver.org/ Semantic Versioning] * [https://git-scm.com/book/en/v2/Git-Basics-Tagging Git Basics - Tagging - Git] * [https://help.github.com/articles/creating-releases/ Creating Releases - GitHub Help] I'm just following the guidelines in those articles. === License === * [http://choosealicense.com/ Choose an open source license] I've picked MIT as my default to give people freedom to use the code however they want and because I don't expect to have patents to license. == Tests == Based on the advice in ''Learn Python the Hard Way'', I've chosen nose as a test management tool, but since the [http://nose.readthedocs.io/en/latest/ future of nose] is uncertain, I'm using [https://github.com/nose-devs/nose2 nose2]. == User interface == === Command line === To make my projects usable quickly, I'm starting most of them with a command line interface. * [https://wiki.python.org/moin/CmdModule CmdModule - The Python Wiki] * [https://docs.python.org/3/library/cmd.html cmd - The Python Standard Library] I'm placing the commands in <code>cli.py</code> within the package. == Documentation == When you're coding for yourself, it's easy to forget about documentation, since you know how your code works and how to use it, and if you forget, you can reread it and figure it out. Deciphering your own code annoying, but possibly less annoying than writing documentation. Usually when I'm in my lazy, non-documenting mode, I comment pieces of the code during especially painful rereadings. I'd like to be nicer than that to people who aren't me. Documentation comes in several different kinds, based on its location, format, and intended audience. It might help to think of documentation as falling into two basic genres: cookbooks and references. References tell you how the project works, and cookbooks tell you how to navigate through the project to reach particular objectives. Tutorials, for example, are a type of cookbook. Audiences fall into about three main categories: end users, API users who are developers using the code to write plugins or outside apps, and project developers. As an overview, here's my take on the purpose and audience of documentation types you might find in Python projects, though most aren't limited to Python. Afterward I'll list links that discuss each type in more detail. * '''README''' - In a document in the root directory of the project. A cookbook that tells users and developers the basics of working with the project. * '''Docstrings''' - Mostly at the top of a function. A reference that tells API users how to use the function. * '''Command line help''' - In the docstrings of command handling functions and at the top of a script. A reference that tells the user how to use the script and its command. * '''Comments''' - Interspersed among lines of code. A reference that tells project developers what the code does and why. * '''Code conventions''' - Elements of coding style aimed at communicating the code's intentions. A reference that tells project developers and API users what the code does. Some developers try to substitute this technique for comments. * '''Project documentation''' - In documents separate from the code. A cookbook and reference that gives users and developers thorough information for working with the project. * '''Literate programming''' - Interspersed among chunks of code. A reference that gives developers detailed explanations of the reasoning behind the code. This type of documentation isn't common, but it could be a good idea for some projects. === General advice === * [http://docs.python-guide.org/en/latest/writing/documentation/ Documentation - The Hitchhiker's Guide to Python] - Covers a lot of these documentation types. * [https://docs.python.org/devguide/documenting.html Documenting Python - Python Developer's Guide - Python.org] - A style guide for the Python source code, which could be adopted for other projects. === README === Here are some example READMEs that have helped me plan mine: * [https://gist.github.com/jxson/1784669 jxson/README.md] * [https://gist.github.com/PurpleBooth/109311bb0361f32d87a2 PurpleBooth/README-Template.md] * [https://gist.github.com/zenorocha/4526327 zenorocha/README.md] Here are some other lists of READMEs: * [https://changelog.com/posts/a-beginners-guide-to-creating-a-readme A Beginner's Guide to Creating a README] * [https://github.com/matiassingers/awesome-readme matiassingers/awesome-readme] * [https://github.com/repat/README-template repat/README-template] The initial README I came up with is [https://github.com/thinkulum/math-student-sim/blob/master/README.md here]. === Docstrings === Here are discussions of what to put in a docstring: * [https://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-0257/ PEP 257 -- Docstring Conventions - Python.org] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/3898572/what-is-the-standard-python-docstring-format What is the standard Python docstring format? - Stack Overflow] My snippets for functions and modules will include docstring outlines. Then you need a tool to present the docstrings to the reader. I'm going with Sphinx, since Python developers seem to prefer it. Since it formats more than just docstrings, I've put its links in the "Project documentation" section below. === Command line help === Traditional command-line programs are run from the OS command line, and their help statement is called a usage message. On Unix-like OSes they may also have a man (manual) page. I'll talk about man pages in the "Project documentation" section. Python has the <code>cmd</code> module for creating a command-line interpreter within your program, and each of your program's commands can also have a help message, contained in the command function's docstring. My snippets for scripts and command functions will include outlines for usage and help messages. ==== Usage message ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Usage_message Usage message - Wikipedia] * [http://courses.cms.caltech.edu/cs11/material/general/usage.html How to write usage statements - CS 11 - Caltech] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/17314872/shell-scripts-conventions-to-write-usage-text-for-parameters Shell scripts: conventions to write usage text for parameters? - Stack Overflow] * [https://github.com/docopt/docopt docopt (Python implementation)] - A library that checks the user's command line arguments by parsing the script's usage message. Even if you're not using docopt, it gives you a convenient set of conventions for formatting usage messages. * [https://docs.python.org/3/library/argparse.html argparse - Python.org] - Moves in the opposite direction from docopt, generating a usage message from a specification. ==== Command help ==== I haven't found any conventions for <code>cmd</code> help text, and the examples I've seen have been free-form descriptions. Maybe it would make sense to treat each command as a separate program and use usage message conventions for its help. === Comments === [TODO] === Code conventions === [TODO] === Project documentation === [TODO] === Literate programming === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Literate_programming Literate programming - Wikipedia] * [http://akkartik.name/post/literate-programming Literate programming: Knuth is doing it wrong - Kartik Agaram] Python tools: * [https://sourceforge.net/projects/pywebtool/ pyWeb] - After glancing at a few, I chose pyWeb as probably the closest to what I was looking for. * [http://mpastell.com/pweave/ Pweave] - A feature-rich tool I might try at some point. My first attempt at literate programming is my [https://github.com/thinkulum/math-student-sim Math Student Simulator]. See the README for basic details on writing and processing the source files. [More sections to come] <disqus/> [[Category:Programming]] [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Developing]] 7a27620d8794d05fcf45a3a3ce764d1f44e88c5b 296 295 2017-04-22T02:44:52Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added a caveat about centering on CLIs. Added behavior-driven development, PyRefactor, a README guide, Javadoc, code comments and self-documentation, project documentation, and a literate programming intro. wikitext text/x-wiki == Introduction == For most of my coding life, I have been the only user of my programs. I wrote them to aid my work or personal life, and only rarely did anyone else even see my code or watch it run. This wasn't on purpose. It just turned out that way. In my current job I do belong to a small development team, but our programs are still only for in-house use, so the only needs we have to consider are our own. This situation is starting to change. My programming projects are becoming more relevant to the outside world, and I want to share some of them as open source. This means I'm needing to reshape some of my programming practices and learn some areas of software development I've had the luxury of ignoring all these years. I haven't completely ignored these areas, though. I pick up on them here and there as I read about how other people code or see them in the software I use. Knowing that I'll probably need to know about them someday, I've kept a list. And now the time has come for me to fill in the details. I'm filling in the details here in this guide for two reasons. First, as I learn, writing helps me clarify my thoughts and keep them flowing. And second, posting my writing might help other people. So if you're like me and you've programmed mainly for yourself--what I call private coding--and you're starting to share your work with others--public coding--then maybe what I've learned so far can grease some of your own planning. This project consists of my reading other developers' advice, examining their code, deciding what to adopt and how to adapt it to my needs and preferences, and creating templates, procedures, reference materials, and anything else that might help me code well for a public user base. To give you an idea of my background, I've worked for the past 15 or so years in the publishing industry doing mostly text processing and some web development. The languages I'm most familiar with are Perl, Python, XSLT, and some JavaScript, with a smattering of PHP and VBA. I've spent almost all my time in Windows. I hope to branch out into at least Linux in the future, if only to expand my mind. This guide will be oriented toward Python for now, but I imagine a lot of its suggestions apply to other languages too. At this point it also centers around desktop command-line programs, but I'm hoping to expand it into other interfaces and environments. Since this guide is a place for me to learn, I welcome feedback, and I'm always open to arguments that my choices could be improved or suggestions for things I've missed. This is an early iteration of the guide, so it's incomplete, and a lot of it is only sketched out. == General coding guides == These are resources with advice on many aspects of writing good code. The ones I haven't read are on my to-read list. I'll probably be adding others. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Code_Complete Code Complete - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Art_of_Unix_Programming The Art of Unix Programming - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perl_Best_Practices Perl Best Practices - Wikipedia] Another resource that overlaps with this guide but covers more on the project management end of OSS is [http://producingoss.com/ Producing Open Source Software]. == Code examples == To show how I'm implementing these ideas in my own code, I'll refer to [https://github.com/thinkulum my GitHub repositories] throughout the guide, mainly my templates for [https://github.com/audreyr/cookiecutter cookiecutter], a Python app that creates project skeletons for any language, and my snippets for [https://www.sublimetext.com/ Sublime Text 2], the text editor I use. Snippets are templates Sublime inserts wherever you type the corresponding trigger strings. Here are projects that show up in lists of high quality code, so I'll examine some of them and include any relevant discoveries in the guide. All the projects I'm listing for now are in Python. * [https://launchpad.net/bzr Bazaar] * [https://github.com/boto/boto3 boto3] * [https://github.com/django/django Django] * [https://github.com/pallets/flask Flask] * [https://github.com/gevent/gevent gevent] * [https://www.mercurial-scm.org/downloads Mercurial] * [https://github.com/nltk/nltk NLTK] * [https://github.com/Pylons/pyramid Pyramid] * [https://github.com/reddit/reddit reddit] * [https://github.com/kennethreitz/requests Requests] * [https://github.com/zzzeek/sqlalchemy SQLAlchemy] * [https://github.com/kennethreitz/tablib Tablib] * [https://github.com/tornadoweb/tornado Tornado] * [http://trac.edgewall.org/browser/trunk/trac trac] * [https://github.com/twisted/twisted Twisted] * [https://github.com/rg3/youtube-dl youtube-dl] In addition to these, I keep a mental list of software with features I might want to emulate, even if I don't plan to study their code very thoroughly: * [https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Mozilla/Developer_guide/Source_Code Firefox] - automatic updating; possibly its add-on architecture, if it ever settles down * [https://wordpress.org/download/source/ WordPress] - plugin hooks == Software development methodology == I'll start with some general principles that direct my thinking about software development in general. These are the ideas behind agile development practices. [https://www.agilealliance.org/agile101/ Agile software development] is a paradigm that was created to answer waterfall development, the approach of planning all the features of a piece of software in advance, an effort that often ends up wasted because the customer's needs change in the middle of the project, so the software has to be redesigned. So agile development was intended to prevent overplanning. But using any development methodology will help prevent the opposite problem, which is a complete ''lack'' of structure and discipline. This results in a code organization scheme called a [http://www.laputan.org/mud/ big ball of mud]. I don't think my programs were complete mud, but the fact that I was the only one seeing or using my code let me get by with a lot of slacking. Slacking does keep you from working too hard, but it fails to prevent other kinds of problems. Agile software development seems like a good middle ground. Agile development encompasses a lot of principles and practices, and it has a lot of varieties, but for me at this point, its most important practices are incremental development, test-driven development, and refactoring. === Incremental development === [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iterative_and_incremental_development Incremental development] is the approach of adding a few features per release rather than developing the whole program at once. It lets users begin using the software earlier, and it lets the feature roadmap change without wasting much development effort on the original design. It's different from iterative development, but they normally go together, so I'm use incremental as shorthand for both. If you're a developer working on your own, the habit of small, frequent releases also can add accountability to the development process. It'll at least hold you accountable to work on the project, since other people will notice when the releases stop coming. It might even encourage you to code each feature well. A short release cycle does mean there's less time to get the code right, but there's also less time to procrastinate on getting it to work, and if you implement good programming practices, you'll waste less of that time debugging. Small, frequent releases can also help the developer avoid procrastination, since the tasks for a small release feel more achievable, similar to writing a [http://volokh.com/posts/1182282037.shtml zeroth draft] of a manuscript. There's little concern for polish, so a zeroth draft has fewer requirements to worry about, and therefore it's more likely to get written. A related practice is to deliberately trim your feature list for each release, captured in the [http://wiki.c2.com/?ExtremeProgramming Extreme Programming] practice [http://wiki.c2.com/?YouArentGonnaNeedIt You Aren't Gonna Need It]. One practice that's helping me think in terms of incremental development is using [http://scottchacon.com/2011/08/31/github-flow.html GitHub flow] as my version control workflow. In GitHub flow the master branch is reserved for deployable code, so anything I'm actively developing goes into a topically named branch off of master. Once the code related to that branch is ready for deployment, I merge that branch back into master. This procedure gets me to plan in terms of small clusters of features. I'll talk more about version control in the next main section. === Test-driven development === * [https://martinfowler.com/bliki/TestDrivenDevelopment.html TestDrivenDevelopment - Martin Fowler] * [http://agiledata.org/essays/tdd.html Introduction to Test Driven Development (TDD) - Agile Data] * [https://www.facebook.com/notes/kent-beck/rip-tdd/750840194948847/ RIP TDD - Kent Beck - Facebook] To get myself into the habit of writing tests first, I'm including it as a subtask for each function I note in my task manager (I use [https://nirvanahq.com/ Nirvana], an app designed with [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Getting_Things_Done GTD] in mind). I have a template for these subtasks, which I copy into the description of the tasks. At the moment the template looks like this: <pre> - Document - Test - Code - Commit </pre> Really I'll move back and forth between documenting, testing, and coding, but I'll check them off when I've completed the first instance of each of those subtasks for that function. A practice I'm starting to explore that takes TDD a step further is behavior-driven development. It allows you to derive tests from documentation that's both human readable and executable. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Behavior-driven_development Behavior-driven development - Wikipedia] * [https://github.com/cucumber/cucumber/wiki/Python Python - cucumber Wiki] - A short list of Cucumber alternatives for Python. === Refactoring === * [https://martinfowler.com/books/refactoring.html Refactoring - Martin Fowler] I don't have a specific refactoring procedure in place. I just do it when I notice the need. I'm hoping to study Fowler's book and learn to think in terms of the structures that refactoring creates. That way I can create them as I code and reduce the need to refactor. Some IDEs have tools to aid refactoring. I'm planning to test using the Sublime Text plugin [https://packagecontrol.io/packages/PyRefactor PyRefactor] for refactoring Python. == Version control == * [http://guides.beanstalkapp.com/version-control/intro-to-version-control.html An introduction to version control - Beanstalk Guides] I'm hosting my projects on GitHub (see the Distribution section), which means I'm using Git as my version control system. (Before that I was using Subversion via TortoiseSVN, which I still use for some non-GitHub projects.) I learned how to use Git from ''Git Essentials'' by Ferdinando Santacroce, and I try to follow its advice. For a reference I use ''Git Pocket Guide'' by Richard Silverman. Rather than typing all the Git commands myself, I'm lazy and use the GUI tool [https://www.gitkraken.com/ GitKraken]. As I said above, I use the GitHub flow workflow to organize my commits. GitHub has as [https://guides.github.com/introduction/flow/ guide] for it. == Coding style == * [https://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-0008/ PEP 8 -- Style Guide for Python Code - Python.org] I've picked up my coding style from various sources, including ''Perl Best Practices'', but PEP 8 is a good starting point that's specifically geared toward Python. == Project structure == * [http://docs.python-guide.org/en/latest/writing/structure/ Structuring Your Project - The Hitchhiker's Guide to Python] * [https://learnpythonthehardway.org/book/ex46.html Exercise 46: A Project Skeleton - Learn Python the Hard Way] I make a directory on my local machine named whatever I'm using for the GitHub URL (e.g., math-student-sim), and I create this structure inside it: <pre> docs/ <package>/ tests/ app.py LICENSE.md MANIFEST.in README.md setup.py </pre> My package name is usually the project name without the hyphens (e.g., mathstudentsim). I'll fill in more of the details in later sections. == Distribution == To distribute your code you need somewhere to host it, and I've chosen GitHub, since it's the one I hear the most about. * [http://kbroman.org/github_tutorial/ git/github guide - Karl Broman] == Installation == I haven't completely wrapped my mind around Python code distribution and installation, but for now I'm relying on people downloading the source from GitHub and running the setup script. Here are some more details on some of the issues that came up for me in the project structure guides above. * [https://docs.python.org/3/distutils/setupscript.html Writing the Setup Script - Distributing Python Modules (Legacy version)] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/9949420/how-to-configure-setup-py-to-have-pip-install-from-github-master How to configure setup.py to have pip install from GitHub master? - Stack Overflow] * [https://caremad.io/posts/2013/07/setup-vs-requirement/ setup.py vs requirements.txt - caremad] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/7923509/how-to-include-docs-directory-in-python-distribution How to include docs directory in python distribution - Stack Overflow] == Metadata == Users of your project will need certain information about it, and you'll need to keep this information somewhere. For Python modules this is in the setup script. * [https://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-0345/ PEP 345 -- Metadata for Python Software Packages 1.2 - Python.org] === Version numbers === * [https://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-0396/ PEP 396 -- Module Version Numbers - Python.org] * [http://semver.org/ Semantic Versioning] * [https://git-scm.com/book/en/v2/Git-Basics-Tagging Git Basics - Tagging - Git] * [https://help.github.com/articles/creating-releases/ Creating Releases - GitHub Help] I'm just following the guidelines in those articles. === License === * [http://choosealicense.com/ Choose an open source license] I've picked MIT as my default to give people freedom to use the code however they want and because I don't expect to have patents to license. == Tests == Based on the advice in ''Learn Python the Hard Way'', I've chosen nose as a test management tool, but since the [http://nose.readthedocs.io/en/latest/ future of nose] is uncertain, I'm using [https://github.com/nose-devs/nose2 nose2]. == User interface == === Command line === To make my projects usable quickly, I'm starting most of them with a command line interface. * [https://wiki.python.org/moin/CmdModule CmdModule - The Python Wiki] * [https://docs.python.org/3/library/cmd.html cmd - The Python Standard Library] I'm placing the commands in <code>cli.py</code> within the package. == Documentation == When you're coding for yourself, it's easy to forget about documentation, since you know how your code works and how to use it, and if you forget, you can reread it and figure it out. Deciphering your own code annoying, but possibly less annoying than writing documentation. Usually when I'm in my lazy, non-documenting mode, I comment pieces of the code during especially painful rereadings. I'd like to be nicer than that to people who aren't me. Documentation comes in several different kinds, based on its location, format, and intended audience. It might help to think of documentation as falling into two basic genres: cookbooks and references. References tell you how the project works, and cookbooks tell you how to navigate through the project to reach particular objectives. Tutorials, for example, are a type of cookbook. Audiences fall into about three main categories: end users, API users who are developers using the code to write plugins or outside apps, and project developers. As an overview, here's my take on the purpose and audience of documentation types you might find in Python projects, though most aren't limited to Python. Afterward I'll list links that discuss each type in more detail. * '''README''' - In a document in the root directory of the project. A cookbook that tells users and developers the basics of working with the project. * '''Docstrings''' - Mostly at the top of a function. A reference that tells API users how to use the function. * '''Command line help''' - In the docstrings of command handling functions and at the top of a script. A reference that tells the user how to use the script and its command. * '''Comments''' - Interspersed among lines of code. A reference that tells project developers what the code does and why. * '''Code self-documentation''' - Elements of coding style aimed at communicating the code's intentions. A reference that tells project developers and API users what the code does. Some developers try to substitute this technique for comments. * '''Project documentation''' - In documents separate from the code. A cookbook and reference that gives users and developers thorough information for working with the project. * '''Literate programming''' - Interspersed among chunks of code. A reference that gives developers detailed explanations of the reasoning behind the code. This type of documentation isn't common, but it could be a good idea for some projects. === General advice === * [http://docs.python-guide.org/en/latest/writing/documentation/ Documentation - The Hitchhiker's Guide to Python] - Covers a lot of these documentation types. * [https://docs.python.org/devguide/documenting.html Documenting Python - Python Developer's Guide - Python.org] - A style guide for the Python source code, which could be adopted for other projects. === README === Here's a recommendation of what to put in a README: * [http://www.writethedocs.org/guide/writing/beginners-guide-to-docs/ A beginner’s guide to writing documentation - Write the Docs] Here are some example READMEs that have helped me plan mine: * [https://gist.github.com/jxson/1784669 jxson/README.md] * [https://gist.github.com/PurpleBooth/109311bb0361f32d87a2 PurpleBooth/README-Template.md] * [https://gist.github.com/zenorocha/4526327 zenorocha/README.md] Here are some other lists of READMEs: * [https://changelog.com/posts/a-beginners-guide-to-creating-a-readme A Beginner's Guide to Creating a README] * [https://github.com/matiassingers/awesome-readme matiassingers/awesome-readme] * [https://github.com/repat/README-template repat/README-template] The initial README I came up with is [https://github.com/thinkulum/math-student-sim/blob/master/README.md here]. === Docstrings === Here are discussions of what to put in a docstring: * [https://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-0257/ PEP 257 -- Docstring Conventions - Python.org] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/3898572/what-is-the-standard-python-docstring-format What is the standard Python docstring format? - Stack Overflow] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Javadoc Javadoc - Wikipedia] - A documentation generator for Java code. The conventions Javadoc understands can be adapted for other languages. I'm evaluating tools for processing Python docstrings that use this format. My snippets for functions and modules will include docstring outlines. Then you need a tool to present the docstrings to the reader. For now I'm going with Sphinx, since Python developers seem to prefer it. Since it formats more than just docstrings, I've put its links in the "Project documentation" section below. === Command line help === Traditional command-line programs are run from the OS command line, and their help statement is called a usage message. On Unix-like OSes they may also have a man (manual) page. I'll talk about man pages in the "Project documentation" section. Python has the <code>cmd</code> module for creating a command-line interpreter within your program, and each of your program's commands can also have a help message, contained in the command function's docstring. My snippets for scripts and command functions will include outlines for usage and help messages. ==== Usage message ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Usage_message Usage message - Wikipedia] * [http://courses.cms.caltech.edu/cs11/material/general/usage.html How to write usage statements - CS 11 - Caltech] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/17314872/shell-scripts-conventions-to-write-usage-text-for-parameters Shell scripts: conventions to write usage text for parameters? - Stack Overflow] * [https://github.com/docopt/docopt docopt (Python implementation)] - A library that checks the user's command line arguments by parsing the script's usage message. Even if you're not using docopt, it gives you a convenient set of conventions for formatting usage messages. * [https://docs.python.org/3/library/argparse.html argparse - Python.org] - Moves in the opposite direction from docopt, generating a usage message from a specification. ==== Command help ==== I haven't found any conventions for <code>cmd</code> help text, and the examples I've seen have been free-form descriptions. Maybe it would make sense to treat each command as a separate program and use usage message conventions for its help. === Comments and self-documentation === Comments and self-documentation are the two sides of the code clarity coin. Code comments are one of the [http://www.hacker-dictionary.com/terms/holy-wars holy wars] of programming--everyone has a strongly held view and debates it vigorously. I basically agree with the views in these articles: * [https://visualstudiomagazine.com/articles/2013/06/01/roc-rocks.aspx Why You Shouldn't Comment (or Document) Code - Visual Studio Magazine] * [https://sourcemaking.com/refactoring/smells/comments Comments - Source Making] * [https://www.pluralsight.com/blog/software-development/code-comments-dos-and-donts Code comments: A quick guide on when (and when not) to use them - Pluralsight] That is, comments are a liability, so for the most part write them as little as possible, and update them when you update the code. Make your code as clear as you can (see the self-documentation section), and comment only to communicate what the code can't on its own, such as its purpose and the reasoning behind your choices in implementing it. If nothing else, comments can be a good indication of places that need refactoring. I don't think it's necessary to stick to one procedure for commenting, but generally when I've commented more, it's because I've paused after a chunk of coding time, such as when I've finished a function. I code in paragraphs, sets of related lines separated by a blank line. In the commenting phase I reread the code I've just written and try to summarize or justify each paragraph, if needed. Stepping back from the code to state things in English sometimes leads to improvements in the code--refactoring or bug fixes. Here are some in-depth discussions on making code self-documenting: * [http://wiki.c2.com/?SelfDocumentingCode Self Documenting Code - WikiWikiWeb] * [http://wiki.c2.com/?SystemMetaphor System Metaphor - WikiWikiWeb] * [https://m.signalvnoise.com/hunting-for-great-names-in-programming-16f624c8fc03 Hunting for great names in programming - Signal v. Noise] Every solution has its own problems. Self-documentation can go wrong too, and in some of the same ways comments can. For example, your function name doesn't have to have anything to do with its contents. Here are a bunch of tricks for wrecking your code's clarity: * [http://mindprod.com/jgloss/unmain.html unmaintainable code - Java Glossary] On the problem that documentation isn't executable, behavior-driven development might give us a partial solution. See the links in the test-driven development section above. === Project documentation === READMEs give the reader a basic intro to your project, but at some point they'll need more extensive information. I'm calling this in-depth treatment the project documentation. ==== Documentation generation ==== Some documentation is freeform writing, but using [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Documentation_generator documentation generators] a lot of it can be collected from specialized comments and formatted automatically. You'd mainly use this to document your API. Sphinx is a popular Python tool for this purpose. It handles both types of documentation. * [http://www.sphinx-doc.org/en/stable/ Sphinx] My default Sphinx setup will be in my cookiecutter templates. ==== Content ==== I didn't find many guides to writing user or developer guides beyond the README, so I may have to write my own at some point, based on an examination of well-documented projects. But here's one guide that covers some of the information developers will need: * [https://www.ctl.io/developers/blog/post/how-to-document-a-project How to Document a Project - CenturyLink Cloud Developer Center] One source of insight for documenters might be the content of man pages. Man (manual) pages are the documentation for Unix tools, and they have a fairly standard format. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Man_page man page - Wikipedia] * [https://liw.fi/manpages/ Writing manual pages - Lars Wirzenius] * [http://www.schweikhardt.net/man_page_howto.html The Linux Man Page How-to - Jens Schweikhardt] === Literate programming === In spite of what I said about comments and self-documentation, sometimes I really want to expound on the meaning of my code, and literate programming is the way to do it. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Literate_programming Literate programming - Wikipedia] * [http://akkartik.name/post/literate-programming Literate programming: Knuth is doing it wrong - Kartik Agaram] Python tools: * [https://sourceforge.net/projects/pywebtool/ pyWeb] - After glancing at a few, I chose pyWeb as probably the closest to what I was looking for. * [http://mpastell.com/pweave/ Pweave] - A feature-rich tool I might try at some point. My first attempt at literate programming is my [https://github.com/thinkulum/math-student-sim Math Student Simulator]. See the README for basic details on writing and processing the source files. [More sections to come] <disqus/> [[Category:Programming]] [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Developing]] caaff1729b924a08d8b63ff508f0e934822fcd96 300 296 2017-05-03T10:52:29Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the Configuration and Logging sections. wikitext text/x-wiki == Introduction == For most of my coding life, I have been the only user of my programs. I wrote them to aid my work or personal life, and only rarely did anyone else even see my code or watch it run. This wasn't on purpose. It just turned out that way. In my current job I do belong to a small development team, but our programs are still only for in-house use, so the only needs we have to consider are our own. This situation is starting to change. My programming projects are becoming more relevant to the outside world, and I want to share some of them as open source. This means I'm needing to reshape some of my programming practices and learn some areas of software development I've had the luxury of ignoring all these years. I haven't completely ignored these areas, though. I pick up on them here and there as I read about how other people code or see them in the software I use. Knowing that I'll probably need to know about them someday, I've kept a list. And now the time has come for me to fill in the details. I'm filling in the details here in this guide for two reasons. First, as I learn, writing helps me clarify my thoughts and keep them flowing. And second, posting my writing might help other people. So if you're like me and you've programmed mainly for yourself--what I call private coding--and you're starting to share your work with others--public coding--then maybe what I've learned so far can grease some of your own planning. This project consists of my reading other developers' advice, examining their code, deciding what to adopt and how to adapt it to my needs and preferences, and creating templates, procedures, reference materials, and anything else that might help me code well for a public user base. To give you an idea of my background, I've worked for the past 15 or so years in the publishing industry doing mostly text processing and some web development. The languages I'm most familiar with are Perl, Python, XSLT, and some JavaScript, with a smattering of PHP and VBA. I've spent almost all my time in Windows. I hope to branch out into at least Linux in the future, if only to expand my mind. This guide will be oriented toward Python for now, but I imagine a lot of its suggestions apply to other languages too. At this point it also centers around desktop command-line programs, but I'm hoping to expand it into other interfaces and environments. Since this guide is a place for me to learn, I welcome feedback, and I'm always open to arguments that my choices could be improved or suggestions for things I've missed. This is an early iteration of the guide, so it's incomplete, and a lot of it is only sketched out. == General coding guides == These are resources with advice on many aspects of writing good code. The ones I haven't read are on my to-read list. I'll probably be adding others. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Code_Complete Code Complete - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Art_of_Unix_Programming The Art of Unix Programming - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perl_Best_Practices Perl Best Practices - Wikipedia] Another resource that overlaps with this guide but covers more on the project management end of OSS is [http://producingoss.com/ Producing Open Source Software]. == Code examples == To show how I'm implementing these ideas in my own code, I'll refer to [https://github.com/thinkulum my GitHub repositories] throughout the guide, mainly my templates for [https://github.com/audreyr/cookiecutter cookiecutter], a Python app that creates project skeletons for any language, and my snippets for [https://www.sublimetext.com/ Sublime Text 2], the text editor I use. Snippets are templates Sublime inserts wherever you type the corresponding trigger strings. Here are projects that show up in lists of high quality code, so I'll examine some of them and include any relevant discoveries in the guide. All the projects I'm listing for now are in Python. * [https://launchpad.net/bzr Bazaar] * [https://github.com/boto/boto3 boto3] * [https://github.com/django/django Django] * [https://github.com/pallets/flask Flask] * [https://github.com/gevent/gevent gevent] * [https://www.mercurial-scm.org/downloads Mercurial] * [https://github.com/nltk/nltk NLTK] * [https://github.com/Pylons/pyramid Pyramid] * [https://github.com/reddit/reddit reddit] * [https://github.com/kennethreitz/requests Requests] * [https://github.com/zzzeek/sqlalchemy SQLAlchemy] * [https://github.com/kennethreitz/tablib Tablib] * [https://github.com/tornadoweb/tornado Tornado] * [http://trac.edgewall.org/browser/trunk/trac trac] * [https://github.com/twisted/twisted Twisted] * [https://github.com/rg3/youtube-dl youtube-dl] In addition to these, I keep a mental list of software with features I might want to emulate, even if I don't plan to study their code very thoroughly: * [https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Mozilla/Developer_guide/Source_Code Firefox] - automatic updating; possibly its add-on architecture, if it ever settles down * [https://wordpress.org/download/source/ WordPress] - plugin hooks == Software development methodology == I'll start with some general principles that direct my thinking about software development in general. These are the ideas behind agile development practices. [https://www.agilealliance.org/agile101/ Agile software development] is a paradigm that was created to answer waterfall development, the approach of planning all the features of a piece of software in advance, an effort that often ends up wasted because the customer's needs change in the middle of the project, so the software has to be redesigned. So agile development was intended to prevent overplanning. But using any development methodology will help prevent the opposite problem, which is a complete ''lack'' of structure and discipline. This results in a code organization scheme called a [http://www.laputan.org/mud/ big ball of mud]. I don't think my programs were complete mud, but the fact that I was the only one seeing or using my code let me get by with a lot of slacking. Slacking does keep you from working too hard, but it fails to prevent other kinds of problems. Agile software development seems like a good middle ground. Agile development encompasses a lot of principles and practices, and it has a lot of varieties, but for me at this point, its most important practices are incremental development, test-driven development, and refactoring. === Incremental development === [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iterative_and_incremental_development Incremental development] is the approach of adding a few features per release rather than developing the whole program at once. It lets users begin using the software earlier, and it lets the feature roadmap change without wasting much development effort on the original design. It's different from iterative development, but they normally go together, so I'm use incremental as shorthand for both. If you're a developer working on your own, the habit of small, frequent releases also can add accountability to the development process. It'll at least hold you accountable to work on the project, since other people will notice when the releases stop coming. It might even encourage you to code each feature well. A short release cycle does mean there's less time to get the code right, but there's also less time to procrastinate on getting it to work, and if you implement good programming practices, you'll waste less of that time debugging. Small, frequent releases can also help the developer avoid procrastination, since the tasks for a small release feel more achievable, similar to writing a [http://volokh.com/posts/1182282037.shtml zeroth draft] of a manuscript. There's little concern for polish, so a zeroth draft has fewer requirements to worry about, and therefore it's more likely to get written. A related practice is to deliberately trim your feature list for each release, captured in the [http://wiki.c2.com/?ExtremeProgramming Extreme Programming] practice [http://wiki.c2.com/?YouArentGonnaNeedIt You Aren't Gonna Need It]. One practice that's helping me think in terms of incremental development is using [http://scottchacon.com/2011/08/31/github-flow.html GitHub flow] as my version control workflow. In GitHub flow the master branch is reserved for deployable code, so anything I'm actively developing goes into a topically named branch off of master. Once the code related to that branch is ready for deployment, I merge that branch back into master. This procedure gets me to plan in terms of small clusters of features. I'll talk more about version control in the next main section. === Test-driven development === * [https://martinfowler.com/bliki/TestDrivenDevelopment.html TestDrivenDevelopment - Martin Fowler] * [http://agiledata.org/essays/tdd.html Introduction to Test Driven Development (TDD) - Agile Data] * [https://www.facebook.com/notes/kent-beck/rip-tdd/750840194948847/ RIP TDD - Kent Beck - Facebook] To get myself into the habit of writing tests first, I'm including it as a subtask for each function I note in my task manager (I use [https://nirvanahq.com/ Nirvana], an app designed with [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Getting_Things_Done GTD] in mind). I have a template for these subtasks, which I copy into the description of the tasks. At the moment the template looks like this: <pre> - Document - Test - Code - Commit </pre> Really I'll move back and forth between documenting, testing, and coding, but I'll check them off when I've completed the first instance of each of those subtasks for that function. A practice I'm starting to explore that takes TDD a step further is behavior-driven development. It allows you to derive tests from documentation that's both human readable and executable. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Behavior-driven_development Behavior-driven development - Wikipedia] * [https://github.com/cucumber/cucumber/wiki/Python Python - cucumber Wiki] - A short list of Cucumber alternatives for Python. === Refactoring === * [https://martinfowler.com/books/refactoring.html Refactoring - Martin Fowler] I don't have a specific refactoring procedure in place. I just do it when I notice the need. I'm hoping to study Fowler's book and learn to think in terms of the structures that refactoring creates. That way I can create them as I code and reduce the need to refactor. Some IDEs have tools to aid refactoring. I'm planning to test using the Sublime Text plugin [https://packagecontrol.io/packages/PyRefactor PyRefactor] for refactoring Python. == Version control == * [http://guides.beanstalkapp.com/version-control/intro-to-version-control.html An introduction to version control - Beanstalk Guides] I'm hosting my projects on GitHub (see the Distribution section), which means I'm using Git as my version control system. (Before that I was using Subversion via TortoiseSVN, which I still use for some non-GitHub projects.) I learned how to use Git from ''Git Essentials'' by Ferdinando Santacroce, and I try to follow its advice. For a reference I use ''Git Pocket Guide'' by Richard Silverman. Rather than typing all the Git commands myself, I'm lazy and use the GUI tool [https://www.gitkraken.com/ GitKraken]. As I said above, I use the GitHub flow workflow to organize my commits. GitHub has as [https://guides.github.com/introduction/flow/ guide] for it. == Coding style == * [https://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-0008/ PEP 8 -- Style Guide for Python Code - Python.org] I've picked up my coding style from various sources, including ''Perl Best Practices'', but PEP 8 is a good starting point that's specifically geared toward Python. == Project structure == * [http://docs.python-guide.org/en/latest/writing/structure/ Structuring Your Project - The Hitchhiker's Guide to Python] * [https://learnpythonthehardway.org/book/ex46.html Exercise 46: A Project Skeleton - Learn Python the Hard Way] I make a directory on my local machine named whatever I'm using for the GitHub URL (e.g., math-student-sim), and I create this structure inside it: <pre> docs/ <package>/ tests/ app.py LICENSE.md MANIFEST.in README.md setup.py </pre> My package name is usually the project name without the hyphens (e.g., mathstudentsim). I'll fill in more of the details in later sections. == Distribution == To distribute your code you need somewhere to host it, and I've chosen GitHub, since it's the one I hear the most about. * [http://kbroman.org/github_tutorial/ git/github guide - Karl Broman] == Installation == I haven't completely wrapped my mind around Python code distribution and installation, but for now I'm relying on people downloading the source from GitHub and running the setup script. Here are some more details on some of the issues that came up for me in the project structure guides above. * [https://docs.python.org/3/distutils/setupscript.html Writing the Setup Script - Distributing Python Modules (Legacy version)] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/9949420/how-to-configure-setup-py-to-have-pip-install-from-github-master How to configure setup.py to have pip install from GitHub master? - Stack Overflow] * [https://caremad.io/posts/2013/07/setup-vs-requirement/ setup.py vs requirements.txt - caremad] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/7923509/how-to-include-docs-directory-in-python-distribution How to include docs directory in python distribution - Stack Overflow] == Metadata == Users of your project will need certain information about it, and you'll need to keep this information somewhere. For Python modules this is in the setup script. * [https://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-0345/ PEP 345 -- Metadata for Python Software Packages 1.2 - Python.org] === Version numbers === * [https://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-0396/ PEP 396 -- Module Version Numbers - Python.org] * [http://semver.org/ Semantic Versioning] * [https://git-scm.com/book/en/v2/Git-Basics-Tagging Git Basics - Tagging - Git] * [https://help.github.com/articles/creating-releases/ Creating Releases - GitHub Help] I'm just following the guidelines in those articles. === License === * [http://choosealicense.com/ Choose an open source license] I've picked MIT as my default to give people freedom to use the code however they want and because I don't expect to have patents to license. == Tests == Based on the advice in ''Learn Python the Hard Way'', I've chosen nose as a test management tool, but since the [http://nose.readthedocs.io/en/latest/ future of nose] is uncertain, I'm using [https://github.com/nose-devs/nose2 nose2]. == User interface == === Command line === To make my projects usable quickly, I'm starting most of them with a command line interface. * [https://wiki.python.org/moin/CmdModule CmdModule - The Python Wiki] * [https://docs.python.org/3/library/cmd.html cmd - The Python Standard Library] I'm placing the commands in <code>cli.py</code> within the package. == Documentation == When you're coding for yourself, it's easy to forget about documentation, since you know how your code works and how to use it, and if you forget, you can reread it and figure it out. Deciphering your own code annoying, but possibly less annoying than writing documentation. Usually when I'm in my lazy, non-documenting mode, I comment pieces of the code during especially painful rereadings. I'd like to be nicer than that to people who aren't me. Documentation comes in several different kinds, based on its location, format, and intended audience. It might help to think of documentation as falling into two basic genres: cookbooks and references. References tell you how the project works, and cookbooks tell you how to navigate through the project to reach particular objectives. Tutorials, for example, are a type of cookbook. Audiences fall into about three main categories: end users, API users who are developers using the code to write plugins or outside apps, and project developers. As an overview, here's my take on the purpose and audience of documentation types you might find in Python projects, though most aren't limited to Python. Afterward I'll list links that discuss each type in more detail. * '''README''' - In a document in the root directory of the project. A cookbook that tells users and developers the basics of working with the project. * '''Docstrings''' - Mostly at the top of a function. A reference that tells API users how to use the function. * '''Command line help''' - In the docstrings of command handling functions and at the top of a script. A reference that tells the user how to use the script and its command. * '''Comments''' - Interspersed among lines of code. A reference that tells project developers what the code does and why. * '''Code self-documentation''' - Elements of coding style aimed at communicating the code's intentions. A reference that tells project developers and API users what the code does. Some developers try to substitute this technique for comments. * '''Project documentation''' - In documents separate from the code. A cookbook and reference that gives users and developers thorough information for working with the project. * '''Literate programming''' - Interspersed among chunks of code. A reference that gives developers detailed explanations of the reasoning behind the code. This type of documentation isn't common, but it could be a good idea for some projects. === General advice === * [http://docs.python-guide.org/en/latest/writing/documentation/ Documentation - The Hitchhiker's Guide to Python] - Covers a lot of these documentation types. * [https://docs.python.org/devguide/documenting.html Documenting Python - Python Developer's Guide - Python.org] - A style guide for the Python source code, which could be adopted for other projects. === README === Here's a recommendation of what to put in a README: * [http://www.writethedocs.org/guide/writing/beginners-guide-to-docs/ A beginner’s guide to writing documentation - Write the Docs] Here are some example READMEs that have helped me plan mine: * [https://gist.github.com/jxson/1784669 jxson/README.md] * [https://gist.github.com/PurpleBooth/109311bb0361f32d87a2 PurpleBooth/README-Template.md] * [https://gist.github.com/zenorocha/4526327 zenorocha/README.md] Here are some other lists of READMEs: * [https://changelog.com/posts/a-beginners-guide-to-creating-a-readme A Beginner's Guide to Creating a README] * [https://github.com/matiassingers/awesome-readme matiassingers/awesome-readme] * [https://github.com/repat/README-template repat/README-template] The initial README I came up with is [https://github.com/thinkulum/math-student-sim/blob/master/README.md here]. === Docstrings === Here are discussions of what to put in a docstring: * [https://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-0257/ PEP 257 -- Docstring Conventions - Python.org] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/3898572/what-is-the-standard-python-docstring-format What is the standard Python docstring format? - Stack Overflow] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Javadoc Javadoc - Wikipedia] - A documentation generator for Java code. The conventions Javadoc understands can be adapted for other languages. I'm evaluating tools for processing Python docstrings that use this format. My snippets for functions and modules will include docstring outlines. Then you need a tool to present the docstrings to the reader. For now I'm going with Sphinx, since Python developers seem to prefer it. Since it formats more than just docstrings, I've put its links in the "Project documentation" section below. === Command line help === Traditional command-line programs are run from the OS command line, and their help statement is called a usage message. On Unix-like OSes they may also have a man (manual) page. I'll talk about man pages in the "Project documentation" section. Python has the <code>cmd</code> module for creating a command-line interpreter within your program, and each of your program's commands can also have a help message, contained in the command function's docstring. My snippets for scripts and command functions will include outlines for usage and help messages. ==== Usage message ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Usage_message Usage message - Wikipedia] * [http://courses.cms.caltech.edu/cs11/material/general/usage.html How to write usage statements - CS 11 - Caltech] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/17314872/shell-scripts-conventions-to-write-usage-text-for-parameters Shell scripts: conventions to write usage text for parameters? - Stack Overflow] * [https://github.com/docopt/docopt docopt (Python implementation)] - A library that checks the user's command line arguments by parsing the script's usage message. Even if you're not using docopt, it gives you a convenient set of conventions for formatting usage messages. * [https://docs.python.org/3/library/argparse.html argparse - Python.org] - Moves in the opposite direction from docopt, generating a usage message from a specification. ==== Command help ==== I haven't found any conventions for <code>cmd</code> help text, and the examples I've seen have been free-form descriptions. Maybe it would make sense to treat each command as a separate program and use usage message conventions for its help. === Comments and self-documentation === Comments and self-documentation are the two sides of the code clarity coin. Code comments are one of the [http://www.hacker-dictionary.com/terms/holy-wars holy wars] of programming--everyone has a strongly held view and debates it vigorously. I basically agree with the views in these articles: * [https://visualstudiomagazine.com/articles/2013/06/01/roc-rocks.aspx Why You Shouldn't Comment (or Document) Code - Visual Studio Magazine] * [https://sourcemaking.com/refactoring/smells/comments Comments - Source Making] * [https://www.pluralsight.com/blog/software-development/code-comments-dos-and-donts Code comments: A quick guide on when (and when not) to use them - Pluralsight] That is, comments are a liability, so for the most part write them as little as possible, and update them when you update the code. Make your code as clear as you can (see the self-documentation section), and comment only to communicate what the code can't on its own, such as its purpose and the reasoning behind your choices in implementing it. If nothing else, comments can be a good indication of places that need refactoring. I don't think it's necessary to stick to one procedure for commenting, but generally when I've commented more, it's because I've paused after a chunk of coding time, such as when I've finished a function. I code in paragraphs, sets of related lines separated by a blank line. In the commenting phase I reread the code I've just written and try to summarize or justify each paragraph, if needed. Stepping back from the code to state things in English sometimes leads to improvements in the code--refactoring or bug fixes. Here are some in-depth discussions on making code self-documenting: * [http://wiki.c2.com/?SelfDocumentingCode Self Documenting Code - WikiWikiWeb] * [http://wiki.c2.com/?SystemMetaphor System Metaphor - WikiWikiWeb] * [https://m.signalvnoise.com/hunting-for-great-names-in-programming-16f624c8fc03 Hunting for great names in programming - Signal v. Noise] Every solution has its own problems. Self-documentation can go wrong too, and in some of the same ways comments can. For example, your function name doesn't have to have anything to do with its contents. Here are a bunch of tricks for wrecking your code's clarity: * [http://mindprod.com/jgloss/unmain.html unmaintainable code - Java Glossary] On the problem that documentation isn't executable, behavior-driven development might give us a partial solution. See the links in the test-driven development section above. === Project documentation === READMEs give the reader a basic intro to your project, but at some point they'll need more extensive information. I'm calling this in-depth treatment the project documentation. ==== Documentation generation ==== Some documentation is freeform writing, but using [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Documentation_generator documentation generators] a lot of it can be collected from specialized comments and formatted automatically. You'd mainly use this to document your API. Sphinx is a popular Python tool for this purpose. It handles both types of documentation. * [http://www.sphinx-doc.org/en/stable/ Sphinx] My default Sphinx setup will be in my cookiecutter templates. ==== Content ==== I didn't find many guides to writing user or developer guides beyond the README, so I may have to write my own at some point, based on an examination of well-documented projects. But here's one guide that covers some of the information developers will need: * [https://www.ctl.io/developers/blog/post/how-to-document-a-project How to Document a Project - CenturyLink Cloud Developer Center] One source of insight for documenters might be the content of man pages. Man (manual) pages are the documentation for Unix tools, and they have a fairly standard format. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Man_page man page - Wikipedia] * [https://liw.fi/manpages/ Writing manual pages - Lars Wirzenius] * [http://www.schweikhardt.net/man_page_howto.html The Linux Man Page How-to - Jens Schweikhardt] === Literate programming === In spite of what I said about comments and self-documentation, sometimes I really want to expound on the meaning of my code, and literate programming is the way to do it. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Literate_programming Literate programming - Wikipedia] * [http://akkartik.name/post/literate-programming Literate programming: Knuth is doing it wrong - Kartik Agaram] Python tools: * [https://sourceforge.net/projects/pywebtool/ pyWeb] - After glancing at a few, I chose pyWeb as probably the closest to what I was looking for. * [http://mpastell.com/pweave/ Pweave] - A feature-rich tool I might try at some point. My first attempt at literate programming is my [https://github.com/thinkulum/math-student-sim Math Student Simulator]. See the README for basic details on writing and processing the source files. == Configuration == When you're coding for yourself, it's easy to keep all the variables inside the code files, since you can just open the files and change the values whenever you want. But when you have outside users, you don't necessarily want them changing the code, and if the code is compiled into binary executables, they can't change it anyway. Plus, separating code and data makes your program easier to think about. So you'll want to put the user-settable data in external files. There are at least two questions to answer: what format to store the settings in and where to store them. === Format === Here are some discussions that cover several formats: * [http://pyvideo.org/pycon-us-2009/pycon-2009--a-configuration-comparison-in-python-.html A Configuration Comparison in Python - PyCon 2009 - PyVideo] (video). * [https://martin-thoma.com/configuration-files-in-python/ Configuration files in Python - Martin Thoma] - Examples of most of the formats I'm listing here. * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/8225954/python-configuration-file-any-file-format-recommendation-ini-format-still-appr Python configuration file: Any file format recommendation? INI format still appropriate? Seems quite old school - Stack Overflow] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/5055042/whats-the-best-practice-using-a-settings-file-in-python What's the best practice using a settings file in Python? - Stack Overflow] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/186916/configuration-file-with-list-of-key-value-pairs-in-python Configuration file with list of key-value pairs in python - Stack Overflow] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/1726802/what-is-the-difference-between-yaml-and-json-when-to-prefer-one-over-the-other What is the difference between YAML and JSON? When to prefer one over the other - Stack Overflow] * [http://www.robg3d.com/2012/06/why-bother-with-python-and-config-files/ Why bother with python and config files? - RobG3d] I've sorted these formats roughly in order of increasing complexity. ==== CSV ==== * [https://docs.python.org/3/library/csv.html csv - The Python Standard Library] Pros: * It's simple. * Some version of it is supported in many languages. * It's fairly easy to import and export. Cons: * It's a little hard to read, especially when the lines get long. * It's limited to simple data. * It doesn't enforce data types. * It doesn't have a standard format. ==== INI ==== * [https://docs.python.org/3/library/configparser.html configparser - The Python Standard Library] * [https://pypi.python.org/pypi/configobj/ ConfigObj - PyPI] - This one has a few more features than configparser. Pros: * It's easy to read. * It's easy to avoid syntax errors (given a particular format). * Some version of it is supported in many languages. * It's easy to import and export. Cons: * It's limited to simple data. * It doesn't enforce data types (unless you use ConfigObj). * It doesn't have a standard format. ==== JSON ==== * [https://docs.python.org/3/library/json.html json - The Python Standard Library] Pros: * It enables multiple data types. * It enables complex data structures. * It's supported in many languages. * It's easy to import and export. Cons: * It's easy to commit syntax errors, especially if you're not familiar with the format. * It can be hard to read, especially if it's not pretty printed or if it uses complex data structures. ==== YAML ==== * [http://pyyaml.org/ PyYAML] Pros: * It enables multiple data types. * It enables complex data structures. * It's supported in many languages. * It's easy to import and export. * It's easy to read if you stick to simple data structures. Cons: * It can be hard to write if you use its more complex features. I'm trying out YAML as my default choice. ==== XML ==== There are a few major Python tools for working with XML: * [http://lxml.de/tutorial.html lxml.etree Tutorial - lxml] * [https://www.crummy.com/software/BeautifulSoup/ Beautiful Soup - Crummy: The Site] - It's mainly meant for HTML, but it parses XML too. * [https://docs.python.org/3/library/xml.etree.elementtree.html xml.etree.ElementTree - The Python Standard Library ] Here's some discussion of the use of XML for configuration: * [https://commons.apache.org/proper/commons-configuration/userguide/howto_hierarchical.html Hierarchical Configurations - Apache Commons Configuration User Guide] Pros: * It enables multiple data types. * It enables complex data structures. * It's supported in many languages. * It's easy to import. Cons: * It doesn't have a standard format for representing configuration. * It can be hard to read. * It can be hard to export if the starting format isn't compatible. * Enforcing data types requires an additional schema. ==== Python ==== You can use regular Python code to define settings, usually by putting them in their own module. I'd personally only use Python for configuration in special cases. Here are some recommendations and warnings: * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/10439486/loading-settings-py-config-file-into-a-dict Loading settings.py config file into a dict - Stack Overflow] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/2259427/load-python-code-at-runtime load python code at runtime - Stack Overflow] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/6198372/most-pythonic-way-to-provide-global-configuration-variables-in-config-py Most Pythonic way to provide global configuration variables in config.py? - Stack Overflow] * [https://pypi.python.org/pypi/pyconfig pyconfig - PyPI] * [https://ralsina.me/posts/python-is-not-a-configuration-file-format.html Python is Not a Configuration File Format - Lateral Opinion] Pros: * It enables multiple data types. * It enables complex data structures. * It enables using conditions to set values. * If your code is already in Python, it doesn't require learning an additional language. * Importing is very easy. Cons: * It mixes code and data, which makes the program harder to think about. * It can create a security risk, since users can add arbitrary code to the configuration file for the program to run. * Exporting can be hard or impossible. * It can be hard to read, depending on the code. * It doesn't have a standard format for representing configuration. * It can be easy to commit syntax errors. ==== Database ==== The formats I've already covered are plain text formats that a human can read and edit. Another option is putting the settings in a binary database and accessing them through a separate UI. The advantages are that you can enforce data types and the user isn't editing the settings file directly, which leaves it less open to syntax errors. For settings to be set by non-technical end users, this is probably the best option. * [https://docs.python.org/3/library/sqlite3.html sqlite3 - The Python Standard Library] Pros: * It's hard for the user to commit syntax errors. * It enables multiple data types. * You can control access to the settings. * It's supported in many languages. * It can be easy to import and export. Cons: * Complex data structures are hard to represent, or they require an additional format. * You have to code a UI for viewing and setting values. === Location === Where should you put your config file? Depending on the circumstances, you might need more than one file, and they might need to go in different locations. Generally speaking, you might separate global and user settings into different files. Global settings might go in the app's root directory or a config subdirectory, and user settings somewhere in a user directory. * [https://pypi.python.org/pypi/appdirs appdirs - PyPI] - A Python module for finding various directories across platforms, such as the user data, a possible location for a config file. == Logging == You need some kind of reporting even when you're coding for yourself, because to debug your program, you have to know what's going on as it runs. But when you're coding for yourself, you can usually afford to be minimal and undisciplined about it. When you might get bug reports from outside users, among other reasons, your program needs to write relevant state and event information to a file they can share. * [https://docs.python.org/3/library/logging.html logging - The Python Standard Library] * [http://python-guide-pt-br.readthedocs.io/en/latest/writing/logging/ Logging - The Hitchhiker's Guide to Python] * [https://www.blog.pythonlibrary.org/2012/08/02/python-101-an-intro-to-logging/ Python 101: An Intro to logging - Mouse vs Python] * [https://fangpenlin.com/posts/2012/08/26/good-logging-practice-in-python/ Good logging practice in Python - Fang's coding note] [More sections to come] <disqus/> [[Category:Programming]] [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Developing]] 980b94420912b3da7d31aee0b3fa56d228cb1466 14 107 286 2017-03-20T05:58:55Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the category. wikitext text/x-wiki [[Category:STEM]] a1ffc30bc1a1cc8bcfd0c5061f41a417db3453bd 14 108 287 2017-03-31T18:34:39Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the category. wikitext text/x-wiki [[Category:Arts]] d1506439f9d51e39e313798ac6599a2cee896a8e 14 109 288 2017-03-31T18:35:11Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the category. wikitext text/x-wiki [[Category:Genres]] 75fe0104216c967febe971952d7599328af69021 0 110 289 2017-03-31T18:35:31Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the article. wikitext text/x-wiki Here are games about programming I've run across. == Computer games == * [http://bot.land/ Bot Land] * [https://screeps.com/ Screeps] * [http://www.zachtronics.com/tis-100/ TIS-100] == Board games == * [http://www.thinkfun.com/products/code-master/ Code Master] [[Category:Games]] [[Category:Programming]] [[Category:Lists]] [[Category:Developing]] b140d2c7337c955a200351bf9ee0df9fc18bf44f 290 289 2017-03-31T18:44:13Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the "Other lists" section. wikitext text/x-wiki Here are games about programming I've run across. == Computer games == * [http://bot.land/ Bot Land] * [https://screeps.com/ Screeps] * [http://www.zachtronics.com/tis-100/ TIS-100] == Board games == * [http://www.thinkfun.com/products/code-master/ Code Master] [[Category:Games]] [[Category:Programming]] [[Category:Lists]] [[Category:Developing]] == Other lists == * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Programming_games Category:Programming games - Wikipedia] * [http://programminggames.org/ Programming Games Wiki] * [http://store.steampowered.com/tag/en/Programming/ Programming games on Steam] * [http://www.kongregate.com/programming-games Programming games on Kongregate] 580c6825c99e6dbe1d70739bba1c55b808cedac7 293 290 2017-04-04T20:48:14Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added Pwn Adventure. wikitext text/x-wiki Here are games about programming I've run across. == Computer games == * [http://bot.land/ Bot Land] * [http://pwnadventure.com/ Pwn Adventure] * [https://screeps.com/ Screeps] * [http://www.zachtronics.com/tis-100/ TIS-100] == Board games == * [http://www.thinkfun.com/products/code-master/ Code Master] [[Category:Games]] [[Category:Programming]] [[Category:Lists]] [[Category:Developing]] == Other lists == * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Programming_games Category:Programming games - Wikipedia] * [http://programminggames.org/ Programming Games Wiki] * [http://store.steampowered.com/tag/en/Programming/ Programming games on Steam] * [http://www.kongregate.com/programming-games Programming games on Kongregate] ed2db6b2c3b73fb9fdcbc76e8a3e35ca036425a5 294 293 2017-04-04T20:56:13Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added The Magic Circle. wikitext text/x-wiki Here are games about programming I've run across. == Computer games == * [http://bot.land/ Bot Land] * [http://www.magiccirclegame.com/ The Magic Circle] (sort of) * [http://pwnadventure.com/ Pwn Adventure] * [https://screeps.com/ Screeps] * [http://www.zachtronics.com/tis-100/ TIS-100] == Board games == * [http://www.thinkfun.com/products/code-master/ Code Master] [[Category:Games]] [[Category:Programming]] [[Category:Lists]] [[Category:Developing]] == Other lists == * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Programming_games Category:Programming games - Wikipedia] * [http://programminggames.org/ Programming Games Wiki] * [http://store.steampowered.com/tag/en/Programming/ Programming games on Steam] * [http://www.kongregate.com/programming-games Programming games on Kongregate] a4a9d56dd9727573816b050886591a5b54c9d5db 0 111 297 2017-04-26T02:26:27Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the article. wikitext text/x-wiki These links point to the livestream recordings of [http://www.c2e2.com C2E2] 2017. == Live Stage == * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137079103 Fanboys - LIVE every Tuesday at 1pm PT feat. @djWHEAT @iNcontroLTV] - Apr 21, 2017 - 4:29:03 - Twitch * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137140174 C2E2 - Day 1] - Apr 21, 2017 - 1:26:00 - Twitch * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137160515 Twitch Weekly - Live from the St Jude Play Live Summit] - Apr 21, 2017 - 1:30:43 - Twitch * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137180586 Twitch Weekly - Live from the St Jude Play Live Summit] - Apr 21, 2017 - 1:31 - Twitch * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137182811 C2E2 - Day 1] - Apr 21, 2017 - 51:03 - Twitch * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137329426 C2E2 - Day 2] - Apr 22, 2017 - 9:00:12 - Twitch * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137579772 C2E2 - Day 3] - Apr 23, 2017 - 6:55:08 - Twitch == Main Stage == * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137086937 C2E2 - Main Stage] - Apr 21, 2017 - 9:01:56 - ReedPOP * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137208044 Wil Wheaton Spotlight - C2E2 2017] - Apr 21, 2017 - 51:15 - ReedPOP * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137208381 Zachary Levi Spotlight - C2E2 2017] - Apr 21, 2017 - 1:00:17 - ReedPOP * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137208716 Jason David Frank Spotlight - C2E2 2017] - Apr 21, 2017 - 56:02 - ReedPOP * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137209091 A.J. Mendez Brooks: Crazy is My Superpower - C2E2 2017] - Apr 21, 2017 - 54:46 - ReedPOP * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137209442 Everything You Ever Wanted to Know about Voice Acting - C2E2 2017] - Apr 21, 2017 - 1:00:47 - ReedPOP * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137209870 Michael Cudlitz Spotlight - C2E2 2017] - Apr 21, 2017 - 59:26 - ReedPOP * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137210062 Rooster Teeth Animation - C2E2 2017] - Apr 21, 2017 - 58:41 - ReedPOP * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137332288 C2E2 - Main Stage] - Apr 22, 2017 - 10:54:27 - ReedPOP * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137413604 The Men, The Myths, The Legends: Stan Lee and Frank Miller One-on-One - C2E2 2017] - Apr 22, 2017 - 48:34 - ReedPOP * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137414312 Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.’s Iain De Caestecker and Elizabeth Henstridge - C2E2 2017] - Apr 22, 2017 - 35:34 - ReedPOP * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137414780 Evanna Lynch Spotlight - C2E2 2017] - Apr 22, 2017 - 45:45 - ReedPOP * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137415275 Twisted Toonz - C2E2 2017] - Apr 22, 2017 - 1:01:28 - ReedPOP * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137437276 Frank Miller and the Return of the Dark Knight - C2E2 2017] - Apr 22, 2017 - 57:50 - ReedPOP * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137475427 C2E2 Crown Championships of Cosplay 2017] - Apr 22, 2017 - 2:13:54 - ReedPOP * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137582649 C2E2 - Main Stage] - Apr 23, 2017 - 6:37:01 - ReedPOP * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137662033 Vincent D'Onofrio Spotlight - C2E2 2017] - Apr 23, 2017 - 1:01:05 - ReedPOP * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137662446 Millie Bobby Brown Spotlight - C2E2 2017] - Apr 23, 2017 - 43:26 - ReedPOP * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137662846 Always Forward with Mike Colter - C2E2 2017] - Apr 23, 2017 - 58:55 - ReedPOP * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137669057 Lucha Underground - C2E2 2017] - Apr 23, 2017 - 1:03:10 - ReedPOP == Stage 2.0 == * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137097305 C2E2 - Stage 2.0] - Apr 21, 2017 - 8:57:13 - ReedPOP2 * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137217451 Behind the Mask of Doom: Meet Ivy Doomkitty Q&amp;A - C2E2 2017] - Apr 21, 2017 - 1:11:39 - ReedPOP2 * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137217705 Crunchyroll Industry Panel - C2E2 2017] - Apr 21, 2017 - 1:14:14 - ReedPOP2 * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137218082 IDW Entertainment Spotlight on: Wynonna Earp - C2E2 2017] - Apr 21, 2017 - 1:21:33 - ReedPOP2 * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137218458 The Future of Comics: Relevance - C2E2 2017] - Apr 21, 2017 - 48:39 - ReedPOP2 * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137218753 The Making of After Hours: How a Conversation Becomes an Episode - C2E2 2017] - Apr 21, 2017 - 1:12:31 - ReedPOP2 * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137219072 The Revolution of Craft Beer &amp; Comics - C2E2 2017] - Apr 21, 2017 - 1:00:07 - ReedPOP2 * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137348991 C2E2 - Stage 2.0] - Apr 22, 2017 - 5:56:52 - ReedPOP2 * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137370786 Kindred Spirits: Amy Bruni and Adam Berry - C2E2 2017] - Apr 22, 2017 - 1:02:10 - ReedPOP2 * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137406742 Funimation Industry Panel - C2E2 2017] - Apr 22, 2017 - 56:20 - ReedPOP2 * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137426023 Veronica Taylor Spotlight - C2E2 2017] - Apr 22, 2017 - 1:00:32 - ReedPOP2 * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137582793 C2E2 - Stage 2.0] - Apr 23, 2017 - 0:47 - ReedPOP2 * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137582849 C2E2 - Stage 2.0] - Apr 23, 2017 - 5:20:49 - ReedPOP2 * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137606331 DC Comics: Uncharted - C2E2 2017] - Apr 23, 2017 - 1:00:24 - ReedPOP2 * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137646619 Go Go Power Rangers with David Yost and Walter Jones - C2E2 2017] - Apr 23, 2017 - 1:03:47 - ReedPOP2 * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137647407 The Past, Present and Future of Professional Wrestling - C2E2 2017] - Apr 23, 2017 - 1:03:39 - ReedPOP2 * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137668994 Revival: A Post-Mortem - C2E2 2017] - Apr 23, 2017 - 1:04:01 - ReedPOP2 [[Category:Arts events]] [[Category:Lists]] [[Category:Complete]] 6a5e0829c739656301cd9499a6afb3023171fa63 299 297 2017-04-26T02:39:59Z Andy Culbertson 1 Removed an extraneous video. Added room and booth numbers. wikitext text/x-wiki These links point to the livestream recordings of [http://www.c2e2.com C2E2] 2017. I've included room and booth numbers in case they help locate events in the schedule. == Live Stage == Booth 1739 * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137079103 Fanboys - LIVE every Tuesday at 1pm PT feat. @djWHEAT @iNcontroLTV] - Apr 21, 2017 - 4:29:03 - Twitch * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137140174 C2E2 - Day 1] - Apr 21, 2017 - 1:26:00 - Twitch * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137160515 Twitch Weekly - Live from the St Jude Play Live Summit] - Apr 21, 2017 - 1:30:43 - Twitch * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137180586 Twitch Weekly - Live from the St Jude Play Live Summit] - Apr 21, 2017 - 1:31 - Twitch * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137182811 C2E2 - Day 1] - Apr 21, 2017 - 51:03 - Twitch * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137329426 C2E2 - Day 2] - Apr 22, 2017 - 9:00:12 - Twitch * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137579772 C2E2 - Day 3] - Apr 23, 2017 - 6:55:08 - Twitch == Main Stage == Room S406 * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137086937 C2E2 - Main Stage] - Apr 21, 2017 - 9:01:56 - ReedPOP * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137208044 Wil Wheaton Spotlight - C2E2 2017] - Apr 21, 2017 - 51:15 - ReedPOP * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137208381 Zachary Levi Spotlight - C2E2 2017] - Apr 21, 2017 - 1:00:17 - ReedPOP * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137208716 Jason David Frank Spotlight - C2E2 2017] - Apr 21, 2017 - 56:02 - ReedPOP * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137209091 A.J. Mendez Brooks: Crazy is My Superpower - C2E2 2017] - Apr 21, 2017 - 54:46 - ReedPOP * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137209442 Everything You Ever Wanted to Know about Voice Acting - C2E2 2017] - Apr 21, 2017 - 1:00:47 - ReedPOP * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137209870 Michael Cudlitz Spotlight - C2E2 2017] - Apr 21, 2017 - 59:26 - ReedPOP * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137210062 Rooster Teeth Animation - C2E2 2017] - Apr 21, 2017 - 58:41 - ReedPOP * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137332288 C2E2 - Main Stage] - Apr 22, 2017 - 10:54:27 - ReedPOP * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137413604 The Men, The Myths, The Legends: Stan Lee and Frank Miller One-on-One - C2E2 2017] - Apr 22, 2017 - 48:34 - ReedPOP * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137414312 Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.’s Iain De Caestecker and Elizabeth Henstridge - C2E2 2017] - Apr 22, 2017 - 35:34 - ReedPOP * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137414780 Evanna Lynch Spotlight - C2E2 2017] - Apr 22, 2017 - 45:45 - ReedPOP * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137415275 Twisted Toonz - C2E2 2017] - Apr 22, 2017 - 1:01:28 - ReedPOP * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137437276 Frank Miller and the Return of the Dark Knight - C2E2 2017] - Apr 22, 2017 - 57:50 - ReedPOP * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137475427 C2E2 Crown Championships of Cosplay 2017] - Apr 22, 2017 - 2:13:54 - ReedPOP * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137582649 C2E2 - Main Stage] - Apr 23, 2017 - 6:37:01 - ReedPOP * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137662033 Vincent D'Onofrio Spotlight - C2E2 2017] - Apr 23, 2017 - 1:01:05 - ReedPOP * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137662446 Millie Bobby Brown Spotlight - C2E2 2017] - Apr 23, 2017 - 43:26 - ReedPOP * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137662846 Always Forward with Mike Colter - C2E2 2017] - Apr 23, 2017 - 58:55 - ReedPOP * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137669057 Lucha Underground - C2E2 2017] - Apr 23, 2017 - 1:03:10 - ReedPOP == Stage 2.0 == Room S404 * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137097305 C2E2 - Stage 2.0] - Apr 21, 2017 - 8:57:13 - ReedPOP2 * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137217451 Behind the Mask of Doom: Meet Ivy Doomkitty Q&amp;A - C2E2 2017] - Apr 21, 2017 - 1:11:39 - ReedPOP2 * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137217705 Crunchyroll Industry Panel - C2E2 2017] - Apr 21, 2017 - 1:14:14 - ReedPOP2 * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137218082 IDW Entertainment Spotlight on: Wynonna Earp - C2E2 2017] - Apr 21, 2017 - 1:21:33 - ReedPOP2 * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137218458 The Future of Comics: Relevance - C2E2 2017] - Apr 21, 2017 - 48:39 - ReedPOP2 * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137218753 The Making of After Hours: How a Conversation Becomes an Episode - C2E2 2017] - Apr 21, 2017 - 1:12:31 - ReedPOP2 * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137219072 The Revolution of Craft Beer &amp; Comics - C2E2 2017] - Apr 21, 2017 - 1:00:07 - ReedPOP2 * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137348991 C2E2 - Stage 2.0] - Apr 22, 2017 - 5:56:52 - ReedPOP2 * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137370786 Kindred Spirits: Amy Bruni and Adam Berry - C2E2 2017] - Apr 22, 2017 - 1:02:10 - ReedPOP2 * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137406742 Funimation Industry Panel - C2E2 2017] - Apr 22, 2017 - 56:20 - ReedPOP2 * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137426023 Veronica Taylor Spotlight - C2E2 2017] - Apr 22, 2017 - 1:00:32 - ReedPOP2 * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137582849 C2E2 - Stage 2.0] - Apr 23, 2017 - 5:20:49 - ReedPOP2 * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137606331 DC Comics: Uncharted - C2E2 2017] - Apr 23, 2017 - 1:00:24 - ReedPOP2 * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137646619 Go Go Power Rangers with David Yost and Walter Jones - C2E2 2017] - Apr 23, 2017 - 1:03:47 - ReedPOP2 * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137647407 The Past, Present and Future of Professional Wrestling - C2E2 2017] - Apr 23, 2017 - 1:03:39 - ReedPOP2 * [https://www.twitch.tv/videos/137668994 Revival: A Post-Mortem - C2E2 2017] - Apr 23, 2017 - 1:04:01 - ReedPOP2 [[Category:Arts events]] [[Category:Lists]] [[Category:Complete]] 7e9a730dddb0ada0f5db7cd101976805200e9127 14 112 298 2017-04-26T02:27:17Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the category. wikitext text/x-wiki [[Category:Arts]] d1506439f9d51e39e313798ac6599a2cee896a8e 0 110 301 294 2017-05-09T14:20:26Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added Tynker. wikitext text/x-wiki Here are games about programming I've run across. == Computer games == * [http://bot.land/ Bot Land] * [http://www.magiccirclegame.com/ The Magic Circle] (sort of) * [http://pwnadventure.com/ Pwn Adventure] * [https://screeps.com/ Screeps] * [http://www.zachtronics.com/tis-100/ TIS-100] * [https://www.tynker.com/ Tynker] - Publisher of children's coding games. == Board games == * [http://www.thinkfun.com/products/code-master/ Code Master] [[Category:Games]] [[Category:Programming]] [[Category:Lists]] [[Category:Developing]] == Other lists == * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Programming_games Category:Programming games - Wikipedia] * [http://programminggames.org/ Programming Games Wiki] * [http://store.steampowered.com/tag/en/Programming/ Programming games on Steam] * [http://www.kongregate.com/programming-games Programming games on Kongregate] 2c8aea3166ec0d9b66968d4e644b340f6e789a63 318 301 2017-09-24T06:14:01Z Andy Culbertson 1 Changed the Developing category to Ongoing. Moved the categories to the end of the article. wikitext text/x-wiki Here are games about programming I've run across. == Computer games == * [http://bot.land/ Bot Land] * [http://www.magiccirclegame.com/ The Magic Circle] (sort of) * [http://pwnadventure.com/ Pwn Adventure] * [https://screeps.com/ Screeps] * [http://www.zachtronics.com/tis-100/ TIS-100] * [https://www.tynker.com/ Tynker] - Publisher of children's coding games. == Board games == * [http://www.thinkfun.com/products/code-master/ Code Master] == Other lists == * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Programming_games Category:Programming games - Wikipedia] * [http://programminggames.org/ Programming Games Wiki] * [http://store.steampowered.com/tag/en/Programming/ Programming games on Steam] * [http://www.kongregate.com/programming-games Programming games on Kongregate] [[Category:Games]] [[Category:Programming]] [[Category:Lists]] [[Category:Ongoing]] 090ad73b4168c70575a726e4f09d1bc6c62517fa 325 318 2018-03-16T18:31:39Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added Bits and Bricks. wikitext text/x-wiki Here are games about programming I've run across. == Computer games == * [https://www.lego.com/en-us/games/webgames/bits-and-bricks-2ca484b751a946559fe6ebf0ecb10e66 Bits and Bricks] * [http://bot.land/ Bot Land] * [http://www.magiccirclegame.com/ The Magic Circle] (sort of) * [http://pwnadventure.com/ Pwn Adventure] * [https://screeps.com/ Screeps] * [http://www.zachtronics.com/tis-100/ TIS-100] * [https://www.tynker.com/ Tynker] - Publisher of children's coding games. == Board games == * [http://www.thinkfun.com/products/code-master/ Code Master] == Other lists == * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Programming_games Category:Programming games - Wikipedia] * [http://programminggames.org/ Programming Games Wiki] * [http://store.steampowered.com/tag/en/Programming/ Programming games on Steam] * [http://www.kongregate.com/programming-games Programming games on Kongregate] [[Category:Games]] [[Category:Programming]] [[Category:Lists]] [[Category:Ongoing]] bac5c6987b1a1ad116f5c735b301dbb4c9e2b234 326 325 2018-03-16T18:36:26Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added a note on the source of Bits and Bricks. wikitext text/x-wiki Here are games about programming I've run across. == Computer games == * [https://www.lego.com/en-us/games/webgames/bits-and-bricks-2ca484b751a946559fe6ebf0ecb10e66 Bits and Bricks] - The LEGO^® version of this game. * [http://bot.land/ Bot Land] * [http://www.magiccirclegame.com/ The Magic Circle] (sort of) * [http://pwnadventure.com/ Pwn Adventure] * [https://screeps.com/ Screeps] * [http://www.zachtronics.com/tis-100/ TIS-100] * [https://www.tynker.com/ Tynker] - Publisher of children's coding games. == Board games == * [http://www.thinkfun.com/products/code-master/ Code Master] == Other lists == * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Programming_games Category:Programming games - Wikipedia] * [http://programminggames.org/ Programming Games Wiki] * [http://store.steampowered.com/tag/en/Programming/ Programming games on Steam] * [http://www.kongregate.com/programming-games Programming games on Kongregate] [[Category:Games]] [[Category:Programming]] [[Category:Lists]] [[Category:Ongoing]] b50135a6496074df023413b67b1aae8868efee5c 0 113 302 2017-05-15T10:19:46Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the article. wikitext text/x-wiki Comics are an inviting art form for many reasons, but they're also an overwhelming one. There are just too many comics to know where to start or to easily make sense of the material. At least that's how it can look to a newcomer. This article is a beginner-to-beginner guide to getting started in reading comics. That is, I have a long way to go before I'd call myself an expert, but I'm far enough along that I have things to say. When I was starting my latest attempt to launch into the world of comics, I asked Google for some getting-started guides. It gave me some, and they were helpful, but they didn't entirely give me what I wanted. So I've done some of my own research and put together a guide that's closer to the map I'm looking for. In this guide I'll invite you to be an explorer. The world of comics is vast, and so is the world of comics discussion. My goal is to give you a way to think about these discussions and then give you starting points for finding them. It's up to you to chart your own path. This is a work in progress, so expect some updates! == Mapping the territory == Before we start navigating, it might be good to get an overall picture of the world we'll be traveling. Here's a good starting point: * [http://www.comicspectrum.com/comics.html Comics - Comic Spectrum] - These articles give brief overviews of different aspects of comics, from which are the major publishers to how to buy comics to what the deal is with manga and webcomics. The next sites cover large areas of the comics industry in detail. You can use them as references to search for specific information or wander through them aimlessly, clicking any links that catch your eye. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portal:Comics The Comics Portal - Wikipedia] * [http://animanga.wikia.com/wiki/Animanga_Wiki Animanga Wiki] * [https://dmoztools.net/Arts/Comics/ Arts > Comics - dmoztools.net] - The comics section of a general web directory, a large, organized collections of links. This site is only a mirror of the original DMOZ directory, which has been shut down, so more recent sites won't be included, but there's still plenty to explore. Even in the age of the web, books are still a good source of information. Here are some worthwhile reference books: * [https://www.amazon.com/DC-Comics-History-Daniel-Wallace/dp/1465433848/ DC Comics: A Visual History, Updated Edition] - This book highlights the major developments in DC Comics for each year the publisher has existed, heavily illustrated with comic covers and other art. It's a good place to find artists to follow, pick up on major characters and storylines, and place it all in the context of other developments in the comic industry and in world history. * [https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1465414436/ Marvel Year by Year, Updated and Expanded] - The Marvel version of the DC visual history. == Choosing destinations == Whenever you start on a journey, you'll want a destination in mind, or at least a purpose for your travels. For example: * Every few months comic-related hype blows up your Twitter feed, and you want to see what all the hubbub is about. * You've dabbled in comics and want to explore them more extensively. * You like comic fans and want to be able to talk with them. * You want to study the work of other comic creators to learn how to tell your own stories with pictures. * You just want to read some good visual stories. Your goals will guide your decisions along the way. Before going into the details, though, let's look more closely at some destinations you might be aiming for. === Keeping up with new comics === One of your goals might be to catch up on some current storylines in comics so you can keep up with them going forward. How will you keep up once you've caught up? Here's some advice on doing that: * [https://www.themarysue.com/how-to-buy-comics-a-beginners-guide/ How To Buy Comics: A Beginner’s Guide - The Mary Sue] * [http://comicsalliance.com/small-press-previews-indie-comics-website/ Small Press Previews: A New Way Of Keeping Up To Date With The Latest Indie Comics - Comics Alliance] Here are some places to find out about new comic releases: * [https://www.previewsworld.com/NewReleases New Releases - Previews World] * [http://freshcomics.us/ Fresh Comics] * [http://www.midtowncomics.com/ Midtown Comics] * [http://indiecomicsmagazine.com/ Indie Comics Magazine] * [http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/news/archive News Archive - Anime News Network] - Search the post titles for "releases." === Places to talk about comics === If one of your goals is to discuss comics with other fans, there's no shortage of places to do that. Here are some starting points for finding them: * [https://www.meetup.com/find/events/?keywords=comics Comics meetups near you - Meetup.com] - Places to talk to fellow comic fans in person. * [https://www.reddit.com/r/comics/ Comics - Reddit] * [https://www.reddit.com/r/manga/ Manga - Reddit] * [https://www.wishberry.in/blog/10-international-comic-blogs-that-keep-you-updated-with-the-comic-space/ 10 International Comic Blogs That Keep You Updated With The Comic Space - Wishberry] - Most blogs like these let you comment on the posts, and some even have forums so you can start your own discussions. * [http://www.theweeklypull.net/ The Weekly Pull] - The hub for a group of large comic-related YouTube channels, centered around their shared podcast. They sometimes have guests from other channels, such as [http://www.theweeklypull.net/the-weekly-pull-podcast-episode-22-wnerdsync-productions NerdSync], so you can get an idea of who else is out there. In addition to podcast episodes and YouTube videos, the site features articles and a forum. == Planning routes == Once you have an idea of your destination, or at least the kind of travel you want to experience, how will you get there? The approach I'm recommending is to pick one or more specific ways to organize your journey and then pick a strategy for choosing your stops along the way. Here are some other writers who recommend a similar approach: * [http://www.howtolovecomics.com/2013/09/12/how-do-i-get-into-comics-guide-for-those-new-to-comics/ How Do I Get Into Comics? - How to Love Comics] - A good set of general advice. * [http://lifehacker.com/how-to-get-started-reading-comics-that-have-been-runnin-1692145879 How to Get Started Reading Comics That Have Been Running For Decades - Lifehacker] * [http://www.comicbookherald.com/how-to-start-reading-comics/ How To Start Reading Comics In 2017: A Beginner’s Guide - Comic Book Herald] In my version of this scheme, the organizing factors you could choose are * sources (places to find comics), * stories (quality, stand-alone comic collections), * creators (writers and artists), * events (important stories from a character's life or a publisher's continuity), * and themes (topics or story elements). I'll go into more detail on each of these factors in the rest of this section. But first let's talk about some basic strategies for choosing comics from your chosen route. === Strategies for choosing comics === Any path you choose will probably include a lot of comics. There are a few patterns you could use to decide on which of those to read: * '''Serendipitous selecting''' - In this strategy you pick up any comics that appeal to you without worrying about the ones you leave on the shelf. Your selection can end up looking kind of random. Serendipity is especially helpful for the times when you're looking for possible new routes. When using this strategy, it helps if you aren't a completist. Otherwise you'll still worry about the comics you've left behind. * '''Exhaustive selecting''' - In this strategy you read every comic you can get your hands on in the route you've chosen. In some cases the route is short enough that this will be manageable. In other cases it'll be challenging or impossible, and that's a good time to consider the next strategy. * '''Ranked selecting''' - In this strategy you read only the important comics in your route. It'll take some research, advice, and thought to decide which comics are important to you, but it could save you a lot of extra reading time. Now let's look at some ways to find routes. === Source-oriented routes === In this method, you base your selection on whatever you can pick up from a particular source. Sources include libraries, brick-and-mortar stores, and online stores. You probably won't be able to read everything your source offers, so I'd say this method works best with a serendipitous strategy. It's a good way to sample comics when you're looking for a route from another category, such as finding a character to follow (that is, a story- or event-oriented route). * [http://bookriot.com/2016/06/20/6-ways-to-keep-up-with-comics-when-youre-broke/ 6 Ways to Keep up With Comics When You’re Broke - Book Riot] - This article describes some sources of cheap or free comics. ==== Free comics ==== * [http://www.worldcat.org/ WorldCat] - An online catalog of thousands of libraries worldwide. If you're only after good comics from your local library, take a trip there and look around. If you're looking for a specific comic, you can search this catalog and see which libraries near you have it. If none of them do, you can probably borrow it through your local library's [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interlibrary_loan interlibrary loan] service. * [https://www.hoopladigital.com/browse/comic/popular Comics - Hoopla] - Libraries subscribe to this service to offer you digital comics (along with ebooks, audiobooks, music, and movies). Check your library's website to see if they're signed up with Hoopla. * [https://www.comixology.com/free-comics Free Comics - comiXology] - Free digital comics from one of the major online retailers. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_Comic_Book_Day Free Comic Book Day - Wikipedia] - An annual event that offers a set of free promotional comics through your local comic stores. * [http://l-lists.com/en/lists/quobv1.html List of Webcomic Directories - L-Lists] - The sites on this list link to thousands of webcomics, most of them completely free. ==== Paid comics ==== * [http://www.freecomicbookday.com/storelocator Find a Shop - Free Comic Book Day] - A searchable directory of physical comic book stores. These are good places to get overwhelmed by comics and to subscribe to regular installments of your favorite titles. * [https://www.yelp.com/search?find_desc=Bookstores Bookstores near you - Yelp] - Bookstores sell comics too. One notable chain is [https://www.hpb.com/ Half Price Books], which happily buys and sells used comics and graphic novels. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_comic#Notable_digital_distributors Notable digital distributors - Digital comic - Wikipedia] - Places to buy digital comics online. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_comics_publishing_companies List of comics publishing companies - Wikipedia] - You may be able to order print or digital comics directly from your favorite publishers. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_manga_distributors List of manga distributors - Wikipedia] - Places to buy manga, in some cases the digital editions. === Story-oriented routes === With this method you're looking for high quality comics. You don't care if they're important to a larger storyline. It helps if these are stand-alone stories, but they don't have to be. You can find these by visiting some of the more selective comic sources, such as libraries, and reading whatever they've decided is worth offering. Here's one source of lists that are based on data: * [http://www.diamondcomics.com/Home/1/1/3/237 Industry Statistics - Diamond Comic Distributors, Inc.] - Diamond distributes comics from publishers to retailers. This page links to their monthly lists of top selling comics and graphic novels. These ranks are based on orders from retailers rather than purchases by customers, but they should give you a good idea of the significant titles you might want to read. You can also look for lists of good comics online through web searches such as these: * [https://www.google.com/search?q=best+comics+stories Best comics stories - Google] * [https://www.google.com/search?q=new+to+comics New to comics - Google] * [https://www.google.com/search?q=comics+getting+started Comics getting started - Google] * [https://www.google.com/search?q=best+stand+alone+comics Best stand alone comics - Google] * [https://www.google.com/search?q=literary+comics Literary comics - Google] * [https://www.google.com/search?q=best+indie+comics Best indie comics - Google] * [https://www.google.com/search?q=best+manga Best manga - Google] You'll find a lot of these lists. Here are a bunch to start with: * [http://twocatscomicbookstore.blogspot.com/p/new-to-reading-comic-books-heres-where.html New to Comics? Start Here! - All Things Geeky] * [http://mashable.com/2015/08/02/comics-for-new-fans/#U7pBRxbd9sqF 25 comic books for nerdy newbies to read first - Mashable] * [https://comicvine.gamespot.com/profile/johnkmccubbin91/lists/my-top-stories-and-story-arcs-of-all-time/44413/ My Top Stories and Story Arcs of All Time - Comic Vine] * [http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/lists/superhero-comic-books-100-best-934371 100 Greatest Superhero Comics - Hollywood Reporter] * [http://www.complex.com/pop-culture/2013/01/the-25-comic-books-you-need-to-read-before-you-die/ The 25 Comic Books You Need To Read Before You Die - Complex] * [https://forbiddenplanet.com/log/50-best-best-graphic-novels/ 50 Best Of The Best Graphic Novels - Forbidden Planet] * [http://www.listchallenges.com/top-100-comic-book-storylines Top 100 Comic Book Storylines - List Challenges] * [http://www.comicbookherald.com/the-best-comics-of-all-time/ Dave’s Faves: All The Best Comics I’ve Ever Read - Comic Book Herald] * [http://www.nerdophiles.com/2015/01/25/a-beginners-guide-to-literary-comics/ A Beginner’s Guide to Literary Comics - Nerdophiles] * [http://www.rollingstone.com/culture/lists/drawn-out-the-50-best-non-superhero-graphic-novels-20140505 Drawn Out: The 50 Best Non-Superhero Graphic Novels - Rolling Stone] * [https://www.buzzfeed.com/summeranne/60-comics-everyone-should-read?utm_term=.axBWP74x1R#.hqQM2PK43k 60 Comics Everyone Should Read - BuzzFeed] * [https://www.comixology.com/New-to-comiXology-Start-Here/page/502 New to Comics? Start Here! - comiXology] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_best-selling_manga List of best-selling manga - Wikipedia] * [https://www.theguardian.com/childrens-books-site/2014/feb/03/manga-top-ten-teens Manga comics: where to start - The Guardian] === Creator-oriented routes === In this method you pick one or more comic writers or artists to follow and read some or all of their works. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Comics_creators Category:Comics creators - Wikipedia] * [https://pjmedia.com/lifestyle/2014/6/25/the-10-greatest-comic-book-writers-of-all-time/ The 10 Greatest Comic Book Writers of All Time - PJ Media] * [http://www.goliath.com/comics/the-10-most-influential-comic-book-writers-of-all-time/ The 10 Most Influential Comic Book Writers Of All Time - Goliath] * [http://www.creativebloq.com/comics/comic-book-artists-712389 The 10 greatest comic book artists of all time - Creative Bloq] * [http://www.comicartfans.com/comicartistsmain.asp Comic Artists - Comicartfans] - A large database of artists with lists on the front page of top ranking entries. * [http://geekandsundry.com/keep-current-by-reading-this-one-bleeding-edge-comic-book/ Keep Current by Reading This One Bleeding Edge Comic Book - Geek & Sundry] === Event-oriented routes === Many stories in comics take place in the context of a larger storyline. You could view the life of a character or team as a single storyline, or an entire comic book series, or even a publisher's complete body of work. One type of route is to read through one or more of these story arcs. If you have the time, you could try to read through every issue of the arc, or you can find ways to narrow down the list to the most interesting or important parts of the story. The fact that the top two publishers treat so much of their material as one semi-cohesive set of stories is one reason people find comics so hard to start reading. The good news is that both DC and Marvel periodically publish major story arcs in the form of crossover events. These events can serve as a way to organize the overall storyline of the publisher's universe. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Publication_history_of_DC_Comics_crossover_events Publication history of DC Comics crossover events - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Publication_history_of_Marvel_Comics_crossover_events Publication history of Marvel Comics crossover events - Wikipedia] Some story arcs can be hard to follow because they're spread out over a long time period and draw from several comic titles. So a lot of people have taken the time to put together reading orders to guide you, either through every issue of the story or through what they consider the most important parts. Here are some sites that cover a lot of storylines, mostly from DC and Marvel: * [http://www.comicbookherald.com/ Comic Book Herald] * [http://comicbookreadingorders.com/ Comic Book Reading Orders] * [http://www.tradereadingorder.com/list/comics/ Comics - Trade Reading Order] * [http://www.readingorders.com/ Comic Reading Orders] * [http://www.dcindexes.com/ Mike's Amazing World of Comics] * [https://www.reddit.com/r/comicreadingorders/ Comic Reading Orders - Reddit] * [http://cmro.travis-starnes.com/ The Complete Marvel Reading Order] * [http://www.alltimelines.com/all-comic-timelines/ All Comic Timelines - All Timelines] - This site puts the comics from various universes in chronological rather than publication order. * [http://www.supermegamonkey.net/chronocomic/ Marvel Comics Chronology - SuperMegaMonkey] If you search the web yourself for reading orders, you'll also find some for more obscure storylines, such as this interesting project that explores short-lived publishers from the 1990s: * [http://www.theshareduniverse.com/tag/dead-universes/ Dead Universes - The Shared Universe] === Theme-oriented routes === This last method is sort of a catch-all category for factors that cut across the other methods. These include story elements, genres, audiences, topics, and any other factor you can think of. Sometimes you'll find websites about comics on your chosen theme, but in a lot of cases, the best way to find relevant comics is a good old fashioned web search. Here are some examples: * [https://www.google.com/search?q=comics+about+cyborgs Comics about cyborgs - Google] - A story element, a character type. * [https://www.google.com/search?q=comics+set+in+chicago Comics set in Chicago - Google] - Another story element, a setting. * [https://www.google.com/search?q=slice+of+life+manga Slice of life manga - Google] - A genre. * [https://www.google.com/search?q=manga+about+revenge Manga about revenge - Google] - A topic. * [http://www.kidscomics.com/Home/1/1/60/1046 Kids Comics] - An audience. == Closing thoughts == In this guide I've tried to give you a broad set of starting points for planning your comic reading adventures. The next steps are up to you. Pick a goal, pick a method, do some research, chart a course, and have fun reading. Maybe even share your journey with others. And feel free to leave feedback on this guide in the comments below. <disqus/> [[Category:Comics]] [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Developing]] 349a7123196ca207292e15270d62b52ce179e325 304 302 2017-05-29T13:30:29Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the "Planned updates" section. wikitext text/x-wiki Comics are an inviting art form for many reasons, but they're also an overwhelming one. There are just too many comics to know where to start or to easily make sense of the material. At least that's how it can look to a newcomer. This article is a beginner-to-beginner guide to getting started in reading comics. That is, I have a long way to go before I'd call myself an expert, but I'm far enough along that I have things to say. When I was starting my latest attempt to launch into the world of comics, I asked Google for some getting-started guides. It gave me some, and they were helpful, but they didn't entirely give me what I wanted. So I've done some of my own research and put together a guide that's closer to the map I'm looking for. In this guide I'll invite you to be an explorer. The world of comics is vast, and so is the world of comics discussion. My goal is to give you a way to think about these discussions and then give you starting points for finding them. It's up to you to chart your own path. This is a work in progress, so expect some updates! == Mapping the territory == Before we start navigating, it might be good to get an overall picture of the world we'll be traveling. Here's a good starting point: * [http://www.comicspectrum.com/comics.html Comics - Comic Spectrum] - These articles give brief overviews of different aspects of comics, from which are the major publishers to how to buy comics to what the deal is with manga and webcomics. The next sites cover large areas of the comics industry in detail. You can use them as references to search for specific information or wander through them aimlessly, clicking any links that catch your eye. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portal:Comics The Comics Portal - Wikipedia] * [http://animanga.wikia.com/wiki/Animanga_Wiki Animanga Wiki] * [https://dmoztools.net/Arts/Comics/ Arts > Comics - dmoztools.net] - The comics section of a general web directory, a large, organized collections of links. This site is only a mirror of the original DMOZ directory, which has been shut down, so more recent sites won't be included, but there's still plenty to explore. Even in the age of the web, books are still a good source of information. Here are some worthwhile reference books: * [https://www.amazon.com/DC-Comics-History-Daniel-Wallace/dp/1465433848/ DC Comics: A Visual History, Updated Edition] - This book highlights the major developments in DC Comics for each year the publisher has existed, heavily illustrated with comic covers and other art. It's a good place to find artists to follow, pick up on major characters and storylines, and place it all in the context of other developments in the comic industry and in world history. * [https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1465414436/ Marvel Year by Year, Updated and Expanded] - The Marvel version of the DC visual history. == Choosing destinations == Whenever you start on a journey, you'll want a destination in mind, or at least a purpose for your travels. For example: * Every few months comic-related hype blows up your Twitter feed, and you want to see what all the hubbub is about. * You've dabbled in comics and want to explore them more extensively. * You like comic fans and want to be able to talk with them. * You want to study the work of other comic creators to learn how to tell your own stories with pictures. * You just want to read some good visual stories. Your goals will guide your decisions along the way. Before going into the details, though, let's look more closely at some destinations you might be aiming for. === Keeping up with new comics === One of your goals might be to catch up on some current storylines in comics so you can keep up with them going forward. How will you keep up once you've caught up? Here's some advice on doing that: * [https://www.themarysue.com/how-to-buy-comics-a-beginners-guide/ How To Buy Comics: A Beginner’s Guide - The Mary Sue] * [http://comicsalliance.com/small-press-previews-indie-comics-website/ Small Press Previews: A New Way Of Keeping Up To Date With The Latest Indie Comics - Comics Alliance] Here are some places to find out about new comic releases: * [https://www.previewsworld.com/NewReleases New Releases - Previews World] * [http://freshcomics.us/ Fresh Comics] * [http://www.midtowncomics.com/ Midtown Comics] * [http://indiecomicsmagazine.com/ Indie Comics Magazine] * [http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/news/archive News Archive - Anime News Network] - Search the post titles for "releases." === Places to talk about comics === If one of your goals is to discuss comics with other fans, there's no shortage of places to do that. Here are some starting points for finding them: * [https://www.meetup.com/find/events/?keywords=comics Comics meetups near you - Meetup.com] - Places to talk to fellow comic fans in person. * [https://www.reddit.com/r/comics/ Comics - Reddit] * [https://www.reddit.com/r/manga/ Manga - Reddit] * [https://www.wishberry.in/blog/10-international-comic-blogs-that-keep-you-updated-with-the-comic-space/ 10 International Comic Blogs That Keep You Updated With The Comic Space - Wishberry] - Most blogs like these let you comment on the posts, and some even have forums so you can start your own discussions. * [http://www.theweeklypull.net/ The Weekly Pull] - The hub for a group of large comic-related YouTube channels, centered around their shared podcast. They sometimes have guests from other channels, such as [http://www.theweeklypull.net/the-weekly-pull-podcast-episode-22-wnerdsync-productions NerdSync], so you can get an idea of who else is out there. In addition to podcast episodes and YouTube videos, the site features articles and a forum. == Planning routes == Once you have an idea of your destination, or at least the kind of travel you want to experience, how will you get there? The approach I'm recommending is to pick one or more specific ways to organize your journey and then pick a strategy for choosing your stops along the way. Here are some other writers who recommend a similar approach: * [http://www.howtolovecomics.com/2013/09/12/how-do-i-get-into-comics-guide-for-those-new-to-comics/ How Do I Get Into Comics? - How to Love Comics] - A good set of general advice. * [http://lifehacker.com/how-to-get-started-reading-comics-that-have-been-runnin-1692145879 How to Get Started Reading Comics That Have Been Running For Decades - Lifehacker] * [http://www.comicbookherald.com/how-to-start-reading-comics/ How To Start Reading Comics In 2017: A Beginner’s Guide - Comic Book Herald] In my version of this scheme, the organizing factors you could choose are * sources (places to find comics), * stories (quality, stand-alone comic collections), * creators (writers and artists), * events (important stories from a character's life or a publisher's continuity), * and themes (topics or story elements). I'll go into more detail on each of these factors in the rest of this section. But first let's talk about some basic strategies for choosing comics from your chosen route. === Strategies for choosing comics === Any path you choose will probably include a lot of comics. There are a few patterns you could use to decide on which of those to read: * '''Serendipitous selecting''' - In this strategy you pick up any comics that appeal to you without worrying about the ones you leave on the shelf. Your selection can end up looking kind of random. Serendipity is especially helpful for the times when you're looking for possible new routes. When using this strategy, it helps if you aren't a completist. Otherwise you'll still worry about the comics you've left behind. * '''Exhaustive selecting''' - In this strategy you read every comic you can get your hands on in the route you've chosen. In some cases the route is short enough that this will be manageable. In other cases it'll be challenging or impossible, and that's a good time to consider the next strategy. * '''Ranked selecting''' - In this strategy you read only the important comics in your route. It'll take some research, advice, and thought to decide which comics are important to you, but it could save you a lot of extra reading time. Now let's look at some ways to find routes. === Source-oriented routes === In this method, you base your selection on whatever you can pick up from a particular source. Sources include libraries, brick-and-mortar stores, and online stores. You probably won't be able to read everything your source offers, so I'd say this method works best with a serendipitous strategy. It's a good way to sample comics when you're looking for a route from another category, such as finding a character to follow (that is, a story- or event-oriented route). * [http://bookriot.com/2016/06/20/6-ways-to-keep-up-with-comics-when-youre-broke/ 6 Ways to Keep up With Comics When You’re Broke - Book Riot] - This article describes some sources of cheap or free comics. ==== Free comics ==== * [http://www.worldcat.org/ WorldCat] - An online catalog of thousands of libraries worldwide. If you're only after good comics from your local library, take a trip there and look around. If you're looking for a specific comic, you can search this catalog and see which libraries near you have it. If none of them do, you can probably borrow it through your local library's [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interlibrary_loan interlibrary loan] service. * [https://www.hoopladigital.com/browse/comic/popular Comics - Hoopla] - Libraries subscribe to this service to offer you digital comics (along with ebooks, audiobooks, music, and movies). Check your library's website to see if they're signed up with Hoopla. * [https://www.comixology.com/free-comics Free Comics - comiXology] - Free digital comics from one of the major online retailers. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_Comic_Book_Day Free Comic Book Day - Wikipedia] - An annual event that offers a set of free promotional comics through your local comic stores. * [http://l-lists.com/en/lists/quobv1.html List of Webcomic Directories - L-Lists] - The sites on this list link to thousands of webcomics, most of them completely free. ==== Paid comics ==== * [http://www.freecomicbookday.com/storelocator Find a Shop - Free Comic Book Day] - A searchable directory of physical comic book stores. These are good places to get overwhelmed by comics and to subscribe to regular installments of your favorite titles. * [https://www.yelp.com/search?find_desc=Bookstores Bookstores near you - Yelp] - Bookstores sell comics too. One notable chain is [https://www.hpb.com/ Half Price Books], which happily buys and sells used comics and graphic novels. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_comic#Notable_digital_distributors Notable digital distributors - Digital comic - Wikipedia] - Places to buy digital comics online. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_comics_publishing_companies List of comics publishing companies - Wikipedia] - You may be able to order print or digital comics directly from your favorite publishers. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_manga_distributors List of manga distributors - Wikipedia] - Places to buy manga, in some cases the digital editions. === Story-oriented routes === With this method you're looking for high quality comics. You don't care if they're important to a larger storyline. It helps if these are stand-alone stories, but they don't have to be. You can find these by visiting some of the more selective comic sources, such as libraries, and reading whatever they've decided is worth offering. Here's one source of lists that are based on data: * [http://www.diamondcomics.com/Home/1/1/3/237 Industry Statistics - Diamond Comic Distributors, Inc.] - Diamond distributes comics from publishers to retailers. This page links to their monthly lists of top selling comics and graphic novels. These ranks are based on orders from retailers rather than purchases by customers, but they should give you a good idea of the significant titles you might want to read. You can also look for lists of good comics online through web searches such as these: * [https://www.google.com/search?q=best+comics+stories Best comics stories - Google] * [https://www.google.com/search?q=new+to+comics New to comics - Google] * [https://www.google.com/search?q=comics+getting+started Comics getting started - Google] * [https://www.google.com/search?q=best+stand+alone+comics Best stand alone comics - Google] * [https://www.google.com/search?q=literary+comics Literary comics - Google] * [https://www.google.com/search?q=best+indie+comics Best indie comics - Google] * [https://www.google.com/search?q=best+manga Best manga - Google] You'll find a lot of these lists. Here are a bunch to start with: * [http://twocatscomicbookstore.blogspot.com/p/new-to-reading-comic-books-heres-where.html New to Comics? Start Here! - All Things Geeky] * [http://mashable.com/2015/08/02/comics-for-new-fans/#U7pBRxbd9sqF 25 comic books for nerdy newbies to read first - Mashable] * [https://comicvine.gamespot.com/profile/johnkmccubbin91/lists/my-top-stories-and-story-arcs-of-all-time/44413/ My Top Stories and Story Arcs of All Time - Comic Vine] * [http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/lists/superhero-comic-books-100-best-934371 100 Greatest Superhero Comics - Hollywood Reporter] * [http://www.complex.com/pop-culture/2013/01/the-25-comic-books-you-need-to-read-before-you-die/ The 25 Comic Books You Need To Read Before You Die - Complex] * [https://forbiddenplanet.com/log/50-best-best-graphic-novels/ 50 Best Of The Best Graphic Novels - Forbidden Planet] * [http://www.listchallenges.com/top-100-comic-book-storylines Top 100 Comic Book Storylines - List Challenges] * [http://www.comicbookherald.com/the-best-comics-of-all-time/ Dave’s Faves: All The Best Comics I’ve Ever Read - Comic Book Herald] * [http://www.nerdophiles.com/2015/01/25/a-beginners-guide-to-literary-comics/ A Beginner’s Guide to Literary Comics - Nerdophiles] * [http://www.rollingstone.com/culture/lists/drawn-out-the-50-best-non-superhero-graphic-novels-20140505 Drawn Out: The 50 Best Non-Superhero Graphic Novels - Rolling Stone] * [https://www.buzzfeed.com/summeranne/60-comics-everyone-should-read?utm_term=.axBWP74x1R#.hqQM2PK43k 60 Comics Everyone Should Read - BuzzFeed] * [https://www.comixology.com/New-to-comiXology-Start-Here/page/502 New to Comics? Start Here! - comiXology] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_best-selling_manga List of best-selling manga - Wikipedia] * [https://www.theguardian.com/childrens-books-site/2014/feb/03/manga-top-ten-teens Manga comics: where to start - The Guardian] === Creator-oriented routes === In this method you pick one or more comic writers or artists to follow and read some or all of their works. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Comics_creators Category:Comics creators - Wikipedia] * [https://pjmedia.com/lifestyle/2014/6/25/the-10-greatest-comic-book-writers-of-all-time/ The 10 Greatest Comic Book Writers of All Time - PJ Media] * [http://www.goliath.com/comics/the-10-most-influential-comic-book-writers-of-all-time/ The 10 Most Influential Comic Book Writers Of All Time - Goliath] * [http://www.creativebloq.com/comics/comic-book-artists-712389 The 10 greatest comic book artists of all time - Creative Bloq] * [http://www.comicartfans.com/comicartistsmain.asp Comic Artists - Comicartfans] - A large database of artists with lists on the front page of top ranking entries. * [http://geekandsundry.com/keep-current-by-reading-this-one-bleeding-edge-comic-book/ Keep Current by Reading This One Bleeding Edge Comic Book - Geek & Sundry] === Event-oriented routes === Many stories in comics take place in the context of a larger storyline. You could view the life of a character or team as a single storyline, or an entire comic book series, or even a publisher's complete body of work. One type of route is to read through one or more of these story arcs. If you have the time, you could try to read through every issue of the arc, or you can find ways to narrow down the list to the most interesting or important parts of the story. The fact that the top two publishers treat so much of their material as one semi-cohesive set of stories is one reason people find comics so hard to start reading. The good news is that both DC and Marvel periodically publish major story arcs in the form of crossover events. These events can serve as a way to organize the overall storyline of the publisher's universe. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Publication_history_of_DC_Comics_crossover_events Publication history of DC Comics crossover events - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Publication_history_of_Marvel_Comics_crossover_events Publication history of Marvel Comics crossover events - Wikipedia] Some story arcs can be hard to follow because they're spread out over a long time period and draw from several comic titles. So a lot of people have taken the time to put together reading orders to guide you, either through every issue of the story or through what they consider the most important parts. Here are some sites that cover a lot of storylines, mostly from DC and Marvel: * [http://www.comicbookherald.com/ Comic Book Herald] * [http://comicbookreadingorders.com/ Comic Book Reading Orders] * [http://www.tradereadingorder.com/list/comics/ Comics - Trade Reading Order] * [http://www.readingorders.com/ Comic Reading Orders] * [http://www.dcindexes.com/ Mike's Amazing World of Comics] * [https://www.reddit.com/r/comicreadingorders/ Comic Reading Orders - Reddit] * [http://cmro.travis-starnes.com/ The Complete Marvel Reading Order] * [http://www.alltimelines.com/all-comic-timelines/ All Comic Timelines - All Timelines] - This site puts the comics from various universes in chronological rather than publication order. * [http://www.supermegamonkey.net/chronocomic/ Marvel Comics Chronology - SuperMegaMonkey] If you search the web yourself for reading orders, you'll also find some for more obscure storylines, such as this interesting project that explores short-lived publishers from the 1990s: * [http://www.theshareduniverse.com/tag/dead-universes/ Dead Universes - The Shared Universe] === Theme-oriented routes === This last method is sort of a catch-all category for factors that cut across the other methods. These include story elements, genres, audiences, topics, and any other factor you can think of. Sometimes you'll find websites about comics on your chosen theme, but in a lot of cases, the best way to find relevant comics is a good old fashioned web search. Here are some examples: * [https://www.google.com/search?q=comics+about+cyborgs Comics about cyborgs - Google] - A story element, a character type. * [https://www.google.com/search?q=comics+set+in+chicago Comics set in Chicago - Google] - Another story element, a setting. * [https://www.google.com/search?q=slice+of+life+manga Slice of life manga - Google] - A genre. * [https://www.google.com/search?q=manga+about+revenge Manga about revenge - Google] - A topic. * [http://www.kidscomics.com/Home/1/1/60/1046 Kids Comics] - An audience. == Closing thoughts == In this guide I've tried to give you a broad set of starting points for planning your comic reading adventures. The next steps are up to you. Pick a goal, pick a method, do some research, chart a course, and have fun reading. Maybe even share your journey with others. And feel free to leave feedback on this guide in the comments below. == Planned updates == * Add examples. * Cover the different types of comics more evenly (superhero, licensed, literary, webcomics, manga, etc.). * Add a site that correlates comic book issues with collected editions. <disqus/> [[Category:Comics]] [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Developing]] 359c6a1290b5b40faf812e9e749ffcfe4cf882a2 332 304 2018-05-02T03:04:17Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added advice on finding collections. wikitext text/x-wiki Comics are an inviting art form for many reasons, but they're also an overwhelming one. There are just too many comics to know where to start or to easily make sense of the material. At least that's how it can look to a newcomer. This article is a beginner-to-beginner guide to getting started in reading comics. That is, I have a long way to go before I'd call myself an expert, but I'm far enough along that I have things to say. When I was starting my latest attempt to launch into the world of comics, I asked Google for some getting-started guides. It gave me some, and they were helpful, but they didn't entirely give me what I wanted. So I've done some of my own research and put together a guide that's closer to the map I'm looking for. In this guide I'll invite you to be an explorer. The world of comics is vast, and so is the world of comics discussion. My goal is to give you a way to think about these discussions and then give you starting points for finding them. It's up to you to chart your own path. This is a work in progress, so expect some updates! == Mapping the territory == Before we start navigating, it might be good to get an overall picture of the world we'll be traveling. Here's a good starting point: * [http://www.comicspectrum.com/comics.html Comics - Comic Spectrum] - These articles give brief overviews of different aspects of comics, from which are the major publishers to how to buy comics to what the deal is with manga and webcomics. The next sites cover large areas of the comics industry in detail. You can use them as references to search for specific information or wander through them aimlessly, clicking any links that catch your eye. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portal:Comics The Comics Portal - Wikipedia] * [http://animanga.wikia.com/wiki/Animanga_Wiki Animanga Wiki] * [https://dmoztools.net/Arts/Comics/ Arts > Comics - dmoztools.net] - The comics section of a general web directory, a large, organized collections of links. This site is only a mirror of the original DMOZ directory, which has been shut down, so more recent sites won't be included, but there's still plenty to explore. Even in the age of the web, books are still a good source of information. Here are some worthwhile reference books: * [https://www.amazon.com/DC-Comics-History-Daniel-Wallace/dp/1465433848/ DC Comics: A Visual History, Updated Edition] - This book highlights the major developments in DC Comics for each year the publisher has existed, heavily illustrated with comic covers and other art. It's a good place to find artists to follow, pick up on major characters and storylines, and place it all in the context of other developments in the comic industry and in world history. * [https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1465414436/ Marvel Year by Year, Updated and Expanded] - The Marvel version of the DC visual history. == Choosing destinations == Whenever you start on a journey, you'll want a destination in mind, or at least a purpose for your travels. For example: * Every few months comic-related hype blows up your Twitter feed, and you want to see what all the hubbub is about. * You've dabbled in comics and want to explore them more extensively. * You like comic fans and want to be able to talk with them. * You want to study the work of other comic creators to learn how to tell your own stories with pictures. * You just want to read some good visual stories. Your goals will guide your decisions along the way. Before going into the details, though, let's look more closely at some destinations you might be aiming for. === Keeping up with new comics === One of your goals might be to catch up on some current storylines in comics so you can keep up with them going forward. How will you keep up once you've caught up? Here's some advice on doing that: * [https://www.themarysue.com/how-to-buy-comics-a-beginners-guide/ How To Buy Comics: A Beginner’s Guide - The Mary Sue] * [http://comicsalliance.com/small-press-previews-indie-comics-website/ Small Press Previews: A New Way Of Keeping Up To Date With The Latest Indie Comics - Comics Alliance] Here are some places to find out about new comic releases: * [https://www.previewsworld.com/NewReleases New Releases - Previews World] * [http://freshcomics.us/ Fresh Comics] * [http://www.midtowncomics.com/ Midtown Comics] * [http://indiecomicsmagazine.com/ Indie Comics Magazine] * [http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/news/archive News Archive - Anime News Network] - Search the post titles for "releases." === Places to talk about comics === If one of your goals is to discuss comics with other fans, there's no shortage of places to do that. Here are some starting points for finding them: * [https://www.meetup.com/find/events/?keywords=comics Comics meetups near you - Meetup.com] - Places to talk to fellow comic fans in person. * [https://www.reddit.com/r/comics/ Comics - Reddit] * [https://www.reddit.com/r/manga/ Manga - Reddit] * [https://www.wishberry.in/blog/10-international-comic-blogs-that-keep-you-updated-with-the-comic-space/ 10 International Comic Blogs That Keep You Updated With The Comic Space - Wishberry] - Most blogs like these let you comment on the posts, and some even have forums so you can start your own discussions. * [http://www.theweeklypull.net/ The Weekly Pull] - The hub for a group of large comic-related YouTube channels, centered around their shared podcast. They sometimes have guests from other channels, such as [http://www.theweeklypull.net/the-weekly-pull-podcast-episode-22-wnerdsync-productions NerdSync], so you can get an idea of who else is out there. In addition to podcast episodes and YouTube videos, the site features articles and a forum. == Planning routes == Once you have an idea of your destination, or at least the kind of travel you want to experience, how will you get there? The approach I'm recommending is to pick one or more specific ways to organize your journey and then pick a strategy for choosing your stops along the way. Here are some other writers who recommend a similar approach: * [http://www.howtolovecomics.com/2013/09/12/how-do-i-get-into-comics-guide-for-those-new-to-comics/ How Do I Get Into Comics? - How to Love Comics] - A good set of general advice. * [http://lifehacker.com/how-to-get-started-reading-comics-that-have-been-runnin-1692145879 How to Get Started Reading Comics That Have Been Running For Decades - Lifehacker] * [http://www.comicbookherald.com/how-to-start-reading-comics/ How To Start Reading Comics In 2017: A Beginner’s Guide - Comic Book Herald] In my version of this scheme, the organizing factors you could choose are * sources (places to find comics), * stories (quality, stand-alone comic collections), * creators (writers and artists), * events (important stories from a character's life or a publisher's continuity), * and themes (topics or story elements). I'll go into more detail on each of these factors in the rest of this section. But first let's talk about some basic strategies for choosing comics from your chosen route. === Strategies for choosing comics === Any path you choose will probably include a lot of comics. There are a few patterns you could use to decide on which of those to read: * '''Serendipitous selecting''' - In this strategy you pick up any comics that appeal to you without worrying about the ones you leave on the shelf. Your selection can end up looking kind of random. Serendipity is especially helpful for the times when you're looking for possible new routes. When using this strategy, it helps if you aren't a completist. Otherwise you'll still worry about the comics you've left behind. * '''Exhaustive selecting''' - In this strategy you read every comic you can get your hands on in the route you've chosen. In some cases the route is short enough that this will be manageable. In other cases it'll be challenging or impossible, and that's a good time to consider the next strategy. * '''Ranked selecting''' - In this strategy you read only the important comics in your route. It'll take some research, advice, and thought to decide which comics are important to you, but it could save you a lot of extra reading time. Now let's look at some ways to find routes. === Source-oriented routes === In this method, you base your selection on whatever you can pick up from a particular source. Sources include libraries, brick-and-mortar stores, and online stores. You probably won't be able to read everything your source offers, so I'd say this method works best with a serendipitous strategy. It's a good way to sample comics when you're looking for a route from another category, such as finding a character to follow (that is, a story- or event-oriented route). * [http://bookriot.com/2016/06/20/6-ways-to-keep-up-with-comics-when-youre-broke/ 6 Ways to Keep up With Comics When You’re Broke - Book Riot] - This article describes some sources of cheap or free comics. ==== Free comics ==== * [http://www.worldcat.org/ WorldCat] - An online catalog of thousands of libraries worldwide. If you're only after good comics from your local library, take a trip there and look around. If you're looking for a specific comic, you can search this catalog and see which libraries near you have it. If none of them do, you can probably borrow it through your local library's [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interlibrary_loan interlibrary loan] service. * [https://www.hoopladigital.com/browse/comic/popular Comics - Hoopla] - Libraries subscribe to this service to offer you digital comics (along with ebooks, audiobooks, music, and movies). Check your library's website to see if they're signed up with Hoopla. * [https://www.comixology.com/free-comics Free Comics - comiXology] - Free digital comics from one of the major online retailers. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_Comic_Book_Day Free Comic Book Day - Wikipedia] - An annual event that offers a set of free promotional comics through your local comic stores. * [http://l-lists.com/en/lists/quobv1.html List of Webcomic Directories - L-Lists] - The sites on this list link to thousands of webcomics, most of them completely free. ==== Paid comics ==== * [http://www.freecomicbookday.com/storelocator Find a Shop - Free Comic Book Day] - A searchable directory of physical comic book stores. These are good places to get overwhelmed by comics and to subscribe to regular installments of your favorite titles. * [https://www.yelp.com/search?find_desc=Bookstores Bookstores near you - Yelp] - Bookstores sell comics too. One notable chain is [https://www.hpb.com/ Half Price Books], which happily buys and sells used comics and graphic novels. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_comic#Notable_digital_distributors Notable digital distributors - Digital comic - Wikipedia] - Places to buy digital comics online. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_comics_publishing_companies List of comics publishing companies - Wikipedia] - You may be able to order print or digital comics directly from your favorite publishers. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_manga_distributors List of manga distributors - Wikipedia] - Places to buy manga, in some cases the digital editions. === Story-oriented routes === With this method you're looking for high quality comics. You don't care if they're important to a larger storyline. It helps if these are stand-alone stories, but they don't have to be. You can find these by visiting some of the more selective comic sources, such as libraries, and reading whatever they've decided is worth offering. Here's one source of lists that are based on data: * [http://www.diamondcomics.com/Home/1/1/3/237 Industry Statistics - Diamond Comic Distributors, Inc.] - Diamond distributes comics from publishers to retailers. This page links to their monthly lists of top selling comics and graphic novels. These ranks are based on orders from retailers rather than purchases by customers, but they should give you a good idea of the significant titles you might want to read. You can also look for lists of good comics online through web searches such as these: * [https://www.google.com/search?q=best+comics+stories Best comics stories - Google] * [https://www.google.com/search?q=new+to+comics New to comics - Google] * [https://www.google.com/search?q=comics+getting+started Comics getting started - Google] * [https://www.google.com/search?q=best+stand+alone+comics Best stand alone comics - Google] * [https://www.google.com/search?q=literary+comics Literary comics - Google] * [https://www.google.com/search?q=best+indie+comics Best indie comics - Google] * [https://www.google.com/search?q=best+manga Best manga - Google] You'll find a lot of these lists. Here are a bunch to start with: * [http://twocatscomicbookstore.blogspot.com/p/new-to-reading-comic-books-heres-where.html New to Comics? Start Here! - All Things Geeky] * [http://mashable.com/2015/08/02/comics-for-new-fans/#U7pBRxbd9sqF 25 comic books for nerdy newbies to read first - Mashable] * [https://comicvine.gamespot.com/profile/johnkmccubbin91/lists/my-top-stories-and-story-arcs-of-all-time/44413/ My Top Stories and Story Arcs of All Time - Comic Vine] * [http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/lists/superhero-comic-books-100-best-934371 100 Greatest Superhero Comics - Hollywood Reporter] * [http://www.complex.com/pop-culture/2013/01/the-25-comic-books-you-need-to-read-before-you-die/ The 25 Comic Books You Need To Read Before You Die - Complex] * [https://forbiddenplanet.com/log/50-best-best-graphic-novels/ 50 Best Of The Best Graphic Novels - Forbidden Planet] * [http://www.listchallenges.com/top-100-comic-book-storylines Top 100 Comic Book Storylines - List Challenges] * [http://www.comicbookherald.com/the-best-comics-of-all-time/ Dave’s Faves: All The Best Comics I’ve Ever Read - Comic Book Herald] * [http://www.nerdophiles.com/2015/01/25/a-beginners-guide-to-literary-comics/ A Beginner’s Guide to Literary Comics - Nerdophiles] * [http://www.rollingstone.com/culture/lists/drawn-out-the-50-best-non-superhero-graphic-novels-20140505 Drawn Out: The 50 Best Non-Superhero Graphic Novels - Rolling Stone] * [https://www.buzzfeed.com/summeranne/60-comics-everyone-should-read?utm_term=.axBWP74x1R#.hqQM2PK43k 60 Comics Everyone Should Read - BuzzFeed] * [https://www.comixology.com/New-to-comiXology-Start-Here/page/502 New to Comics? Start Here! - comiXology] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_best-selling_manga List of best-selling manga - Wikipedia] * [https://www.theguardian.com/childrens-books-site/2014/feb/03/manga-top-ten-teens Manga comics: where to start - The Guardian] === Creator-oriented routes === In this method you pick one or more comic writers or artists to follow and read some or all of their works. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Comics_creators Category:Comics creators - Wikipedia] * [https://pjmedia.com/lifestyle/2014/6/25/the-10-greatest-comic-book-writers-of-all-time/ The 10 Greatest Comic Book Writers of All Time - PJ Media] * [http://www.goliath.com/comics/the-10-most-influential-comic-book-writers-of-all-time/ The 10 Most Influential Comic Book Writers Of All Time - Goliath] * [http://www.creativebloq.com/comics/comic-book-artists-712389 The 10 greatest comic book artists of all time - Creative Bloq] * [http://www.comicartfans.com/comicartistsmain.asp Comic Artists - Comicartfans] - A large database of artists with lists on the front page of top ranking entries. * [http://geekandsundry.com/keep-current-by-reading-this-one-bleeding-edge-comic-book/ Keep Current by Reading This One Bleeding Edge Comic Book - Geek & Sundry] === Event-oriented routes === Many stories in comics take place in the context of a larger storyline. You could view the life of a character or team as a single storyline, or an entire comic book series, or even a publisher's complete body of work. One type of route is to read through one or more of these story arcs. If you have the time, you could try to read through every issue of the arc, or you can find ways to narrow down the list to the most interesting or important parts of the story. The fact that the top two publishers treat so much of their material as one semi-cohesive set of stories is one reason people find comics so hard to start reading. The good news is that both DC and Marvel periodically publish major story arcs in the form of crossover events. These events can serve as a way to organize the overall storyline of the publisher's universe. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Publication_history_of_DC_Comics_crossover_events Publication history of DC Comics crossover events - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Publication_history_of_Marvel_Comics_crossover_events Publication history of Marvel Comics crossover events - Wikipedia] Some story arcs can be hard to follow because they're spread out over a long time period and draw from several comic titles. So a lot of people have taken the time to put together reading orders to guide you, either through every issue of the story or through what they consider the most important parts. Here are some sites that cover a lot of storylines, mostly from DC and Marvel: * [http://www.comicbookherald.com/ Comic Book Herald] * [http://comicbookreadingorders.com/ Comic Book Reading Orders] * [http://www.tradereadingorder.com/list/comics/ Comics - Trade Reading Order] * [http://www.readingorders.com/ Comic Reading Orders] * [http://www.dcindexes.com/ Mike's Amazing World of Comics] * [https://www.reddit.com/r/comicreadingorders/ Comic Reading Orders - Reddit] * [http://cmro.travis-starnes.com/ The Complete Marvel Reading Order] * [http://www.alltimelines.com/all-comic-timelines/ All Comic Timelines - All Timelines] - This site puts the comics from various universes in chronological rather than publication order. * [http://www.supermegamonkey.net/chronocomic/ Marvel Comics Chronology - SuperMegaMonkey] If you search the web yourself for reading orders, you'll also find some for more obscure storylines, such as this interesting project that explores short-lived publishers from the 1990s: * [http://www.theshareduniverse.com/tag/dead-universes/ Dead Universes - The Shared Universe] A lot of reading orders list individual comic issues, but these can be hard to get your hands on. Fortunately, publishers often release collections of related issues as trade paperbacks or hardcovers, and these are a lot easier to find. How will you know which collections have the issues you need? The database sites below will help. Search for an issue, and the issue's page will list other issues or collections where it's been reprinted: * [https://www.comics.org/ The Grand Comics Database] - The GCD lists reprints of the individual stories within an issue. * [http://comicbookdb.com/ Comic Book DB] - Trade paperback collections are labeled TPB, and hardcovers are labeled HC. === Theme-oriented routes === This last method is sort of a catch-all category for factors that cut across the other methods. These include story elements, genres, audiences, topics, and any other factor you can think of. Sometimes you'll find websites about comics on your chosen theme, but in a lot of cases, the best way to find relevant comics is a good old fashioned web search. Here are some examples: * [https://www.google.com/search?q=comics+about+cyborgs Comics about cyborgs - Google] - A story element, a character type. * [https://www.google.com/search?q=comics+set+in+chicago Comics set in Chicago - Google] - Another story element, a setting. * [https://www.google.com/search?q=slice+of+life+manga Slice of life manga - Google] - A genre. * [https://www.google.com/search?q=manga+about+revenge Manga about revenge - Google] - A topic. * [http://www.kidscomics.com/Home/1/1/60/1046 Kids Comics] - An audience. == Closing thoughts == In this guide I've tried to give you a broad set of starting points for planning your comic reading adventures. The next steps are up to you. Pick a goal, pick a method, do some research, chart a course, and have fun reading. Maybe even share your journey with others. And feel free to leave feedback on this guide in the comments below. == Planned updates == * Add examples. * Cover the different types of comics more evenly (superhero, licensed, literary, webcomics, manga, etc.). * Add a site that correlates comic book issues with collected editions. <disqus/> [[Category:Comics]] [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Developing]] d464631ab357b5be3d34de1215ee5f327a32d81f 333 332 2018-05-02T03:05:27Z Andy Culbertson 1 Removed the collections item from the planned updates. wikitext text/x-wiki Comics are an inviting art form for many reasons, but they're also an overwhelming one. There are just too many comics to know where to start or to easily make sense of the material. At least that's how it can look to a newcomer. This article is a beginner-to-beginner guide to getting started in reading comics. That is, I have a long way to go before I'd call myself an expert, but I'm far enough along that I have things to say. When I was starting my latest attempt to launch into the world of comics, I asked Google for some getting-started guides. It gave me some, and they were helpful, but they didn't entirely give me what I wanted. So I've done some of my own research and put together a guide that's closer to the map I'm looking for. In this guide I'll invite you to be an explorer. The world of comics is vast, and so is the world of comics discussion. My goal is to give you a way to think about these discussions and then give you starting points for finding them. It's up to you to chart your own path. This is a work in progress, so expect some updates! == Mapping the territory == Before we start navigating, it might be good to get an overall picture of the world we'll be traveling. Here's a good starting point: * [http://www.comicspectrum.com/comics.html Comics - Comic Spectrum] - These articles give brief overviews of different aspects of comics, from which are the major publishers to how to buy comics to what the deal is with manga and webcomics. The next sites cover large areas of the comics industry in detail. You can use them as references to search for specific information or wander through them aimlessly, clicking any links that catch your eye. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portal:Comics The Comics Portal - Wikipedia] * [http://animanga.wikia.com/wiki/Animanga_Wiki Animanga Wiki] * [https://dmoztools.net/Arts/Comics/ Arts > Comics - dmoztools.net] - The comics section of a general web directory, a large, organized collections of links. This site is only a mirror of the original DMOZ directory, which has been shut down, so more recent sites won't be included, but there's still plenty to explore. Even in the age of the web, books are still a good source of information. Here are some worthwhile reference books: * [https://www.amazon.com/DC-Comics-History-Daniel-Wallace/dp/1465433848/ DC Comics: A Visual History, Updated Edition] - This book highlights the major developments in DC Comics for each year the publisher has existed, heavily illustrated with comic covers and other art. It's a good place to find artists to follow, pick up on major characters and storylines, and place it all in the context of other developments in the comic industry and in world history. * [https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1465414436/ Marvel Year by Year, Updated and Expanded] - The Marvel version of the DC visual history. == Choosing destinations == Whenever you start on a journey, you'll want a destination in mind, or at least a purpose for your travels. For example: * Every few months comic-related hype blows up your Twitter feed, and you want to see what all the hubbub is about. * You've dabbled in comics and want to explore them more extensively. * You like comic fans and want to be able to talk with them. * You want to study the work of other comic creators to learn how to tell your own stories with pictures. * You just want to read some good visual stories. Your goals will guide your decisions along the way. Before going into the details, though, let's look more closely at some destinations you might be aiming for. === Keeping up with new comics === One of your goals might be to catch up on some current storylines in comics so you can keep up with them going forward. How will you keep up once you've caught up? Here's some advice on doing that: * [https://www.themarysue.com/how-to-buy-comics-a-beginners-guide/ How To Buy Comics: A Beginner’s Guide - The Mary Sue] * [http://comicsalliance.com/small-press-previews-indie-comics-website/ Small Press Previews: A New Way Of Keeping Up To Date With The Latest Indie Comics - Comics Alliance] Here are some places to find out about new comic releases: * [https://www.previewsworld.com/NewReleases New Releases - Previews World] * [http://freshcomics.us/ Fresh Comics] * [http://www.midtowncomics.com/ Midtown Comics] * [http://indiecomicsmagazine.com/ Indie Comics Magazine] * [http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/news/archive News Archive - Anime News Network] - Search the post titles for "releases." === Places to talk about comics === If one of your goals is to discuss comics with other fans, there's no shortage of places to do that. Here are some starting points for finding them: * [https://www.meetup.com/find/events/?keywords=comics Comics meetups near you - Meetup.com] - Places to talk to fellow comic fans in person. * [https://www.reddit.com/r/comics/ Comics - Reddit] * [https://www.reddit.com/r/manga/ Manga - Reddit] * [https://www.wishberry.in/blog/10-international-comic-blogs-that-keep-you-updated-with-the-comic-space/ 10 International Comic Blogs That Keep You Updated With The Comic Space - Wishberry] - Most blogs like these let you comment on the posts, and some even have forums so you can start your own discussions. * [http://www.theweeklypull.net/ The Weekly Pull] - The hub for a group of large comic-related YouTube channels, centered around their shared podcast. They sometimes have guests from other channels, such as [http://www.theweeklypull.net/the-weekly-pull-podcast-episode-22-wnerdsync-productions NerdSync], so you can get an idea of who else is out there. In addition to podcast episodes and YouTube videos, the site features articles and a forum. == Planning routes == Once you have an idea of your destination, or at least the kind of travel you want to experience, how will you get there? The approach I'm recommending is to pick one or more specific ways to organize your journey and then pick a strategy for choosing your stops along the way. Here are some other writers who recommend a similar approach: * [http://www.howtolovecomics.com/2013/09/12/how-do-i-get-into-comics-guide-for-those-new-to-comics/ How Do I Get Into Comics? - How to Love Comics] - A good set of general advice. * [http://lifehacker.com/how-to-get-started-reading-comics-that-have-been-runnin-1692145879 How to Get Started Reading Comics That Have Been Running For Decades - Lifehacker] * [http://www.comicbookherald.com/how-to-start-reading-comics/ How To Start Reading Comics In 2017: A Beginner’s Guide - Comic Book Herald] In my version of this scheme, the organizing factors you could choose are * sources (places to find comics), * stories (quality, stand-alone comic collections), * creators (writers and artists), * events (important stories from a character's life or a publisher's continuity), * and themes (topics or story elements). I'll go into more detail on each of these factors in the rest of this section. But first let's talk about some basic strategies for choosing comics from your chosen route. === Strategies for choosing comics === Any path you choose will probably include a lot of comics. There are a few patterns you could use to decide on which of those to read: * '''Serendipitous selecting''' - In this strategy you pick up any comics that appeal to you without worrying about the ones you leave on the shelf. Your selection can end up looking kind of random. Serendipity is especially helpful for the times when you're looking for possible new routes. When using this strategy, it helps if you aren't a completist. Otherwise you'll still worry about the comics you've left behind. * '''Exhaustive selecting''' - In this strategy you read every comic you can get your hands on in the route you've chosen. In some cases the route is short enough that this will be manageable. In other cases it'll be challenging or impossible, and that's a good time to consider the next strategy. * '''Ranked selecting''' - In this strategy you read only the important comics in your route. It'll take some research, advice, and thought to decide which comics are important to you, but it could save you a lot of extra reading time. Now let's look at some ways to find routes. === Source-oriented routes === In this method, you base your selection on whatever you can pick up from a particular source. Sources include libraries, brick-and-mortar stores, and online stores. You probably won't be able to read everything your source offers, so I'd say this method works best with a serendipitous strategy. It's a good way to sample comics when you're looking for a route from another category, such as finding a character to follow (that is, a story- or event-oriented route). * [http://bookriot.com/2016/06/20/6-ways-to-keep-up-with-comics-when-youre-broke/ 6 Ways to Keep up With Comics When You’re Broke - Book Riot] - This article describes some sources of cheap or free comics. ==== Free comics ==== * [http://www.worldcat.org/ WorldCat] - An online catalog of thousands of libraries worldwide. If you're only after good comics from your local library, take a trip there and look around. If you're looking for a specific comic, you can search this catalog and see which libraries near you have it. If none of them do, you can probably borrow it through your local library's [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interlibrary_loan interlibrary loan] service. * [https://www.hoopladigital.com/browse/comic/popular Comics - Hoopla] - Libraries subscribe to this service to offer you digital comics (along with ebooks, audiobooks, music, and movies). Check your library's website to see if they're signed up with Hoopla. * [https://www.comixology.com/free-comics Free Comics - comiXology] - Free digital comics from one of the major online retailers. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_Comic_Book_Day Free Comic Book Day - Wikipedia] - An annual event that offers a set of free promotional comics through your local comic stores. * [http://l-lists.com/en/lists/quobv1.html List of Webcomic Directories - L-Lists] - The sites on this list link to thousands of webcomics, most of them completely free. ==== Paid comics ==== * [http://www.freecomicbookday.com/storelocator Find a Shop - Free Comic Book Day] - A searchable directory of physical comic book stores. These are good places to get overwhelmed by comics and to subscribe to regular installments of your favorite titles. * [https://www.yelp.com/search?find_desc=Bookstores Bookstores near you - Yelp] - Bookstores sell comics too. One notable chain is [https://www.hpb.com/ Half Price Books], which happily buys and sells used comics and graphic novels. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_comic#Notable_digital_distributors Notable digital distributors - Digital comic - Wikipedia] - Places to buy digital comics online. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_comics_publishing_companies List of comics publishing companies - Wikipedia] - You may be able to order print or digital comics directly from your favorite publishers. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_manga_distributors List of manga distributors - Wikipedia] - Places to buy manga, in some cases the digital editions. === Story-oriented routes === With this method you're looking for high quality comics. You don't care if they're important to a larger storyline. It helps if these are stand-alone stories, but they don't have to be. You can find these by visiting some of the more selective comic sources, such as libraries, and reading whatever they've decided is worth offering. Here's one source of lists that are based on data: * [http://www.diamondcomics.com/Home/1/1/3/237 Industry Statistics - Diamond Comic Distributors, Inc.] - Diamond distributes comics from publishers to retailers. This page links to their monthly lists of top selling comics and graphic novels. These ranks are based on orders from retailers rather than purchases by customers, but they should give you a good idea of the significant titles you might want to read. You can also look for lists of good comics online through web searches such as these: * [https://www.google.com/search?q=best+comics+stories Best comics stories - Google] * [https://www.google.com/search?q=new+to+comics New to comics - Google] * [https://www.google.com/search?q=comics+getting+started Comics getting started - Google] * [https://www.google.com/search?q=best+stand+alone+comics Best stand alone comics - Google] * [https://www.google.com/search?q=literary+comics Literary comics - Google] * [https://www.google.com/search?q=best+indie+comics Best indie comics - Google] * [https://www.google.com/search?q=best+manga Best manga - Google] You'll find a lot of these lists. Here are a bunch to start with: * [http://twocatscomicbookstore.blogspot.com/p/new-to-reading-comic-books-heres-where.html New to Comics? Start Here! - All Things Geeky] * [http://mashable.com/2015/08/02/comics-for-new-fans/#U7pBRxbd9sqF 25 comic books for nerdy newbies to read first - Mashable] * [https://comicvine.gamespot.com/profile/johnkmccubbin91/lists/my-top-stories-and-story-arcs-of-all-time/44413/ My Top Stories and Story Arcs of All Time - Comic Vine] * [http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/lists/superhero-comic-books-100-best-934371 100 Greatest Superhero Comics - Hollywood Reporter] * [http://www.complex.com/pop-culture/2013/01/the-25-comic-books-you-need-to-read-before-you-die/ The 25 Comic Books You Need To Read Before You Die - Complex] * [https://forbiddenplanet.com/log/50-best-best-graphic-novels/ 50 Best Of The Best Graphic Novels - Forbidden Planet] * [http://www.listchallenges.com/top-100-comic-book-storylines Top 100 Comic Book Storylines - List Challenges] * [http://www.comicbookherald.com/the-best-comics-of-all-time/ Dave’s Faves: All The Best Comics I’ve Ever Read - Comic Book Herald] * [http://www.nerdophiles.com/2015/01/25/a-beginners-guide-to-literary-comics/ A Beginner’s Guide to Literary Comics - Nerdophiles] * [http://www.rollingstone.com/culture/lists/drawn-out-the-50-best-non-superhero-graphic-novels-20140505 Drawn Out: The 50 Best Non-Superhero Graphic Novels - Rolling Stone] * [https://www.buzzfeed.com/summeranne/60-comics-everyone-should-read?utm_term=.axBWP74x1R#.hqQM2PK43k 60 Comics Everyone Should Read - BuzzFeed] * [https://www.comixology.com/New-to-comiXology-Start-Here/page/502 New to Comics? Start Here! - comiXology] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_best-selling_manga List of best-selling manga - Wikipedia] * [https://www.theguardian.com/childrens-books-site/2014/feb/03/manga-top-ten-teens Manga comics: where to start - The Guardian] === Creator-oriented routes === In this method you pick one or more comic writers or artists to follow and read some or all of their works. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Comics_creators Category:Comics creators - Wikipedia] * [https://pjmedia.com/lifestyle/2014/6/25/the-10-greatest-comic-book-writers-of-all-time/ The 10 Greatest Comic Book Writers of All Time - PJ Media] * [http://www.goliath.com/comics/the-10-most-influential-comic-book-writers-of-all-time/ The 10 Most Influential Comic Book Writers Of All Time - Goliath] * [http://www.creativebloq.com/comics/comic-book-artists-712389 The 10 greatest comic book artists of all time - Creative Bloq] * [http://www.comicartfans.com/comicartistsmain.asp Comic Artists - Comicartfans] - A large database of artists with lists on the front page of top ranking entries. * [http://geekandsundry.com/keep-current-by-reading-this-one-bleeding-edge-comic-book/ Keep Current by Reading This One Bleeding Edge Comic Book - Geek & Sundry] === Event-oriented routes === Many stories in comics take place in the context of a larger storyline. You could view the life of a character or team as a single storyline, or an entire comic book series, or even a publisher's complete body of work. One type of route is to read through one or more of these story arcs. If you have the time, you could try to read through every issue of the arc, or you can find ways to narrow down the list to the most interesting or important parts of the story. The fact that the top two publishers treat so much of their material as one semi-cohesive set of stories is one reason people find comics so hard to start reading. The good news is that both DC and Marvel periodically publish major story arcs in the form of crossover events. These events can serve as a way to organize the overall storyline of the publisher's universe. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Publication_history_of_DC_Comics_crossover_events Publication history of DC Comics crossover events - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Publication_history_of_Marvel_Comics_crossover_events Publication history of Marvel Comics crossover events - Wikipedia] Some story arcs can be hard to follow because they're spread out over a long time period and draw from several comic titles. So a lot of people have taken the time to put together reading orders to guide you, either through every issue of the story or through what they consider the most important parts. Here are some sites that cover a lot of storylines, mostly from DC and Marvel: * [http://www.comicbookherald.com/ Comic Book Herald] * [http://comicbookreadingorders.com/ Comic Book Reading Orders] * [http://www.tradereadingorder.com/list/comics/ Comics - Trade Reading Order] * [http://www.readingorders.com/ Comic Reading Orders] * [http://www.dcindexes.com/ Mike's Amazing World of Comics] * [https://www.reddit.com/r/comicreadingorders/ Comic Reading Orders - Reddit] * [http://cmro.travis-starnes.com/ The Complete Marvel Reading Order] * [http://www.alltimelines.com/all-comic-timelines/ All Comic Timelines - All Timelines] - This site puts the comics from various universes in chronological rather than publication order. * [http://www.supermegamonkey.net/chronocomic/ Marvel Comics Chronology - SuperMegaMonkey] If you search the web yourself for reading orders, you'll also find some for more obscure storylines, such as this interesting project that explores short-lived publishers from the 1990s: * [http://www.theshareduniverse.com/tag/dead-universes/ Dead Universes - The Shared Universe] A lot of reading orders list individual comic issues, but these can be hard to get your hands on. Fortunately, publishers often release collections of related issues as trade paperbacks or hardcovers, and these are a lot easier to find. How will you know which collections have the issues you need? The database sites below will help. Search for an issue, and the issue's page will list other issues or collections where it's been reprinted: * [https://www.comics.org/ The Grand Comics Database] - The GCD lists reprints of the individual stories within an issue. * [http://comicbookdb.com/ Comic Book DB] - Trade paperback collections are labeled TPB, and hardcovers are labeled HC. === Theme-oriented routes === This last method is sort of a catch-all category for factors that cut across the other methods. These include story elements, genres, audiences, topics, and any other factor you can think of. Sometimes you'll find websites about comics on your chosen theme, but in a lot of cases, the best way to find relevant comics is a good old fashioned web search. Here are some examples: * [https://www.google.com/search?q=comics+about+cyborgs Comics about cyborgs - Google] - A story element, a character type. * [https://www.google.com/search?q=comics+set+in+chicago Comics set in Chicago - Google] - Another story element, a setting. * [https://www.google.com/search?q=slice+of+life+manga Slice of life manga - Google] - A genre. * [https://www.google.com/search?q=manga+about+revenge Manga about revenge - Google] - A topic. * [http://www.kidscomics.com/Home/1/1/60/1046 Kids Comics] - An audience. == Closing thoughts == In this guide I've tried to give you a broad set of starting points for planning your comic reading adventures. The next steps are up to you. Pick a goal, pick a method, do some research, chart a course, and have fun reading. Maybe even share your journey with others. And feel free to leave feedback on this guide in the comments below. == Planned updates == * Add examples. * Cover the different types of comics more evenly (superhero, licensed, literary, webcomics, manga, etc.). <disqus/> [[Category:Comics]] [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Developing]] d6cdc341fd20ad0cc0b863245a88bc45db8a2016 14 114 303 2017-05-15T10:20:25Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the category. wikitext text/x-wiki [[Category:Arts]] d1506439f9d51e39e313798ac6599a2cee896a8e 0 40 305 107 2017-05-29T13:39:27Z Andy Culbertson 1 Andy Culbertson moved page [[My Current Theology]] to [[My Current Beliefs]]: I wanted a broader term than "theology." wikitext text/x-wiki Version 1.0, 7-17-05 Here are some of my current theological positions. This outline comes from a book by Gregory Boyd and Paul Eddy called ''Across the Spectrum: Understanding Issues in Evangelical Theology'' and the online appendix to it ([http://www.gregboyd.org/ www.gregboyd.org]; see the “Books and Essays” section). I’ve rearranged the issues to follow the traditional categories of systematic theology. My purpose in writing this is to give theologically-minded people a quick overview of my distinctive beliefs. Thus I’m assuming you already know what most of these terms mean or where to find out, and I’m not covering the standard details that all Christians or all evangelicals believe. Even though I consider this my theology, most of these positions don’t have the status of a full belief. They’re more like unsettled opinions. I arrived at them either by upbringing or by a minimal to moderate amount of investigation or simply by subjective preference. They will all be up for review at some time in the future. Broadly speaking, I classify myself as an evangelical Protestant. More specifically, I’m a Reformed Baptist. That label ties together a number of views that are scattered throughout this list. === Prolegomena === ==== Theological method ==== # Deriving propositional truth from scripture (the traditional model) # Understanding the Bible’s story through the lens of modern-day culture (the postfoundationalist model) The traditional model. ==== Inspiration ==== # Without error of any kind (the inerrantist view) # Infallible in matters of faith and practice (the infallibilist view) Hmm, toughie. I’ve always believed in inerrancy, but now I believe the biblical writers held the same basic cosmology as their Ancient Near East neighbors, which might put me in the infallibilist camp, unless that’s considered accommodation. Whether there are actual errors in the Bible, wellll, I’ll say no, for now … === Theology proper === ==== Models of the Trinity ==== # The Trinity is analogous to the unity and diversity of the human self (the psychological model) # The Trinity is analogous to the unity of three people (the social model) The psychological model, but only because I find it intriguing. ==== Providence ==== # God is sovereign over all things (the Calvinist view) # God limits his control by granting freedom (the Arminian view) The Calvinist view. ==== Foreknowledge ==== # God foreknows all that shall come to pass (the classical view) # God knows all that shall be and all that may be (the open view) The classical view. ==== Genesis ==== # Created in the recent past (the young earth view) # A very old work of art (the day-age view) # Restoring a destroyed creation (the restoration view) # Literary theme over literal chronology (the literary framework view) The literary framework view, but if I had to pick something chronological, it would be the day-age view. ==== Noah’s flood ==== # Global (the traditional view) # Local This is really more of a biblical studies question, but since it’s in the book I’ll answer it anyway. I don’t know. I’ve always believed the global view, but the local view people have the kinds of arguments that convince me nowadays. Does it really matter? I would like to add one here that was not in Boyd and Eddy’s book, but it’s a fairly significant topic and goes along with my Reformed Baptist views: ==== Redemptive history ==== # Israel and the church are separate entities, and so are the Mosaic and new covenants (Dispensationalism). # Israel and the church are the same entity, but the Mosaic and new covenants are separate (New Covenant Theology). # Israel and the church are the same entity, and so are the Mosaic and new covenants (Covenant Theology). New Covenant Theology. It provides a good framework for the Baptist views on baptism and the Sabbath while not forcing us to be ridiculous about Israel and the church. (heh heh) ==== Christian demonization ==== # Christians cannot be possessed by demons # Christians can be possessed by demons I would say cannot, but really I have no idea. Kind of a random topic. === Anthropology === ==== The divine image ==== # The image of God is the soul (the substantival view) # The image of God is our God-given authority (the functional view) # The image of God is our relationality (the relational view) All of the above. Why in the world would you need to limit it to any of those? ==== The human constitution ==== # The twofold self: body and soul (the dichotomist view) # The threefold self: body, soul, and spirit (the trichotomist view) # The unitary self (the monistic view) Dichotomist. === Christology === ==== The Incarnation ==== # The unavoidable paradox of the God-man (the classical view) # Christ relinquished his divine prerogatives (the kenotic view) The classical view. === Soteriology === ==== The atonement ==== # Christ died in our place (the penal substitution view) # Christ destroyed Satan and his works (the Christus Victor view) # Christ displayed God’s wrath against sin (the moral government view) Penal substitution as a basis for Christus Victor, but moral government is an interesting possibility. ==== Salvation ==== # TULIP (the Calvinist view) # God wants all to be saved (the Arminian view) TULIP. ==== Santification ==== # Santification as a declaration by God (the Lutheran view) # Santification as holiness in christ and in personal conduct (the Reformed [Calvinist] view) # Santification as resting-faith in the sufficiency of christ (the Keswick “deeper life” view) # Entire sanctification as perfect love (the Wesleyan view) The differences among these seem very subtle to me, so it’s hard to choose. I suppose I’ll go with the Reformed view for now, since I’m Reformed in general and I don’t see why sanctification shouldn’t require hard work. ==== Baptism in the Holy Spirit ==== # People are baptized with the Spirit when they believe (the classical Protestant view) # The baptism of the Holy Spirit occurs subsequent to salvation (the subsequent Spirit baptism view) Classical Protestant. ==== Speaking in tongues ==== # Speaking in tongues is evidence that a person is filled with the Holy Spirit (the Pentecostal view [the initial evidence doctrine]) # Some people may be given the gift of speaking in tongues and others not (non-Pentecostal view) Non-Pentecostal. ==== Eternal security ==== # Secure in the power of God (the eternal security view) # The need to persist in faith (the conditional security view) Eternal security. ==== The destiny of the unevangelized ==== # No other name (the restrictivist view) # God does all he can do (the universal opportunity view) # Hope beyond the grave (the postmortem evangelism view) # He has not left himself without a witness (the inclusivist view) Restrictivist, but universal opportunity appeals to me. ==== Infant death ==== # Babies who die automatically go to heaven (the age of accountability view) # Baptized babies go to heaven; all others go to hell (the Augustinian view) # It depends on the faith or unbelief of their parents (a medieval and Reformed view) # Elect babies are predestined to salvation; nonelect babies are not (another Reformed [Westminster Confession] view) # Babies mature in the afterlife and then choose (the postmortem evangelism view) I have no idea, unfortunately. === Ecclesiology === ==== Baptism ==== # Baptism and Christian discipleship (the believer’s baptism view) # Covenanting with the community of God (the infant baptism view) Believer’s baptism. ==== The Lord’s Supper ==== # “This is my body” (the spiritual presence view) # “In remembrance of me” (the memorial view) Memorial. ==== The charismatic gifts ==== # The gifts are for today (the continuationist view) # “Tongues shall cease” (the cessationist view) Continuationist. (You were going to guess cessationist, admit it!) But I personally don’t exercise any charismatic gifts, and I don’t really fit in with the charismatic culture, although I find it interesting. ==== Women in ministry ==== # Created equal, with complementary roles (the complementarian view) # The irrelevance of gender for spiritual authority (the egalitarian view) Another toughie. My personality is very democratic, so I lean heavily toward the egalitarian view, but I’m uncomfortable with female head pastors. ==== Submission in marriage ==== # Wives must submit to their husbands (the complementarian view) # Gender-based authority was only cultural (the egalitarian view) As with the previous one, I want to say egalitarian, but I couldn’t prove it. ==== Christians and politics ==== # The church must transform and ultimately control politics (the transformational [Calvinist] model) # Christians should be wary of involving themselves in politics (the oppositional [anabaptist] model) # God works through the secular government and the church for different purposes (the two-kingdoms [Lutheran] model) I actually lean toward the Lutheran model, for no particular reason. === Eschatology === ==== Hell ==== # The unending torment of the wicked (the classical view) # The wicked shall be no more (the annihilationist view) The classical view, but annihilationism would be nice. ==== The book of Revelation ==== # The events spoken of in Revelation were all specifically fulfilled in the first century (the preterist view) # Revelation is a heavily symbolic dramatization of the ongoing battle between God and evil (the idealist view) # Almost all of Revelation records events that will take place at the end of time (the futurist view) # Revelation records the gradual unfolding of God’s plan for history up to the present (the historicist [Reformation] view) Preterist. ==== The millennium ==== # Raptured before the reign (the premillennial view) # Working toward and waiting for a coming reign of peace (the postmillennial view) # The symbolic thousand-year conquest of Satan (the amillennial view) Amillennial. ==== The rapture ==== # Christ will remove the church before the tribulation (the pre-tribulation view) # Christ will return once, after the tribulation (the post-tribulation view) Neither, since I’m amillennial, but if I had to pick one, it would be post-trib. [[Category:Religion]] f1634d906a3a7e7449912bd113a48a4f656fc8ef 307 305 2017-05-29T17:18:40Z Andy Culbertson 1 Replaced the 2005 essay with the seed for an updated one. wikitext text/x-wiki What do you do when you're a confused Christian who's trying to live and work with other Christians? If you're me, you try to sort out your confusion by writing about it, and then you foolishly post it on your website for reference, without regard for consequences. The consequence you do care about is that at least you'll know where you stand, and then you can strategize about how to interact with other people about belief. This essay is an update to my [http://www.thinkulum.net/w/index.php?title=My_Current_Beliefs&oldid=107 2005 beliefs summary] and my [http://www.thinkulum.net/wiki/On_Being_an_Agnostic_Christian essay on agnostic Christianity] (here's the [http://www.thinkulum.net/wiki/On_Being_an_Agnostic_Christian:_The_Severely_Abridged_Version severely abridged version]). For convenience, I'm organizing this discussion by the traditional categories of systematic theology. But systematic theology covers a lot of topics under those categories, and I'll only be addressing the topics that are important to me. == Prolegomena == In systematic theology, the prolegomena covers general issues you should take care of before getting into the details of specific theological topics. A central issue for me is faith and reason--how they relate, which of them "wins" (if either), what our obligations are to each. I have a growing skeptical side when it comes to religion, alongside my skepticism about everything else. My basic problem with belief is that the more I learn about how people think, the clearer I see how shaky and vulnerable human thought processes are. We get confused easily, except that a lot of the time we confuse our confusion for clarity, and we're confidently wrong. On top of this, I see that everything we think about God and the spiritual realm comes through human beings, whether they're religious authorities or our own minds. So I end up with the fundamental question, what makes us think we're not confused or even deceived about spiritual things? Yet I grew up in Christianity, and I'm not ready to toss it all out the window. So I've ended up with two basic mindsets on each religious topic, a believing one and a skeptical one, and I switch between them based on the situation. So in this article I'll talk about both points of view I have for each issue. Really I'll sometimes have a range of perspectives, some more believing and some more skeptical. Some believers get offended when you question their beliefs. From a rational perspective this doesn't make much sense. Shouldn't people who value truth want to follow the pursuit of truth wherever it leads? Even if you think you've found the truth, it might be irritating to realize you still have more thinking to do, but should you object to it in principle? It seems like you should get over your irritation and get on with the pursuit. The one objection I can come up with that makes sense to me comes down to a question of loyalty. The objection is that the believer who's veering towards apostasy hasn't given their initial beliefs enough of a chance. How dare they jump ship at the first opportunity? It seems to me there's always some threshold to accepting or rejecting an idea, and the person who's asking a doubter to hang onto their first beliefs is asking them to move their rejection threshold further away, maybe an infinite distance away. This idea of a movable threshold seems helpful as I think through all the issues I'll be discussing in this essay. == Bibliology == == Theology proper == == Christology == == Pneumatology == == Anthropology == == Soteriology == == Ecclesiology == == Eschatology == [[Category:Religion]] [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Developing]] c746167d015c9d8aa4ee5af44951c0fe75456321 308 307 2017-06-12T19:08:42Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added to Prolegomena and Bibliology. wikitext text/x-wiki What do you do when you're a confused Christian who's trying to live and work with other Christians? If you're me, you try to sort out your confusion by writing about it, and then you foolishly post it on your website for reference, without regard for consequences. The consequence you do care about is that at least you'll know where you stand, and then you can strategize about how to interact with other people about belief. This essay is an update to my [http://www.thinkulum.net/w/index.php?title=My_Current_Beliefs&oldid=107 2005 beliefs summary] and my [http://www.thinkulum.net/wiki/On_Being_an_Agnostic_Christian essay on agnostic Christianity] (here's the [http://www.thinkulum.net/wiki/On_Being_an_Agnostic_Christian:_The_Severely_Abridged_Version severely abridged version]). For convenience, I'm organizing this discussion by the traditional categories of systematic theology. But systematic theology covers a lot of topics under those categories, and I'll only be addressing the topics that are important to me. == Prolegomena == In systematic theology, the prolegomena covers general issues you should take care of before getting into the details of specific theological topics. A central issue for me is faith and reason--how they relate, which of them "wins" (if either), what our obligations are to each. I have a growing skeptical side when it comes to religion, alongside my skepticism about everything else. My basic problem with belief is that the more I learn about how people think, the clearer I see how shaky and vulnerable human thought processes are. We get confused easily, except that a lot of the time we confuse our confusion for clarity, and we're confidently wrong. On top of this, I see that everything we think about God and the spiritual realm comes through human beings, whether they're religious authorities or our own minds. So I end up with the fundamental question, what makes us think we're not confused or even deceived about spiritual things? Yet I grew up in Christianity, specifically conservative evangelicalism, and I'm not ready to toss it all out the window. So I've ended up with two basic mindsets on each religious topic, a believing one and a skeptical one, and I switch between them based on the situation. So in this article I'll talk about both points of view I have for each issue. Really I'll sometimes have a range of perspectives, some more believing and some more skeptical. Some believers get offended when you question their beliefs. From a rational perspective this doesn't make much sense. Shouldn't people who value truth want to follow the pursuit of truth wherever it leads? Even if you think you've found the truth, it might be irritating to realize you still have more thinking to do, but should you object to it in principle? It seems like you should get over your irritation and get on with the pursuit. The one objection I can come up with that makes sense to me comes down to a question of loyalty. The objection is that the believer who's veering towards apostasy hasn't given their initial beliefs enough of a chance. How dare they jump ship at the first opportunity? It seems to me there's always some threshold to accepting or rejecting an idea, and the person who's asking a doubter to hang onto their first beliefs is asking them to move their rejection threshold further away, maybe an infinite distance away. This idea of a movable threshold seems helpful as I think through all the issues I'll be discussing in this essay. Some have made a theological argument for this perspective of belief as an obligation. In Apologetics to the Glory of God, John Frame argues that Christians (and all other people) have a duty to believe God as part of their overall duty to obey him. They should make their beliefs impervious to change by adopting Christian presuppositions as their foundation. This argument feels both right and wrong to me, so I keep it in mind as something to address. Another concept that's helpful to me is the idea of belief as a form of gambling. When you decide to believe something, whether consciously or unconsciously, you're saying you're willing to risk claiming it's true. I like [https://rachelheldevans.com/blog/why-christian-conference-recap Rachel Held Evans' take]: "I am a Christian because, at the end of the day, the story of Jesus is the story I’m willing to risk being wrong about." So with each of these religious issues and the possible positions on them, some key questions I'll be asking are what risks of belief I'm willing to take, on what basis, and for what rewards. A related perspective I'll use is that a belief is an experiment. You treat it as if it's true for the purpose of seeing where it gets you. If it ends up not working out as expected, given your threshold, you can trade it for another one, though doubtless with some kind of difficulty. On most of these issues I'm willing to be convinced. In fact, I think of many of them as open research projects, and I have resources in mind to investigate. Some people might ask me to just believe whatever they do. But as much as I like to make people happy, I'll have to push back, at least in my head. This is because everybody's point of view is different, and everybody's point of view feels natural to them. How am I to decide between them? I need good reasons, so we have to be prepared for some hard work. == Bibliology == Where does our information about the religious realm come from? Christianity holds that it's from a divine revelation, and the question they debate is where that revelation is located. Among Christians, Protestants say it's the Bible. Catholics and Eastern Orthodox say it's primarily the church. Although I haven't moved away from Protestantism, my Christian side is inclined to agree that revelation is grounded in the church. For one thing, the church (meaning God's people) produced the Bible, which is an argument I've heard from Catholics, and it seems plausible to me. For another, there's the question of the canon. The Bible doesn't tell us which books belong in it. That came from the church, although even then it's not a tidy matter. There was no council that declared it, and different branches of the church have different canons (see Craig Allert's ''A High View of Scripture?''). And finally, most of the Bible's books were written within some context, and they don't record everything it seems we'd need to know about that context. It seems natural to think some of that context is contained in the church's traditions. To illustrate, I know you couldn't get a complete picture of my beliefs and ideas from my writings, and we have more of my writings than, say, Paul's. Paul wrote his letters mainly to churches where he'd preached, so it's plausible he told them things verbally that he didn't bother to write in the letters. But maybe those things were preserved by the church. I don't know how the Reformers conceptualized sola scriptura, but maybe they should've treated it as an experiment. After the Protestant church's half century of trying it, I don't think it's worked all that well. Christians can agree on very little, but especially Protestants, or at least they're very vocal and strident about their disagreements (see Christian Smith's ''The Bible Made Impossible''). If God wants unity, couldn't his revelation have been a little clearer and less messy? What's the relationship between the divine and human sources of the Bible? If we plot them on a spectrum, there are four views I normally think of. On the fundamentalist end there's the dictation view where God told the human writers exactly what to write. Next is the Chicago Statement on Biblical Inerrancy, a conservative evangelical document which basically says God allowed the human writers some freedom, but within that range he ensured they said everything he wanted and nothing that conflicted with it. On the left there's the view that the Bible is the work of human theologians grappling (fallibly) with the divine events they'd encountered. And on the very left is the skeptical view that the Bible is a purely human book. I don't know where the Catholic and Orthodox views land. At this point I'm hovering around the theologian view. I'd like to believe there's something divine going on, but the Bible does seem like a very human book, with conflicting facts and perspectives, culture-bound viewpoints, legend-like material, and even indications of propaganda (see Kenton Sparks' ''Divine Words in Human Words''). Rather than wrenching my mind to harmonize and rationalize all its apparent foibles with less than satisfying results, I'd rather experiment with the idea that the Bible is mostly human but grown from some divine seeds. On this issue the two basic questions for me are (1) what kind of pattern the Bible displays, something more human or something more divine, and (2) whether some other consideration overrides that pattern of evidence, such as the argument that the Bible doesn't lie because God doesn't (which is very inadequate, in my opinion, because it assumes a lot about God's agenda in giving us the Bible). I haven't even begun to examine how faithful to the church's origins its extrabiblical teachings might be or what would make us think they're true. I have doubts it's a tidier affair than the Bible. Traditional Protestants will be wondering, if we dilute the Bible's authority like this, how do we do theology? I don't know, but the [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biblical_hermeneutics#Trajectory_hermeneutics trajectory hermeneutic] is appealing to me. == Theology proper == == Christology == == Pneumatology == == Anthropology == == Soteriology == == Ecclesiology == == Eschatology == [[Category:Religion]] [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Developing]] 2e71497e2805c6f7ab99f86fc3092d08abfdff11 309 308 2017-07-09T03:20:22Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added a discussion on types of belief to the Prolegomena section. wikitext text/x-wiki What do you do when you're a confused Christian who's trying to live and work with other Christians? If you're me, you try to sort out your confusion by writing about it, and then you foolishly post it on your website for reference, without regard for consequences. The consequence you do care about is that at least you'll know where you stand, and then you can strategize about how to interact with other people about belief. This essay is an update to my [http://www.thinkulum.net/w/index.php?title=My_Current_Beliefs&oldid=107 2005 beliefs summary] and my [http://www.thinkulum.net/wiki/On_Being_an_Agnostic_Christian essay on agnostic Christianity] (here's the [http://www.thinkulum.net/wiki/On_Being_an_Agnostic_Christian:_The_Severely_Abridged_Version severely abridged version]). For convenience, I'm organizing this discussion by the traditional categories of systematic theology. But systematic theology covers a lot of topics under those categories, and I'll only be addressing the topics that are important to me. == Prolegomena == In systematic theology, the prolegomena covers general issues you should take care of before getting into the details of specific theological topics. A central issue for me is faith and reason--how they relate, which of them "wins" (if either), what our obligations are to each. I have a growing skeptical side when it comes to religion, alongside my skepticism about everything else. My basic problem with belief is that the more I learn about how people think, the clearer I see how shaky and vulnerable human thought processes are. We get confused easily, except that a lot of the time we confuse our confusion for clarity, and we're confidently wrong. On top of this, I see that everything we think about God and the spiritual realm comes through human beings, whether they're religious authorities or our own minds. So I end up with the fundamental question, what makes us think we're not confused or even deceived about spiritual things? Yet I grew up in Christianity, specifically conservative evangelicalism, and I'm not ready to toss it all out the window. So I've ended up with two basic mindsets on each religious topic, a believing one and a skeptical one, and I switch between them based on the situation. So in this article I'll talk about both points of view I have for each issue. Really I'll sometimes have a range of perspectives, some more believing and some more skeptical. Some believers get offended when you question their beliefs. From a rational perspective this doesn't make much sense. Shouldn't people who value truth want to follow the pursuit of truth wherever it leads? Even if you think you've found the truth, it might be irritating to realize you still have more thinking to do, but should you object to it in principle? It seems like you should get over your irritation and get on with the pursuit. The one objection I can come up with that makes sense to me comes down to a question of loyalty. The objection is that the believer who's veering towards apostasy hasn't given their initial beliefs enough of a chance. How dare they jump ship at the first opportunity? It seems to me there's always some threshold to accepting or rejecting an idea, and the person who's asking a doubter to hang onto their first beliefs is asking them to move their rejection threshold further away, maybe an infinite distance away. This idea of a movable threshold seems helpful as I think through all the issues I'll be discussing in this essay. Some have made a theological argument for this perspective of belief as an obligation. In Apologetics to the Glory of God, John Frame argues that Christians (and all other people) have a duty to believe God as part of their overall duty to obey him. They should make their beliefs impervious to change by adopting Christian presuppositions as their foundation. This argument feels both right and wrong to me, so I keep it in mind as something to address. Another concept that's helpful to me is the idea of belief as a form of gambling. When you decide to believe something, whether consciously or unconsciously, you're saying you're willing to risk claiming it's true. I like [https://rachelheldevans.com/blog/why-christian-conference-recap Rachel Held Evans' take]: "I am a Christian because, at the end of the day, the story of Jesus is the story I’m willing to risk being wrong about." So with each of these religious issues and the possible positions on them, some key questions I'll be asking are what risks of belief I'm willing to take, on what basis, and for what rewards. A related perspective I'll use is that a belief is an experiment. You treat it as if it's true for the purpose of seeing where it gets you. If it ends up not working out as expected, given your threshold, you can trade it for another one, though doubtless with some kind of difficulty. As I consider the conflicting religious ideas that swirl around in my head, I find I need to decide what counts as a belief. When you hear the word "belief," you might think it means "firm conviction," but many of my ideas that feel something like beliefs don't fit that description. They range from conviction all the way to speculation. Where's the cutoff point for including them here? Well, different kinds of belief will be more or less relevant to my goals in writing this essay, so I'll look at those briefly. Partly my goal is to have a starting point for moving toward several other broad goals: feeling more ideologically settled, interacting with Christians and non-Christians, thinking about issues of concern (based on my more settled ideology), and doing good. But largely my goal in this essay is to be honest and express my ambivalent inner reality without unduly worrying the Christians I care about. I think I can approach that goal by starting with the places I'm closest to my Christian friends' beliefs. So generally speaking, for each section I'll cover the following types of belief-related ideas: * ideas I believe out of habit * ideas I'd like to believe * ideas I believe in practice * ideas I ''aim'' to believe in practice (ideals, you could say) * rational arguments that convince me for and against various ideas * areas of argument I'd like to investigate * threats to my rationality I won't list specific ideas I'm open to believing, because that would take too long. Really I'm open to being convinced of just about anything, as long as it falls under my core ideals of reason and empathy. I'm much less open, for example, to views holding that only the strongest people should survive. Some people might want to convince me by asking me to just believe whatever they do. But as much as I like to make people happy, I'll have to push back, at least in my head. This is because everybody's point of view is different, and everybody's point of view feels natural to them. How am I to decide between them? I need good reasons, so we have to be prepared for some hard work. == Bibliology == Where does our information about the religious realm come from? Christianity holds that it's from a divine revelation, and the question they debate is where that revelation is located. Among Christians, Protestants say it's the Bible. Catholics and Eastern Orthodox say it's primarily the church. Although I haven't moved away from Protestantism, my Christian side is inclined to agree that revelation is grounded in the church. For one thing, the church (meaning God's people) produced the Bible, which is an argument I've heard from Catholics, and it seems plausible to me. For another, there's the question of the canon. The Bible doesn't tell us which books belong in it. That came from the church, although even then it's not a tidy matter. There was no council that declared it, and different branches of the church have different canons (see Craig Allert's ''A High View of Scripture?''). And finally, most of the Bible's books were written within some context, and they don't record everything it seems we'd need to know about that context. It seems natural to think some of that context is contained in the church's traditions. To illustrate, I know you couldn't get a complete picture of my beliefs and ideas from my writings, and we have more of my writings than, say, Paul's. Paul wrote his letters mainly to churches where he'd preached, so it's plausible he told them things verbally that he didn't bother to write in the letters. But maybe those things were preserved by the church. I don't know how the Reformers conceptualized sola scriptura, but maybe they should've treated it as an experiment. After the Protestant church's half century of trying it, I don't think it's worked all that well. Christians can agree on very little, but especially Protestants, or at least they're very vocal and strident about their disagreements (see Christian Smith's ''The Bible Made Impossible''). If God wants unity, couldn't his revelation have been a little clearer and less messy? What's the relationship between the divine and human sources of the Bible? If we plot them on a spectrum, there are four views I normally think of. On the fundamentalist end there's the dictation view where God told the human writers exactly what to write. Next is the Chicago Statement on Biblical Inerrancy, a conservative evangelical document which basically says God allowed the human writers some freedom, but within that range he ensured they said everything he wanted and nothing that conflicted with it. On the left there's the view that the Bible is the work of human theologians grappling (fallibly) with the divine events they'd encountered. And on the very left is the skeptical view that the Bible is a purely human book. I don't know where the Catholic and Orthodox views land. At this point I'm hovering around the theologian view. I'd like to believe there's something divine going on, but the Bible does seem like a very human book, with conflicting facts and perspectives, culture-bound viewpoints, legend-like material, and even indications of propaganda (see Kenton Sparks' ''Divine Words in Human Words''). Rather than wrenching my mind to harmonize and rationalize all its apparent foibles with less than satisfying results, I'd rather experiment with the idea that the Bible is mostly human but grown from some divine seeds. On this issue the two basic questions for me are (1) what kind of pattern the Bible displays, something more human or something more divine, and (2) whether some other consideration overrides that pattern of evidence, such as the argument that the Bible doesn't lie because God doesn't (which is very inadequate, in my opinion, because it assumes a lot about God's agenda in giving us the Bible). I haven't even begun to examine how faithful to the church's origins its extrabiblical teachings might be or what would make us think they're true. I have doubts it's a tidier affair than the Bible. Traditional Protestants will be wondering, if we dilute the Bible's authority like this, how do we do theology? I don't know, but the [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biblical_hermeneutics#Trajectory_hermeneutics trajectory hermeneutic] is appealing to me. == Theology proper == == Christology == == Pneumatology == == Anthropology == == Soteriology == == Ecclesiology == == Eschatology == [[Category:Religion]] [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Developing]] 7054186017bf0e5236b1c5573798b833b0117ef0 311 309 2017-08-25T04:19:55Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added Prolegomena subheadings and remarks on statements of belief. wikitext text/x-wiki What do you do when you're a confused Christian who's trying to live and work with other Christians? If you're me, you try to sort out your confusion by writing about it, and then you foolishly post it on your website for reference, without regard for consequences. The consequence you do care about is that at least you'll know where you stand, and then you can strategize about how to interact with other people about belief. This essay is an update to my [http://www.thinkulum.net/w/index.php?title=My_Current_Beliefs&oldid=107 2005 beliefs summary] and my [http://www.thinkulum.net/wiki/On_Being_an_Agnostic_Christian essay on agnostic Christianity] (here's the [http://www.thinkulum.net/wiki/On_Being_an_Agnostic_Christian:_The_Severely_Abridged_Version severely abridged version]). For convenience, I'm organizing this discussion by the traditional categories of systematic theology. But systematic theology covers a lot of topics under those categories, and I'll only be addressing the topics that are important to me. == Prolegomena == In systematic theology, the prolegomena covers general issues you should take care of before getting into the details of specific theological topics. A central issue for me is faith and reason--how they relate, which of them "wins" (if either), what our obligations are to each. === My belief spectrum === I have a growing skeptical side when it comes to religion, alongside my skepticism about everything else. My basic problem with belief is that the more I learn about how people think, the clearer I see how shaky and vulnerable human thought processes are. We get confused easily, except that a lot of the time we confuse our confusion for clarity, and we're confidently wrong. On top of this, I see that everything we think about God and the spiritual realm comes through human beings, whether they're religious authorities or our own minds. So I end up with the fundamental question, what makes us think we're not confused or even deceived about spiritual things? Yet I grew up in Christianity, specifically conservative evangelicalism, and I'm not ready to toss it all out the window. So I've ended up with two basic mindsets on each religious topic, a believing one and a skeptical one, and I switch between them based on the situation. So in this article I'll talk about both points of view I have for each issue. Really I'll sometimes have a range of perspectives, some more believing and some more skeptical. === Thresholds of belief === Some believers get offended when you question their beliefs. From a rational perspective this doesn't make much sense. Shouldn't people who value truth want to follow the pursuit of truth wherever it leads? Even if you think you've found the truth, it might be irritating to realize you still have more thinking to do, but should you object to it in principle? It seems like you should get over your irritation and get on with the pursuit. The one objection I can come up with that makes sense to me comes down to a question of loyalty. The objection is that the believer who's veering towards apostasy hasn't given their initial beliefs enough of a chance. How dare they jump ship at the first opportunity? It seems to me there's always some threshold to accepting or rejecting an idea, and the person who's asking a doubter to hang onto their first beliefs is asking them to move their rejection threshold further away, maybe an infinite distance away. This idea of a movable threshold seems helpful as I think through all the issues I'll be discussing in this essay. === Beliefs as obligations === Some have made a theological argument for this perspective of belief as an obligation. In ''Apologetics to the Glory of God'', John Frame argues that Christians (and all other people) have a duty to believe God as part of their overall duty to obey him. They should make their beliefs impervious to change by adopting Christian presuppositions as their foundation. This argument feels both right and wrong to me, so I keep it in mind as something to address. === Beliefs as wagers === Another concept that's helpful to me is the idea of belief as a form of gambling. When you decide to believe something, whether consciously or unconsciously, you're saying you're willing to risk claiming it's true. I like [https://rachelheldevans.com/blog/why-christian-conference-recap Rachel Held Evans' take]: "I am a Christian because, at the end of the day, the story of Jesus is the story I’m willing to risk being wrong about." So with each of these religious issues and the possible positions on them, some key questions I'll be asking are what risks of belief I'm willing to take, on what basis, and for what rewards. === Beliefs as experiments === A related perspective I'll use is that a belief is an experiment. You treat it as if it's true for the purpose of seeing where it gets you. If it ends up not working out as expected, given your threshold, you can trade it for another one, though doubtless with some kind of difficulty. === Types of belief === As I consider the conflicting religious ideas that swirl around in my head, I find I need to decide what counts as a belief. When you hear the word "belief," you might think it means "firm conviction," but many of my ideas that feel something like beliefs don't fit that description. They range from conviction all the way to speculation. Where's the cutoff point for including them here? Well, different kinds of belief will be more or less relevant to my goals in writing this essay, so I'll look at those briefly. Partly my goal is to have a starting point for moving toward several other broad goals: feeling more ideologically settled, interacting with Christians and non-Christians, thinking about issues of concern (based on my more settled ideology), and doing good. But largely my goal in this essay is to be open and express my ambivalent inner reality without unduly worrying the Christians I care about. I think I can approach that goal by starting with the places I'm closest to my Christian friends' beliefs. So generally speaking, for each section I'll cover the following types of belief-related ideas: * ideas I believe out of habit * ideas I'd like to believe * ideas I believe in practice * ideas I ''aim'' to believe in practice (ideals, you could say) * rational arguments that convince me for and against various ideas * areas of argument I'd like to investigate * threats to my rationality To highlight the ways I agree and disagree with my religious community, I'll comment on the statements of belief of various organizations I've been involved with. These are a good starting point because for the most part I've agreed with them in the past. I've moved around from one evangelical denomination to another, so my main source will be one that represents conservative evangelicalism in general, Wheaton College, where I did my bachelor's and master's degrees. I won't list specific ideas I'm open to believing, because that would take too long. Really I'm open to being convinced of just about anything, as long as it falls under my core ideals of reason and empathy. I'm much less open, for example, to views holding that only the strongest people should survive. === Simple belief === Some people might want to convince me by asking me to just believe whatever they do. But as much as I like to make people happy, I'll have to push back, at least in my head. This is because everybody's point of view is different, and everybody's point of view feels natural to them. How am I to decide between them? I need good reasons, so we have to be prepared for some hard work. == Bibliology == Where does our information about the religious realm come from? Christianity holds that it's from a divine revelation, and the question they debate is where that revelation is located. Among Christians, Protestants say it's the Bible. Catholics and Eastern Orthodox say it's primarily the church. Although I haven't moved away from Protestantism, my Christian side is inclined to agree that revelation is grounded in the church. For one thing, the church (meaning God's people) produced the Bible, which is an argument I've heard from Catholics, and it seems plausible to me. For another, there's the question of the canon. The Bible doesn't tell us which books belong in it. That came from the church, although even then it's not a tidy matter. There was no council that declared it, and different branches of the church have different canons (see Craig Allert's ''A High View of Scripture?''). And finally, most of the Bible's books were written within some context, and they don't record everything it seems we'd need to know about that context. It seems natural to think some of that context is contained in the church's traditions. To illustrate, I know you couldn't get a complete picture of my beliefs and ideas from my writings, and we have more of my writings than, say, Paul's. Paul wrote his letters mainly to churches where he'd preached, so it's plausible he told them things verbally that he didn't bother to write in the letters. But maybe those things were preserved by the church. I don't know how the Reformers conceptualized sola scriptura, but maybe they should've treated it as an experiment. After the Protestant church's half century of trying it, I don't think it's worked all that well. Christians can agree on very little, but especially Protestants, or at least they're very vocal and strident about their disagreements (see Christian Smith's ''The Bible Made Impossible''). If God wants unity, couldn't his revelation have been a little clearer and less messy? What's the relationship between the divine and human sources of the Bible? If we plot them on a spectrum, there are four views I normally think of. On the fundamentalist end there's the dictation view where God told the human writers exactly what to write. Next is the Chicago Statement on Biblical Inerrancy, a conservative evangelical document which basically says God allowed the human writers some freedom, but within that range he ensured they said everything he wanted and nothing that conflicted with it. On the left there's the view that the Bible is the work of human theologians grappling (fallibly) with the divine events they'd encountered. And on the very left is the skeptical view that the Bible is a purely human book. I don't know where the Catholic and Orthodox views land. At this point I'm hovering around the theologian view. I'd like to believe there's something divine going on, but the Bible does seem like a very human book, with conflicting facts and perspectives, culture-bound viewpoints, legend-like material, and even indications of propaganda (see Kenton Sparks' ''Divine Words in Human Words''). Rather than wrenching my mind to harmonize and rationalize all its apparent foibles with less than satisfying results, I'd rather experiment with the idea that the Bible is mostly human but grown from some divine seeds. On this issue the two basic questions for me are (1) what kind of pattern the Bible displays, something more human or something more divine, and (2) whether some other consideration overrides that pattern of evidence, such as the argument that the Bible doesn't lie because God doesn't (which is very inadequate, in my opinion, because it assumes a lot about God's agenda in giving us the Bible). I haven't even begun to examine how faithful to the church's origins its extrabiblical teachings might be or what would make us think they're true. I have doubts it's a tidier affair than the Bible. Traditional Protestants will be wondering, if we dilute the Bible's authority like this, how do we do theology? I don't know, but the [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biblical_hermeneutics#Trajectory_hermeneutics trajectory hermeneutic] is appealing to me. == Theology proper == == Christology == == Pneumatology == == Anthropology == == Soteriology == == Ecclesiology == == Eschatology == [[Category:Religion]] [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Developing]] bca4147bd5f704a61e816b3f57c004c384a9d71d 327 311 2018-03-18T05:20:45Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the Summary section. wikitext text/x-wiki What do you do when you're a confused Christian who's trying to live and work with other Christians? If you're me, you try to sort out your confusion by writing about it, and then you foolishly post it on your website for reference, without regard for consequences. The consequence you do care about is that at least you'll know where you stand, and then you can strategize about how to interact with other people about belief. This essay is an update to my [http://www.thinkulum.net/w/index.php?title=My_Current_Beliefs&oldid=107 2005 beliefs summary] and my [http://www.thinkulum.net/wiki/On_Being_an_Agnostic_Christian essay on agnostic Christianity] (here's the [http://www.thinkulum.net/wiki/On_Being_an_Agnostic_Christian:_The_Severely_Abridged_Version severely abridged version]). For convenience, I'm organizing this discussion by the traditional categories of systematic theology. But systematic theology covers a lot of topics under those categories, and I'll only be addressing the topics that are important to me. == Summary == Here's a 500-word overview. I've emphasized the parts that my conservative evangelical friends can appreciate: Though ''in practice I still believe in the basic Christian notion of God'', I'm vague on the details, and the arguments for God seem weak. The cosmological argument proves little. Evolutionists have a strong position. Fine tuning assumes that humanity is a goal, though ''maybe the argument can work'', but it proves little. The moral argument assumes an objective morality, when noncognitivism seems more likely. The ontological argument assumes absolute definitions of greatness for properties that seem subjective. The transcendental argument is an appeal to consequences and assumes particular positions on several philosophical issues. Proper basicality seems complicated and wrong, but I haven't investigated. ''Plantinga's evolutionary argument might work.'' Miracles need extraordinary evidence, and even then we can't rule out unknown laws of nature. Mystical experiences could be caused merely by the brain, since it's still so mysterious. But to be responsible, philosophy of religion needs to consider all concepts of God, not just the Christian ones. Religious authority is hard to establish. The Bible's teachings are fragmentary, its statements ambiguous. Its interpretations vary widely. It has problems of history and composition that aren't convincingly resolved. I see it as human writers trying to interpret life and history in light of their ideas of God. But ''I still see it as a beneficial source of challenging ideas that should shape my perspective.'' The church seems like a similarly messy source of authority, but I haven't investigated it. ''The Orthodox idea of the Church Fathers as authoritative based on their closeness to God intrigues me.'' ''I take Jesus more seriously than the rest of the Bible.'' I haven't investigated very far, but ''I think the Gospels probably got him mostly right.'' His teachings confuse me, and he seems less patient than I'd expect or want. ''Arguments for his bodily resurrection seem strong. I pray to him and assume he's in heaven interacting with the Father and the world.'' As for the rest, Christians agree on practically nothing, but I believe the following based on a mix of habit, experience, hearsay, logic, desire, and a residual attachment to the Bible as a source of theology. ''The Holy Spirit acts on people's minds to convict and inspire. I thank him for the good in my life. Sometimes I think of specific thoughts as being messages from him. The church is God's adopted family, represents him, and has no prescribed structure. People are saved when they ally themselves with Jesus. I think of the atonement as substitutionary and justification as imputed, and I vaguely believe in a traditional hell'', but my mind is open. I hope God can achieve universal salvation, but I don't count on it. I'm unclear on the soul's existence, since the brain is so tied to the mind, but ''certain near death experiences intrigue me. I don't know when or how Jesus will return'', so I treat the present world as if it'll continue indefinitely, though ''I do imagine a new creation in the hazy future.'' == Prolegomena == In systematic theology, the prolegomena covers general issues you should take care of before getting into the details of specific theological topics. A central issue for me is faith and reason--how they relate, which of them "wins" (if either), what our obligations are to each. === My belief spectrum === I have a growing skeptical side when it comes to religion, alongside my skepticism about everything else. My basic problem with belief is that the more I learn about how people think, the clearer I see how shaky and vulnerable human thought processes are. We get confused easily, except that a lot of the time we confuse our confusion for clarity, and we're confidently wrong. On top of this, I see that everything we think about God and the spiritual realm comes through human beings, whether they're religious authorities or our own minds. So I end up with the fundamental question, what makes us think we're not confused or even deceived about spiritual things? Yet I grew up in Christianity, specifically conservative evangelicalism, and I'm not ready to toss it all out the window. So I've ended up with two basic mindsets on each religious topic, a believing one and a skeptical one, and I switch between them based on the situation. So in this article I'll talk about both points of view I have for each issue. Really I'll sometimes have a range of perspectives, some more believing and some more skeptical. === Thresholds of belief === Some believers get offended when you question their beliefs. From a rational perspective this doesn't make much sense. Shouldn't people who value truth want to follow the pursuit of truth wherever it leads? Even if you think you've found the truth, it might be irritating to realize you still have more thinking to do, but should you object to it in principle? It seems like you should get over your irritation and get on with the pursuit. The one objection I can come up with that makes sense to me comes down to a question of loyalty. The objection is that the believer who's veering towards apostasy hasn't given their initial beliefs enough of a chance. How dare they jump ship at the first opportunity? It seems to me there's always some threshold to accepting or rejecting an idea, and the person who's asking a doubter to hang onto their first beliefs is asking them to move their rejection threshold further away, maybe an infinite distance away. This idea of a movable threshold seems helpful as I think through all the issues I'll be discussing in this essay. === Beliefs as obligations === Some have made a theological argument for this perspective of belief as an obligation. In ''Apologetics to the Glory of God'', John Frame argues that Christians (and all other people) have a duty to believe God as part of their overall duty to obey him. They should make their beliefs impervious to change by adopting Christian presuppositions as their foundation. This argument feels both right and wrong to me, so I keep it in mind as something to address. === Beliefs as wagers === Another concept that's helpful to me is the idea of belief as a form of gambling. When you decide to believe something, whether consciously or unconsciously, you're saying you're willing to risk claiming it's true. I like [https://rachelheldevans.com/blog/why-christian-conference-recap Rachel Held Evans' take]: "I am a Christian because, at the end of the day, the story of Jesus is the story I’m willing to risk being wrong about." So with each of these religious issues and the possible positions on them, some key questions I'll be asking are what risks of belief I'm willing to take, on what basis, and for what rewards. === Beliefs as experiments === A related perspective I'll use is that a belief is an experiment. You treat it as if it's true for the purpose of seeing where it gets you. If it ends up not working out as expected, given your threshold, you can trade it for another one, though doubtless with some kind of difficulty. === Types of belief === As I consider the conflicting religious ideas that swirl around in my head, I find I need to decide what counts as a belief. When you hear the word "belief," you might think it means "firm conviction," but many of my ideas that feel something like beliefs don't fit that description. They range from conviction all the way to speculation. Where's the cutoff point for including them here? Well, different kinds of belief will be more or less relevant to my goals in writing this essay, so I'll look at those briefly. Partly my goal is to have a starting point for moving toward several other broad goals: feeling more ideologically settled, interacting with Christians and non-Christians, thinking about issues of concern (based on my more settled ideology), and doing good. But largely my goal in this essay is to be open and express my ambivalent inner reality without unduly worrying the Christians I care about. I think I can approach that goal by starting with the places I'm closest to my Christian friends' beliefs. So generally speaking, for each section I'll cover the following types of belief-related ideas: * ideas I believe out of habit * ideas I'd like to believe * ideas I believe in practice * ideas I ''aim'' to believe in practice (ideals, you could say) * rational arguments that convince me for and against various ideas * areas of argument I'd like to investigate * threats to my rationality To highlight the ways I agree and disagree with my religious community, I'll comment on the statements of belief of various organizations I've been involved with. These are a good starting point because for the most part I've agreed with them in the past. I've moved around from one evangelical denomination to another, so my main source will be one that represents conservative evangelicalism in general, Wheaton College, where I did my bachelor's and master's degrees. I won't list specific ideas I'm open to believing, because that would take too long. Really I'm open to being convinced of just about anything, as long as it falls under my core ideals of reason and empathy. I'm much less open, for example, to views holding that only the strongest people should survive. === Simple belief === Some people might want to convince me by asking me to just believe whatever they do. But as much as I like to make people happy, I'll have to push back, at least in my head. This is because everybody's point of view is different, and everybody's point of view feels natural to them. How am I to decide between them? I need good reasons, so we have to be prepared for some hard work. == Bibliology == Where does our information about the religious realm come from? Christianity holds that it's from a divine revelation, and the question they debate is where that revelation is located. Among Christians, Protestants say it's the Bible. Catholics and Eastern Orthodox say it's primarily the church. Although I haven't moved away from Protestantism, my Christian side is inclined to agree that revelation is grounded in the church. For one thing, the church (meaning God's people) produced the Bible, which is an argument I've heard from Catholics, and it seems plausible to me. For another, there's the question of the canon. The Bible doesn't tell us which books belong in it. That came from the church, although even then it's not a tidy matter. There was no council that declared it, and different branches of the church have different canons (see Craig Allert's ''A High View of Scripture?''). And finally, most of the Bible's books were written within some context, and they don't record everything it seems we'd need to know about that context. It seems natural to think some of that context is contained in the church's traditions. To illustrate, I know you couldn't get a complete picture of my beliefs and ideas from my writings, and we have more of my writings than, say, Paul's. Paul wrote his letters mainly to churches where he'd preached, so it's plausible he told them things verbally that he didn't bother to write in the letters. But maybe those things were preserved by the church. I don't know how the Reformers conceptualized sola scriptura, but maybe they should've treated it as an experiment. After the Protestant church's half century of trying it, I don't think it's worked all that well. Christians can agree on very little, but especially Protestants, or at least they're very vocal and strident about their disagreements (see Christian Smith's ''The Bible Made Impossible''). If God wants unity, couldn't his revelation have been a little clearer and less messy? What's the relationship between the divine and human sources of the Bible? If we plot them on a spectrum, there are four views I normally think of. On the fundamentalist end there's the dictation view where God told the human writers exactly what to write. Next is the Chicago Statement on Biblical Inerrancy, a conservative evangelical document which basically says God allowed the human writers some freedom, but within that range he ensured they said everything he wanted and nothing that conflicted with it. On the left there's the view that the Bible is the work of human theologians grappling (fallibly) with the divine events they'd encountered. And on the very left is the skeptical view that the Bible is a purely human book. I don't know where the Catholic and Orthodox views land. At this point I'm hovering around the theologian view. I'd like to believe there's something divine going on, but the Bible does seem like a very human book, with conflicting facts and perspectives, culture-bound viewpoints, legend-like material, and even indications of propaganda (see Kenton Sparks' ''Divine Words in Human Words''). Rather than wrenching my mind to harmonize and rationalize all its apparent foibles with less than satisfying results, I'd rather experiment with the idea that the Bible is mostly human but grown from some divine seeds. On this issue the two basic questions for me are (1) what kind of pattern the Bible displays, something more human or something more divine, and (2) whether some other consideration overrides that pattern of evidence, such as the argument that the Bible doesn't lie because God doesn't (which is very inadequate, in my opinion, because it assumes a lot about God's agenda in giving us the Bible). I haven't even begun to examine how faithful to the church's origins its extrabiblical teachings might be or what would make us think they're true. I have doubts it's a tidier affair than the Bible. Traditional Protestants will be wondering, if we dilute the Bible's authority like this, how do we do theology? I don't know, but the [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biblical_hermeneutics#Trajectory_hermeneutics trajectory hermeneutic] is appealing to me. == Theology proper == == Christology == == Pneumatology == == Anthropology == == Soteriology == == Ecclesiology == == Eschatology == [[Category:Religion]] [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Developing]] a3c7aa1ab9c895888b61d83b5e65408966eeae1a 328 327 2018-03-20T15:25:37Z Andy Culbertson 1 Changed some emphasis in the summary. wikitext text/x-wiki What do you do when you're a confused Christian who's trying to live and work with other Christians? If you're me, you try to sort out your confusion by writing about it, and then you foolishly post it on your website for reference, without regard for consequences. The consequence you do care about is that at least you'll know where you stand, and then you can strategize about how to interact with other people about belief. This essay is an update to my [http://www.thinkulum.net/w/index.php?title=My_Current_Beliefs&oldid=107 2005 beliefs summary] and my [http://www.thinkulum.net/wiki/On_Being_an_Agnostic_Christian essay on agnostic Christianity] (here's the [http://www.thinkulum.net/wiki/On_Being_an_Agnostic_Christian:_The_Severely_Abridged_Version severely abridged version]). For convenience, I'm organizing this discussion by the traditional categories of systematic theology. But systematic theology covers a lot of topics under those categories, and I'll only be addressing the topics that are important to me. == Summary == Here's a 500-word overview. I've emphasized the parts that my conservative evangelical friends can appreciate: Though ''in practice I still believe in the basic Christian notion of God'', I'm vague on the details, and the arguments for God seem weak. The cosmological argument proves little. Evolutionists have a strong position. Fine tuning assumes that humanity is a goal, though ''maybe the argument can work'', but it proves little. The moral argument assumes an objective morality, when noncognitivism seems more likely. The ontological argument assumes absolute definitions of greatness for properties that seem subjective. The transcendental argument is an appeal to consequences and assumes particular positions on several philosophical issues. Proper basicality seems complicated and wrong, but I haven't investigated. ''Plantinga's evolutionary argument might work.'' Miracles need extraordinary evidence, and even then we can't rule out unknown laws of nature. Mystical experiences could be caused merely by the brain, since it's still so mysterious. But to be responsible, philosophy of religion needs to consider all concepts of God, not just the Christian ones. Religious authority is hard to establish. The Bible's teachings are fragmentary, its statements ambiguous. Its interpretations vary widely. It has problems of history and composition that aren't convincingly resolved. I see it as human writers trying to interpret life and history in light of their ideas of God. But ''I still see it as a beneficial source of challenging ideas that should shape my perspective.'' The church seems like a similarly messy source of authority, but I haven't investigated it. ''The Orthodox idea of the Church Fathers as authoritative based on their closeness to God intrigues me.'' ''I take Jesus more seriously'' than the rest of the Bible. I haven't investigated very far, but ''I think the Gospels probably got him mostly right.'' His teachings confuse me, and he seems less patient than I'd expect or want. ''Arguments for his bodily resurrection seem strong. I pray to him and assume he's in heaven interacting with the Father and the world.'' As for the rest, Christians agree on practically nothing, but I believe the following based on a mix of habit, experience, hearsay, logic, desire, and a residual attachment to the Bible as a source of theology. ''The Holy Spirit acts on people's minds to convict and inspire. I thank him for the good in my life. Sometimes I think of specific thoughts as being messages from him. The church is God's adopted family, represents him, and has no prescribed structure. People are saved when they ally themselves with Jesus. I think of the atonement as substitutionary and justification as imputed, and I vaguely believe in a traditional hell'', but my mind is open. I hope God can achieve universal salvation, but I don't count on it. I'm unclear on the soul's existence, since the brain is so tied to the mind, but ''certain near death experiences intrigue me. I don't know when or how Jesus will return'', so I treat the present world as if it'll continue indefinitely, though ''I do imagine a new creation in the hazy future.'' == Prolegomena == In systematic theology, the prolegomena covers general issues you should take care of before getting into the details of specific theological topics. A central issue for me is faith and reason--how they relate, which of them "wins" (if either), what our obligations are to each. === My belief spectrum === I have a growing skeptical side when it comes to religion, alongside my skepticism about everything else. My basic problem with belief is that the more I learn about how people think, the clearer I see how shaky and vulnerable human thought processes are. We get confused easily, except that a lot of the time we confuse our confusion for clarity, and we're confidently wrong. On top of this, I see that everything we think about God and the spiritual realm comes through human beings, whether they're religious authorities or our own minds. So I end up with the fundamental question, what makes us think we're not confused or even deceived about spiritual things? Yet I grew up in Christianity, specifically conservative evangelicalism, and I'm not ready to toss it all out the window. So I've ended up with two basic mindsets on each religious topic, a believing one and a skeptical one, and I switch between them based on the situation. So in this article I'll talk about both points of view I have for each issue. Really I'll sometimes have a range of perspectives, some more believing and some more skeptical. === Thresholds of belief === Some believers get offended when you question their beliefs. From a rational perspective this doesn't make much sense. Shouldn't people who value truth want to follow the pursuit of truth wherever it leads? Even if you think you've found the truth, it might be irritating to realize you still have more thinking to do, but should you object to it in principle? It seems like you should get over your irritation and get on with the pursuit. The one objection I can come up with that makes sense to me comes down to a question of loyalty. The objection is that the believer who's veering towards apostasy hasn't given their initial beliefs enough of a chance. How dare they jump ship at the first opportunity? It seems to me there's always some threshold to accepting or rejecting an idea, and the person who's asking a doubter to hang onto their first beliefs is asking them to move their rejection threshold further away, maybe an infinite distance away. This idea of a movable threshold seems helpful as I think through all the issues I'll be discussing in this essay. === Beliefs as obligations === Some have made a theological argument for this perspective of belief as an obligation. In ''Apologetics to the Glory of God'', John Frame argues that Christians (and all other people) have a duty to believe God as part of their overall duty to obey him. They should make their beliefs impervious to change by adopting Christian presuppositions as their foundation. This argument feels both right and wrong to me, so I keep it in mind as something to address. === Beliefs as wagers === Another concept that's helpful to me is the idea of belief as a form of gambling. When you decide to believe something, whether consciously or unconsciously, you're saying you're willing to risk claiming it's true. I like [https://rachelheldevans.com/blog/why-christian-conference-recap Rachel Held Evans' take]: "I am a Christian because, at the end of the day, the story of Jesus is the story I’m willing to risk being wrong about." So with each of these religious issues and the possible positions on them, some key questions I'll be asking are what risks of belief I'm willing to take, on what basis, and for what rewards. === Beliefs as experiments === A related perspective I'll use is that a belief is an experiment. You treat it as if it's true for the purpose of seeing where it gets you. If it ends up not working out as expected, given your threshold, you can trade it for another one, though doubtless with some kind of difficulty. === Types of belief === As I consider the conflicting religious ideas that swirl around in my head, I find I need to decide what counts as a belief. When you hear the word "belief," you might think it means "firm conviction," but many of my ideas that feel something like beliefs don't fit that description. They range from conviction all the way to speculation. Where's the cutoff point for including them here? Well, different kinds of belief will be more or less relevant to my goals in writing this essay, so I'll look at those briefly. Partly my goal is to have a starting point for moving toward several other broad goals: feeling more ideologically settled, interacting with Christians and non-Christians, thinking about issues of concern (based on my more settled ideology), and doing good. But largely my goal in this essay is to be open and express my ambivalent inner reality without unduly worrying the Christians I care about. I think I can approach that goal by starting with the places I'm closest to my Christian friends' beliefs. So generally speaking, for each section I'll cover the following types of belief-related ideas: * ideas I believe out of habit * ideas I'd like to believe * ideas I believe in practice * ideas I ''aim'' to believe in practice (ideals, you could say) * rational arguments that convince me for and against various ideas * areas of argument I'd like to investigate * threats to my rationality To highlight the ways I agree and disagree with my religious community, I'll comment on the statements of belief of various organizations I've been involved with. These are a good starting point because for the most part I've agreed with them in the past. I've moved around from one evangelical denomination to another, so my main source will be one that represents conservative evangelicalism in general, Wheaton College, where I did my bachelor's and master's degrees. I won't list specific ideas I'm open to believing, because that would take too long. Really I'm open to being convinced of just about anything, as long as it falls under my core ideals of reason and empathy. I'm much less open, for example, to views holding that only the strongest people should survive. === Simple belief === Some people might want to convince me by asking me to just believe whatever they do. But as much as I like to make people happy, I'll have to push back, at least in my head. This is because everybody's point of view is different, and everybody's point of view feels natural to them. How am I to decide between them? I need good reasons, so we have to be prepared for some hard work. == Bibliology == Where does our information about the religious realm come from? Christianity holds that it's from a divine revelation, and the question they debate is where that revelation is located. Among Christians, Protestants say it's the Bible. Catholics and Eastern Orthodox say it's primarily the church. Although I haven't moved away from Protestantism, my Christian side is inclined to agree that revelation is grounded in the church. For one thing, the church (meaning God's people) produced the Bible, which is an argument I've heard from Catholics, and it seems plausible to me. For another, there's the question of the canon. The Bible doesn't tell us which books belong in it. That came from the church, although even then it's not a tidy matter. There was no council that declared it, and different branches of the church have different canons (see Craig Allert's ''A High View of Scripture?''). And finally, most of the Bible's books were written within some context, and they don't record everything it seems we'd need to know about that context. It seems natural to think some of that context is contained in the church's traditions. To illustrate, I know you couldn't get a complete picture of my beliefs and ideas from my writings, and we have more of my writings than, say, Paul's. Paul wrote his letters mainly to churches where he'd preached, so it's plausible he told them things verbally that he didn't bother to write in the letters. But maybe those things were preserved by the church. I don't know how the Reformers conceptualized sola scriptura, but maybe they should've treated it as an experiment. After the Protestant church's half century of trying it, I don't think it's worked all that well. Christians can agree on very little, but especially Protestants, or at least they're very vocal and strident about their disagreements (see Christian Smith's ''The Bible Made Impossible''). If God wants unity, couldn't his revelation have been a little clearer and less messy? What's the relationship between the divine and human sources of the Bible? If we plot them on a spectrum, there are four views I normally think of. On the fundamentalist end there's the dictation view where God told the human writers exactly what to write. Next is the Chicago Statement on Biblical Inerrancy, a conservative evangelical document which basically says God allowed the human writers some freedom, but within that range he ensured they said everything he wanted and nothing that conflicted with it. On the left there's the view that the Bible is the work of human theologians grappling (fallibly) with the divine events they'd encountered. And on the very left is the skeptical view that the Bible is a purely human book. I don't know where the Catholic and Orthodox views land. At this point I'm hovering around the theologian view. I'd like to believe there's something divine going on, but the Bible does seem like a very human book, with conflicting facts and perspectives, culture-bound viewpoints, legend-like material, and even indications of propaganda (see Kenton Sparks' ''Divine Words in Human Words''). Rather than wrenching my mind to harmonize and rationalize all its apparent foibles with less than satisfying results, I'd rather experiment with the idea that the Bible is mostly human but grown from some divine seeds. On this issue the two basic questions for me are (1) what kind of pattern the Bible displays, something more human or something more divine, and (2) whether some other consideration overrides that pattern of evidence, such as the argument that the Bible doesn't lie because God doesn't (which is very inadequate, in my opinion, because it assumes a lot about God's agenda in giving us the Bible). I haven't even begun to examine how faithful to the church's origins its extrabiblical teachings might be or what would make us think they're true. I have doubts it's a tidier affair than the Bible. Traditional Protestants will be wondering, if we dilute the Bible's authority like this, how do we do theology? I don't know, but the [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biblical_hermeneutics#Trajectory_hermeneutics trajectory hermeneutic] is appealing to me. == Theology proper == == Christology == == Pneumatology == == Anthropology == == Soteriology == == Ecclesiology == == Eschatology == [[Category:Religion]] [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Developing]] 49c260e91f950e2b2e1282d4b3886782fac7d343 330 328 2018-04-01T02:51:12Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the "Potential sources" section. wikitext text/x-wiki What do you do when you're a confused Christian who's trying to live and work with other Christians? If you're me, you try to sort out your confusion by writing about it, and then you foolishly post it on your website for reference, without regard for consequences. The consequence you do care about is that at least you'll know where you stand, and then you can strategize about how to interact with other people about belief. This essay is an update to my [http://www.thinkulum.net/w/index.php?title=My_Current_Beliefs&oldid=107 2005 beliefs summary] and my [http://www.thinkulum.net/wiki/On_Being_an_Agnostic_Christian essay on agnostic Christianity] (here's the [http://www.thinkulum.net/wiki/On_Being_an_Agnostic_Christian:_The_Severely_Abridged_Version severely abridged version]). For convenience, I'm organizing this discussion by the traditional categories of systematic theology. But systematic theology covers a lot of topics under those categories, and I'll only be addressing the topics that are important to me. == Summary == Here's a 500-word overview. I've emphasized the parts that my conservative evangelical friends can appreciate: Though ''in practice I still believe in the basic Christian notion of God'', I'm vague on the details, and the arguments for God seem weak. The cosmological argument proves little. Evolutionists have a strong position. Fine tuning assumes that humanity is a goal, though ''maybe the argument can work'', but it proves little. The moral argument assumes an objective morality, when noncognitivism seems more likely. The ontological argument assumes absolute definitions of greatness for properties that seem subjective. The transcendental argument is an appeal to consequences and assumes particular positions on several philosophical issues. Proper basicality seems complicated and wrong, but I haven't investigated. ''Plantinga's evolutionary argument might work.'' Miracles need extraordinary evidence, and even then we can't rule out unknown laws of nature. Mystical experiences could be caused merely by the brain, since it's still so mysterious. But to be responsible, philosophy of religion needs to consider all concepts of God, not just the Christian ones. Religious authority is hard to establish. The Bible's teachings are fragmentary, its statements ambiguous. Its interpretations vary widely. It has problems of history and composition that aren't convincingly resolved. I see it as human writers trying to interpret life and history in light of their ideas of God. But ''I still see it as a beneficial source of challenging ideas that should shape my perspective.'' The church seems like a similarly messy source of authority, but I haven't investigated it. ''The Orthodox idea of the Church Fathers as authoritative based on their closeness to God intrigues me.'' ''I take Jesus more seriously'' than the rest of the Bible. I haven't investigated very far, but ''I think the Gospels probably got him mostly right.'' His teachings confuse me, and he seems less patient than I'd expect or want. ''Arguments for his bodily resurrection seem strong. I pray to him and assume he's in heaven interacting with the Father and the world.'' As for the rest, Christians agree on practically nothing, but I believe the following based on a mix of habit, experience, hearsay, logic, desire, and a residual attachment to the Bible as a source of theology. ''The Holy Spirit acts on people's minds to convict and inspire. I thank him for the good in my life. Sometimes I think of specific thoughts as being messages from him. The church is God's adopted family, represents him, and has no prescribed structure. People are saved when they ally themselves with Jesus. I think of the atonement as substitutionary and justification as imputed, and I vaguely believe in a traditional hell'', but my mind is open. I hope God can achieve universal salvation, but I don't count on it. I'm unclear on the soul's existence, since the brain is so tied to the mind, but ''certain near death experiences intrigue me. I don't know when or how Jesus will return'', so I treat the present world as if it'll continue indefinitely, though ''I do imagine a new creation in the hazy future.'' == Prolegomena == In systematic theology, the prolegomena covers general issues you should take care of before getting into the details of specific theological topics. A central issue for me is faith and reason--how they relate, which of them "wins" (if either), what our obligations are to each. === My belief spectrum === I have a growing skeptical side when it comes to religion, alongside my skepticism about everything else. My basic problem with belief is that the more I learn about how people think, the clearer I see how shaky and vulnerable human thought processes are. We get confused easily, except that a lot of the time we confuse our confusion for clarity, and we're confidently wrong. On top of this, I see that everything we think about God and the spiritual realm comes through human beings, whether they're religious authorities or our own minds. So I end up with the fundamental question, what makes us think we're not confused or even deceived about spiritual things? Yet I grew up in Christianity, specifically conservative evangelicalism, and I'm not ready to toss it all out the window. So I've ended up with two basic mindsets on each religious topic, a believing one and a skeptical one, and I switch between them based on the situation. So in this article I'll talk about both points of view I have for each issue. Really I'll sometimes have a range of perspectives, some more believing and some more skeptical. === Thresholds of belief === Some believers get offended when you question their beliefs. From a rational perspective this doesn't make much sense. Shouldn't people who value truth want to follow the pursuit of truth wherever it leads? Even if you think you've found the truth, it might be irritating to realize you still have more thinking to do, but should you object to it in principle? It seems like you should get over your irritation and get on with the pursuit. The one objection I can come up with that makes sense to me comes down to a question of loyalty. The objection is that the believer who's veering towards apostasy hasn't given their initial beliefs enough of a chance. How dare they jump ship at the first opportunity? It seems to me there's always some threshold to accepting or rejecting an idea, and the person who's asking a doubter to hang onto their first beliefs is asking them to move their rejection threshold further away, maybe an infinite distance away. This idea of a movable threshold seems helpful as I think through all the issues I'll be discussing in this essay. === Beliefs as obligations === Some have made a theological argument for this perspective of belief as an obligation. In ''Apologetics to the Glory of God'', John Frame argues that Christians (and all other people) have a duty to believe God as part of their overall duty to obey him. They should make their beliefs impervious to change by adopting Christian presuppositions as their foundation. This argument feels both right and wrong to me, so I keep it in mind as something to address. === Beliefs as wagers === Another concept that's helpful to me is the idea of belief as a form of gambling. When you decide to believe something, whether consciously or unconsciously, you're saying you're willing to risk claiming it's true. I like [https://rachelheldevans.com/blog/why-christian-conference-recap Rachel Held Evans' take]: "I am a Christian because, at the end of the day, the story of Jesus is the story I’m willing to risk being wrong about." So with each of these religious issues and the possible positions on them, some key questions I'll be asking are what risks of belief I'm willing to take, on what basis, and for what rewards. === Beliefs as experiments === A related perspective I'll use is that a belief is an experiment. You treat it as if it's true for the purpose of seeing where it gets you. If it ends up not working out as expected, given your threshold, you can trade it for another one, though doubtless with some kind of difficulty. === Types of belief === As I consider the conflicting religious ideas that swirl around in my head, I find I need to decide what counts as a belief. When you hear the word "belief," you might think it means "firm conviction," but many of my ideas that feel something like beliefs don't fit that description. They range from conviction all the way to speculation. Where's the cutoff point for including them here? Well, different kinds of belief will be more or less relevant to my goals in writing this essay, so I'll look at those briefly. Partly my goal is to have a starting point for moving toward several other broad goals: feeling more ideologically settled, interacting with Christians and non-Christians, thinking about issues of concern (based on my more settled ideology), and doing good. But largely my goal in this essay is to be open and express my ambivalent inner reality without unduly worrying the Christians I care about. I think I can approach that goal by starting with the places I'm closest to my Christian friends' beliefs. So generally speaking, for each section I'll cover the following types of belief-related ideas: * ideas I believe out of habit * ideas I'd like to believe * ideas I believe in practice * ideas I ''aim'' to believe in practice (ideals, you could say) * rational arguments that convince me for and against various ideas * areas of argument I'd like to investigate * threats to my rationality To highlight the ways I agree and disagree with my religious community, I'll comment on the statements of belief of various organizations I've been involved with. These are a good starting point because for the most part I've agreed with them in the past. I've moved around from one evangelical denomination to another, so my main source will be one that represents conservative evangelicalism in general, Wheaton College, where I did my bachelor's and master's degrees. I won't list specific ideas I'm open to believing, because that would take too long. Really I'm open to being convinced of just about anything, as long as it falls under my core ideals of reason and empathy. I'm much less open, for example, to views holding that only the strongest people should survive. === Simple belief === Some people might want to convince me by asking me to just believe whatever they do. But as much as I like to make people happy, I'll have to push back, at least in my head. This is because everybody's point of view is different, and everybody's point of view feels natural to them. How am I to decide between them? I need good reasons, so we have to be prepared for some hard work. == Bibliology == Where does our information about the religious realm come from? Christianity holds that it's from a divine revelation, and the question they debate is where that revelation is located. Among Christians, Protestants say it's the Bible. Catholics and Eastern Orthodox say it's primarily the church. Although I haven't moved away from Protestantism, my Christian side is inclined to agree that revelation is grounded in the church. For one thing, the church (meaning God's people) produced the Bible, which is an argument I've heard from Catholics, and it seems plausible to me. For another, there's the question of the canon. The Bible doesn't tell us which books belong in it. That came from the church, although even then it's not a tidy matter. There was no council that declared it, and different branches of the church have different canons (see Craig Allert's ''A High View of Scripture?''). And finally, most of the Bible's books were written within some context, and they don't record everything it seems we'd need to know about that context. It seems natural to think some of that context is contained in the church's traditions. To illustrate, I know you couldn't get a complete picture of my beliefs and ideas from my writings, and we have more of my writings than, say, Paul's. Paul wrote his letters mainly to churches where he'd preached, so it's plausible he told them things verbally that he didn't bother to write in the letters. But maybe those things were preserved by the church. I don't know how the Reformers conceptualized sola scriptura, but maybe they should've treated it as an experiment. After the Protestant church's half century of trying it, I don't think it's worked all that well. Christians can agree on very little, but especially Protestants, or at least they're very vocal and strident about their disagreements (see Christian Smith's ''The Bible Made Impossible''). If God wants unity, couldn't his revelation have been a little clearer and less messy? What's the relationship between the divine and human sources of the Bible? If we plot them on a spectrum, there are four views I normally think of. On the fundamentalist end there's the dictation view where God told the human writers exactly what to write. Next is the Chicago Statement on Biblical Inerrancy, a conservative evangelical document which basically says God allowed the human writers some freedom, but within that range he ensured they said everything he wanted and nothing that conflicted with it. On the left there's the view that the Bible is the work of human theologians grappling (fallibly) with the divine events they'd encountered. And on the very left is the skeptical view that the Bible is a purely human book. I don't know where the Catholic and Orthodox views land. At this point I'm hovering around the theologian view. I'd like to believe there's something divine going on, but the Bible does seem like a very human book, with conflicting facts and perspectives, culture-bound viewpoints, legend-like material, and even indications of propaganda (see Kenton Sparks' ''Divine Words in Human Words''). Rather than wrenching my mind to harmonize and rationalize all its apparent foibles with less than satisfying results, I'd rather experiment with the idea that the Bible is mostly human but grown from some divine seeds. On this issue the two basic questions for me are (1) what kind of pattern the Bible displays, something more human or something more divine, and (2) whether some other consideration overrides that pattern of evidence, such as the argument that the Bible doesn't lie because God doesn't (which is very inadequate, in my opinion, because it assumes a lot about God's agenda in giving us the Bible). I haven't even begun to examine how faithful to the church's origins its extrabiblical teachings might be or what would make us think they're true. I have doubts it's a tidier affair than the Bible. Traditional Protestants will be wondering, if we dilute the Bible's authority like this, how do we do theology? I don't know, but the [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biblical_hermeneutics#Trajectory_hermeneutics trajectory hermeneutic] is appealing to me. == Theology proper == == Christology == == Pneumatology == == Anthropology == == Soteriology == == Ecclesiology == == Eschatology == == Potential sources == This is a very incomplete, unsorted, inconsistently formatted list of sources from a variety of perspectives I might consult as I work through these issues. Allert, Craig D. ''A High View of Scripture? The Authority of the Bible and the Formation of the New Testament Canon''. Evangelical Ressourcement. Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2007. Bacote, Vincent, Laura C. Miguélez, and Dennis L. Okholm, eds. ''Evangelicals & Scripture: Tradition, Authority, and Hermeneutics''. Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2004. Bahnsen, Greg L. ''Van Til’s Apologetic: Readings and Analysis''. Phillipsburg, NJ: P&R Pub, 1998. Bauckham, Richard. ''Jesus and the Eyewitnesses: The Gospels as Eyewitness Testimony''. Grand Rapids, MI: William B. Eerdmans Pub. Co, 2006. Burkett, Delbert Royce. ''An Introduction to the New Testament and the Origins of Christianity''. Cambridge, UK; New York: Cambridge University Press, 2002. Carson, D. A., Douglas J. Moo, and Leon Morris. ''An Introduction to the New Testament''. New Testament Studies. Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 1992. Casey, Maurice. ''Jesus of Nazareth: An Independent Historian’s Account of His Life and Teaching''. London; New York: T&T Clark, 2010. Collins, John J. ''Introduction to the Hebrew Bible''. Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 2004. Cowan, Steven B., and William Lane Craig, eds. ''Five Views on Apologetics''. Counterpoints. Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Pub. House, 2000. Craig, William Lane, ed. ''Philosophy of Religion: A Reader and Guide''. New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 2002. ———. ''Reasonable Faith: Christian Truth and Apologetics''. 3rd ed. Wheaton, IL: Crossway Books, 2008. Dillard, Raymond B., and Tremper Longman. ''An Introduction to the Old Testament''. Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 1994. Frame, John M. ''Apologetics to the Glory of God: An Introduction''. Phillipsburg, NJ: P&R Pub, 1994. Geisler, Norman L. ''Baker Encyclopedia of Christian Apologetics''. Baker Reference Library. Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Books, 1999. Geivett, R. Douglas, and Gary R. Habermas, eds. ''In Defense of Miracles: A Comprehensive Case for God’s Action in History''. Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1997. Habermas, Gary R, and James Porter Moreland. ''Beyond Death: Exploring the Evidence for Immortality''. Eugene, Ore.: Wipf & Stock, 2004. Hoffmeier, James Karl, and Dennis Robert Magary, eds. ''Do Historical Matters Matter to Faith? A Critical Appraisal of Modern and Postmodern Approaches to Scripture''. Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2012. Keener, Craig S. ''Miracles: The Credibility of the New Testament Accounts''. Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2011. Kitchen, K. A. ''On the Reliability of the Old Testament''. Grand Rapids, MI: W.B. Eerdmans, 2006. Lewis, C. S. ''Mere Christianity: A Revised and Enlarged Edition, with a New Introduction, of the Three Books, the Case for Christianity, Christian Behaviour, and Beyond Personality''. New York: Macmillan Pub. Co., 1986. Licona, Mike. ''The Resurrection of Jesus: A New Historiographical Approach''. Downers Grove, Ill. : Nottingham, England: IVP Academic; Apollos, 2010. Merrick, J., and Stephen Garrett, eds. ''Five Views on Biblical Inerrancy''. Counterpoints: Bible and Theology. Grand Rapids, Michigan: Zondervan, 2013. Murray, Michael J., ed. ''Reason for the Hope Within''. Grand Rapids, MI: W.B. Eerdmans, 1999. Phillips, Timothy R., and Dennis L. Okholm, eds. ''Christian Apologetics in the Postmodern World''. Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1995. Piper, John. ''A Peculiar Glory: How the Christian Scriptures Reveal Their Complete Truthfulness''. Wheaton: Crossway, 2016. Plantinga, Alvin. ''God and Other Minds: A Study of the Rational Justification of Belief in God''. Cornell Paperbacks. Ithaca, N.Y: Cornell Univ. Press, 1990. ———. ''The Nature of Necessity''. Clarendon Library of Logic and Philosophy. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 2010. ———. ''Warranted Christian Belief''. New York: Oxford University Press, 2000. Smith, Christian. ''The Bible Made Impossible: Why Biblicism Is Not a Truly Evangelical Reading of Scripture''. Grand Rapids, MI: Brazos, 2011. Sparks, Kenton L. ''God’s Word in Human Words: An Evangelical Appropriation of Critical Biblical Scholarship''. Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2008. [[Category:Religion]] [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Developing]] ea7f5d33ec5bbf4f3b94c1948a2f3358666e4f1a 0 115 306 2017-05-29T13:39:27Z Andy Culbertson 1 Andy Culbertson moved page [[My Current Theology]] to [[My Current Beliefs]]: I wanted a broader term than "theology." wikitext text/x-wiki #REDIRECT [[My Current Beliefs]] 5ed50acbc35ee4b175f35f1ea785cf58ba194f77 0 116 310 2017-08-14T00:44:37Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the article. wikitext text/x-wiki The spiritual side of life is very important to me, but I've rarely found it very easy. And even though people talk about it a lot in the religious traditions I've been involved with--all conservative Protestant Christian, with some glances at Catholicism and Orthodoxy--they've often left me more confused and disappointed than truly helped. But it's not all bleak. So for myself and anyone else who's interested, I'm writing this (dry, analytical) essay to clarify my spirituality-related problems and views and to try to chart a way forward. It's a spin-off from my essay on theology, "[[My Current Beliefs]]." == Agenda == === A definition === I define spirituality as the activity of relating to God--that is, acting according to our relation to God as creatures and especially as Christians. Our relation to him is basically being created by him and being saved by him. Acting appropriately in this relation generally means serving and loving him. This differentiates into more specific behaviors, such as interacting with him in worship and prayer, obeying his commands, and loving his other creations, and these are activities that are also related to each other in various ways. === Coping === The problem is that I run into problems trying to do this in practice. For example: * I don't find the supporting ideas credible. * I don't find the specific ideas certain enough to support the practices. * I don't really know what the end goals are. What makes a good person? * Pain, or the threat of pain, stops me from being good, or I don't know how to respond to it in a good way. Of these, pain looms the largest. Despite my relatively placid life, it's the factor that comes up most often in my troubled thoughts on spirituality. It keeps me from deriving any encouragement from passages like Psalm 91 or even Jesus' words in Matthew 6:33. The dominance of pain in my spirituality leads me to the idea of formulating a coping-oriented spirituality. Other than continuing in the confused and conflicted state I've been in, my main alternative is to try to formulate a more traditional spirituality in a more consistent way than I've had in my mind. I'm sure this would make traditional evangelicals happy, but I'll probably do it later, if at all. This more traditional model would likely be specifically God oriented, centering my reflections around God's agenda. I'll probably need to do this to a certain degree to give my coping reflections a context, but I have two problems with a God-oriented approach. First, it might lead me to overlook problems I'm trying to solve. And second, it assumes a lot of theological settledness I don't have. === The individual === The question of a God-oriented framework returns me to a discussion from my undergraduate days, the book-vs-boy debate in Christian education: Which do you start with in teaching, the Bible or the student? Henrietta Mears said it should be the Bible--teach what the Bible says, and then relate it to the student's life. Lois LeBar said it should be the student--bring up a need or experience of the students, and then relate it to what the Bible says. To put it in software development terms, since that's closer to the world I live in now, should we be user driven or domain driven? Should we start our design process by considering our software users' needs or by analyzing the subject area the software will cover? When it comes to spirituality, I've always been on the user-first side, because I run into show-stopping problems when I start with the domain. The spirituality domain descriptions can seem irrelevant to the Christian user's goals, or they ignore the user's problems, or they seem simply wrong in some way. So I want a coping-oriented spirituality, but more broadly I want a user-oriented one. Specifically I want an individual-oriented spirituality, since we can also think of a group of people as a user of spirituality--the church. Even though some people think that's the way to go and I largely agree with their position, the community-oriented approach misses important points for me too, and it's not strictly necessary. Neither is starting with the domain. You can encompass the domain and the community with an individual-oriented approach, and starting with the individual makes sure everything gets connected back to the fundamental practical issue: that individuals are the ones who act. === Function and systems === The emphasis on acting surfaces a central feature of most models I create, which is that they are function oriented. By that I mean they start with goals and examine the means of reaching them. In examining function I also take a system-oriented approach, because I try to look at all the structures and dynamics involved in pursuing the goals I have in mind. == High-level framework == Here I'll outline a high-level view of my framework of spirituality. I derived this view by working backward conceptually from the challenges I face when trying to be spiritual. Later I'll drill down into more detailed viewpoints. === Goals, means, and dangers === My overall goal in life is joy, which I might define as a deeply satisfying sense of well-being that manifests itself on a spectrum from contentment to exhilaration. I expect to attain joy through virtue, comfort, growth, and relationship. From a Christian standpoint, salvation enhances and will fulfill these goals. Lack of salvation hinders and will destroy them. So you could say salvation is joy's overarching subgoal, and the other subgoals are something like components of salvation. Each of the components is endangered by certain threats and their fulfillments: temptation and vice, fear and pain, doubt and disbelief. For each joy subgoal, including salvation, my main questions are * How can I attain it? * How can I assess its status? For each danger, my basic question is, how can I cope with it? === Agents === In the pursuit of joy, I am not alone. There are other agents that relate to me in various ways: God, believers, non-believers, and non-human organisms. I might also include the non-living environment in this list. I have interactions with these agents, which break down into my actions toward them and theirs toward me. These interactions relate to salvation and its components in various ways. === Obligations and expectations === The actions have deontic levels, on a scale something like obligation, benefit, permission, and prohibition. For convenience I'll speak in terms of obligations. Toward others I have obligations, and correspondingly of them I have expectations. Obligations relate to values--qualities that encapsulate desired patterns of experience. Obligations especially relate to needs at various levels, such as needs of the agent, of the relationship between agents, and of the environments that support the agents. === Beliefs === On a more abstract level, I interact with ideas--with my beliefs about the realities that help or hinder my status and progress. This is because my beliefs shape my actions. And this is why temptation, fear, and doubt are dangers. Additionally, belief is another type of action, and some of the agents, such as God, care about the beliefs we hold. Virtue seems to entail certain beliefs. === Meaning === Another factor is the individual's internal network of meaning. This is the interconnected set of symbols and messages the person understands and associates with emotions. This network at least partly determines what kind of influence a religious message, activity, or experience will have on the person. === Key challenges === ==== God's disposition ==== Putting these pieces together, we come to two related key issues that especially grip me, in addition to the ones I've covered. One is God's disposition towards me. This partly ties in with how I can assess the status of my salvation, but once salvation is established, what is the tone of the resulting relationship? This is only one part of the overall dynamics of the relationship, but it's one that I think shapes them at a fairly fundamental level. Is God fully happy with me at all times? Does he get disappointed? angry? Does he tend to be more nurturing or more stern? Should I feel wary of him? How quickly should I feel forgiven when I confess? Knowing how God feels about the events of my life will shape how I feel about both myself and God, and these beliefs and emotions will shape how I interact with him. ==== Trusting God ==== The other key issue is whether I can trust God. Christians generally see trusting God as a virtue and one that enables other virtues; trusting him overrides temptation, fear, and doubt in some way; trusting him leads to salvation in some way. But what is he guaranteeing, how reliable does he prove to be, and how do his provisions compare to what I believe I need? If some of my needs remain unmet, how can I cope with them in a way that enables the virtue of trusting God? Trust is linked to both broader and narrower questions. The broader questions I have in mind are whether God is good and capable, which put the question of trust in the same family as the problem of evil: If God is good and all-powerful, yet evil exists, does God exist? If evil and God both exist, can I trust him to be both good and all-powerful? Or to ask a somewhat different but more personal question, can I trust him to be willing and able to take care of the things I care about? The narrower questions are whether and how I can carry out expected Christian practices, such as prayer, worship, and service. To fulfill them with love, confidence, persistence, and other virtues they're meant to have, it seems necessary that I believe certain ideas with conviction, basically that God is good and capable, and so his instructions can be trusted and the important things in life will be better if I obey him. I personally have no trouble assuming God can accomplish anything he wants, so my questions are about his goodness: How willing he is to accomplish things I care about? What kind of goodness does that mean he has? And how I can cope with that possibly painful kind of goodness? That is, how can I relate to it constructively, in a way that produces virtue in me? === Spirituality and theology === This essay is an adjunct to the article "[[My Current Beliefs]]," which covers my theology. So it's worth looking at how spirituality and theology relate. That is, what do I want to know from theology given my model of spirituality? I've found two main questions: (1) What does God expect of us? (2) What circumstances are helping or hindering us in meeting these expectations? There's a third one that isn't specifically related to spirituality but that I always want to answer: How do we know these things? Theology has input into that one too. == Planned updates == * Influences on my spirituality * Comments on spiritual practices [[Category:Religion]] [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Developing]] 2d40ae910cb7763355a2fce1965ca45e1f55b2d5 331 310 2018-04-07T02:01:39Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the "Potential sources" section. wikitext text/x-wiki The spiritual side of life is very important to me, but I've rarely found it very easy. And even though people talk about it a lot in the religious traditions I've been involved with--all conservative Protestant Christian, with some glances at Catholicism and Orthodoxy--they've often left me more confused and disappointed than truly helped. But it's not all bleak. So for myself and anyone else who's interested, I'm writing this (dry, analytical) essay to clarify my spirituality-related problems and views and to try to chart a way forward. It's a spin-off from my essay on theology, "[[My Current Beliefs]]." == Agenda == === A definition === I define spirituality as the activity of relating to God--that is, acting according to our relation to God as creatures and especially as Christians. Our relation to him is basically being created by him and being saved by him. Acting appropriately in this relation generally means serving and loving him. This differentiates into more specific behaviors, such as interacting with him in worship and prayer, obeying his commands, and loving his other creations, and these are activities that are also related to each other in various ways. === Coping === The problem is that I run into problems trying to do this in practice. For example: * I don't find the supporting ideas credible. * I don't find the specific ideas certain enough to support the practices. * I don't really know what the end goals are. What makes a good person? * Pain, or the threat of pain, stops me from being good, or I don't know how to respond to it in a good way. Of these, pain looms the largest. Despite my relatively placid life, it's the factor that comes up most often in my troubled thoughts on spirituality. It keeps me from deriving any encouragement from passages like Psalm 91 or even Jesus' words in Matthew 6:33. The dominance of pain in my spirituality leads me to the idea of formulating a coping-oriented spirituality. Other than continuing in the confused and conflicted state I've been in, my main alternative is to try to formulate a more traditional spirituality in a more consistent way than I've had in my mind. I'm sure this would make traditional evangelicals happy, but I'll probably do it later, if at all. This more traditional model would likely be specifically God oriented, centering my reflections around God's agenda. I'll probably need to do this to a certain degree to give my coping reflections a context, but I have two problems with a God-oriented approach. First, it might lead me to overlook problems I'm trying to solve. And second, it assumes a lot of theological settledness I don't have. === The individual === The question of a God-oriented framework returns me to a discussion from my undergraduate days, the book-vs-boy debate in Christian education: Which do you start with in teaching, the Bible or the student? Henrietta Mears said it should be the Bible--teach what the Bible says, and then relate it to the student's life. Lois LeBar said it should be the student--bring up a need or experience of the students, and then relate it to what the Bible says. To put it in software development terms, since that's closer to the world I live in now, should we be user driven or domain driven? Should we start our design process by considering our software users' needs or by analyzing the subject area the software will cover? When it comes to spirituality, I've always been on the user-first side, because I run into show-stopping problems when I start with the domain. The spirituality domain descriptions can seem irrelevant to the Christian user's goals, or they ignore the user's problems, or they seem simply wrong in some way. So I want a coping-oriented spirituality, but more broadly I want a user-oriented one. Specifically I want an individual-oriented spirituality, since we can also think of a group of people as a user of spirituality--the church. Even though some people think that's the way to go and I largely agree with their position, the community-oriented approach misses important points for me too, and it's not strictly necessary. Neither is starting with the domain. You can encompass the domain and the community with an individual-oriented approach, and starting with the individual makes sure everything gets connected back to the fundamental practical issue: that individuals are the ones who act. === Function and systems === The emphasis on acting surfaces a central feature of most models I create, which is that they are function oriented. By that I mean they start with goals and examine the means of reaching them. In examining function I also take a system-oriented approach, because I try to look at all the structures and dynamics involved in pursuing the goals I have in mind. == High-level framework == Here I'll outline a high-level view of my framework of spirituality. I derived this view by working backward conceptually from the challenges I face when trying to be spiritual. Later I'll drill down into more detailed viewpoints. === Goals, means, and dangers === My overall goal in life is joy, which I might define as a deeply satisfying sense of well-being that manifests itself on a spectrum from contentment to exhilaration. I expect to attain joy through virtue, comfort, growth, and relationship. From a Christian standpoint, salvation enhances and will fulfill these goals. Lack of salvation hinders and will destroy them. So you could say salvation is joy's overarching subgoal, and the other subgoals are something like components of salvation. Each of the components is endangered by certain threats and their fulfillments: temptation and vice, fear and pain, doubt and disbelief. For each joy subgoal, including salvation, my main questions are * How can I attain it? * How can I assess its status? For each danger, my basic question is, how can I cope with it? === Agents === In the pursuit of joy, I am not alone. There are other agents that relate to me in various ways: God, believers, non-believers, and non-human organisms. I might also include the non-living environment in this list. I have interactions with these agents, which break down into my actions toward them and theirs toward me. These interactions relate to salvation and its components in various ways. === Obligations and expectations === The actions have deontic levels, on a scale something like obligation, benefit, permission, and prohibition. For convenience I'll speak in terms of obligations. Toward others I have obligations, and correspondingly of them I have expectations. Obligations relate to values--qualities that encapsulate desired patterns of experience. Obligations especially relate to needs at various levels, such as needs of the agent, of the relationship between agents, and of the environments that support the agents. === Beliefs === On a more abstract level, I interact with ideas--with my beliefs about the realities that help or hinder my status and progress. This is because my beliefs shape my actions. And this is why temptation, fear, and doubt are dangers. Additionally, belief is another type of action, and some of the agents, such as God, care about the beliefs we hold. Virtue seems to entail certain beliefs. === Meaning === Another factor is the individual's internal network of meaning. This is the interconnected set of symbols and messages the person understands and associates with emotions. This network at least partly determines what kind of influence a religious message, activity, or experience will have on the person. === Key challenges === ==== God's disposition ==== Putting these pieces together, we come to two related key issues that especially grip me, in addition to the ones I've covered. One is God's disposition towards me. This partly ties in with how I can assess the status of my salvation, but once salvation is established, what is the tone of the resulting relationship? This is only one part of the overall dynamics of the relationship, but it's one that I think shapes them at a fairly fundamental level. Is God fully happy with me at all times? Does he get disappointed? angry? Does he tend to be more nurturing or more stern? Should I feel wary of him? How quickly should I feel forgiven when I confess? Knowing how God feels about the events of my life will shape how I feel about both myself and God, and these beliefs and emotions will shape how I interact with him. ==== Trusting God ==== The other key issue is whether I can trust God. Christians generally see trusting God as a virtue and one that enables other virtues; trusting him overrides temptation, fear, and doubt in some way; trusting him leads to salvation in some way. But what is he guaranteeing, how reliable does he prove to be, and how do his provisions compare to what I believe I need? If some of my needs remain unmet, how can I cope with them in a way that enables the virtue of trusting God? Trust is linked to both broader and narrower questions. The broader questions I have in mind are whether God is good and capable, which put the question of trust in the same family as the problem of evil: If God is good and all-powerful, yet evil exists, does God exist? If evil and God both exist, can I trust him to be both good and all-powerful? Or to ask a somewhat different but more personal question, can I trust him to be willing and able to take care of the things I care about? The narrower questions are whether and how I can carry out expected Christian practices, such as prayer, worship, and service. To fulfill them with love, confidence, persistence, and other virtues they're meant to have, it seems necessary that I believe certain ideas with conviction, basically that God is good and capable, and so his instructions can be trusted and the important things in life will be better if I obey him. I personally have no trouble assuming God can accomplish anything he wants, so my questions are about his goodness: How willing he is to accomplish things I care about? What kind of goodness does that mean he has? And how I can cope with that possibly painful kind of goodness? That is, how can I relate to it constructively, in a way that produces virtue in me? === Spirituality and theology === This essay is an adjunct to the article "[[My Current Beliefs]]," which covers my theology. So it's worth looking at how spirituality and theology relate. That is, what do I want to know from theology given my model of spirituality? I've found two main questions: (1) What does God expect of us? (2) What circumstances are helping or hindering us in meeting these expectations? There's a third one that isn't specifically related to spirituality but that I always want to answer: How do we know these things? Theology has input into that one too. == Planned updates == * Influences on my spirituality * Comments on spiritual practices == Potential sources == This is a very incomplete, unsorted, inconsistently formatted list of sources from a variety of perspectives I might consult as I work through these issues. Boa, Kenneth. ''Conformed to His Image: Biblical and Practical Approaches to Spiritual Formation''. Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2001. Calhoun, Adele Ahlberg. ''Spiritual Disciplines Handbook: Practices That Transform Us''. Revised and Expanded Edition. Downers Grove, IL: IVP Books, an imprint of InterVarsity Press, 2015. Foster, Richard J. ''Streams of Living Water: Celebrating the Great Traditions of Christian Faith''. 1st ed. San Francisco: HarperSanFrancisco, 1998. Kyle, Eric J. ''Living Spiritual Praxis: Foundations for Spiritual Formation Program Development''. Eugene, OR: PICKWICK Publications, 2013. ———. ''Sacred Systems: Exploring Personal Transformation in the Western Christian Tradition''. Eugene, OR: PICKWICK Publications, 2014. ———. ''Spiritual Being & Becoming: Western Christian and Modern Scientific Views of Human Nature for Spiritual Formation''. Eugene, OR: Pickwick Publications, 2015. Lehman, Karl. ''The Immanuel Approach: For Emotional Healing and for Life''. Immanuel Publishing, 2016. Lossky, Vladimir. ''The Mystical Theology of the Eastern Church''. Crestwood, NY: St. Vladimir’s Seminary Press, 1976. Pargament, Kenneth I. ''The Psychology of Religion and Coping: Theory, Research, Practice''. New York: Guilford Press, 1997. Vlachos, Hierotheos, and Effie Mavromichali. ''Orthodox Spirituality: An Introduction''. Levadia, Greece: Birth of the Theotokos Monastery, 1996. Willard, Dallas. ''Renovation of the Heart: Putting on the Character of Christ''. Colorado Springs, CO: NavPress, 2002. [[Category:Religion]] [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Developing]] c50852cc15375f8cd545be1274612433ec2be035 0 106 312 300 2017-09-05T03:05:33Z Andy Culbertson 1 Fixed some grammatical errors and added minor clarifications. wikitext text/x-wiki == Introduction == For most of my coding life, I have been the only user of my programs. I wrote them to aid my work or personal life, and only rarely did anyone else even see my code or watch it run. This wasn't on purpose. It just turned out that way. In my current job I do belong to a small development team, but our programs are still only for in-house use, so the only needs we have to consider are our own. This situation is starting to change. My programming projects are becoming more relevant to the outside world, and I want to share some of them as open source. This means I'm needing to reshape some of my programming practices and learn some areas of software development I've had the luxury of ignoring all these years. I haven't completely ignored these areas, though. I pick up on them here and there as I read about how other people code or as I see them in the software I use. Knowing that I'll probably need to know about them someday, I've kept a list. And now the time has come for me to fill in the details. I'm filling in the details here in this guide for two reasons. First, as I learn, writing helps me clarify my thoughts and keep them flowing. And second, posting my writing might help other people. So if you're like me and you've programmed mainly for yourself--what I call private coding--and you're starting to share your work with others--public coding--then maybe what I've learned so far can grease some of your own planning. This project consists of my reading other developers' advice, examining their code, deciding what to adopt and how to adapt it to my needs and preferences, and creating templates, procedures, reference materials, and anything else that might help me code well for a public user base. To give you an idea of my background, I've worked for the past 15 or so years in the publishing industry doing mostly text processing and some web development. The languages I'm most familiar with are Perl, Python, XSLT, and some JavaScript, with a smattering of PHP and VBA. I've spent almost all my time in Windows. I hope to branch out into at least Linux in the future, if only to expand my mind. This guide will be oriented toward Python for now, but I imagine a lot of its suggestions apply to other languages too. At this point it also centers around desktop command-line programs, but I'm hoping to expand it into other interfaces and environments. Since this guide is a place for me to learn, I welcome feedback, and I'm always open to arguments that my choices could be improved or suggestions for things I've missed. This is an early iteration of the guide, so it's incomplete, and a lot of it is only sketched out. == General coding guides == These are resources with advice on many aspects of writing good code. The ones I haven't read are on my to-read list. I'll probably be adding others. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Code_Complete Code Complete - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Art_of_Unix_Programming The Art of Unix Programming - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perl_Best_Practices Perl Best Practices - Wikipedia] Another resource that overlaps with this guide but covers more on the project management end of OSS is [http://producingoss.com/ Producing Open Source Software]. == Code examples == To show how I'm implementing these ideas in my own code, I'll refer to [https://github.com/thinkulum my GitHub repositories] throughout the guide, mainly my templates for [https://github.com/audreyr/cookiecutter cookiecutter], a Python app that creates project skeletons for any language, and my snippets for [https://www.sublimetext.com/ Sublime Text 2], the text editor I use. Snippets are templates Sublime inserts wherever you type the corresponding trigger strings. Here are projects that show up in lists of high quality code, so I'll examine some of them and include any relevant discoveries in the guide. All the projects I'm listing for now are in Python. * [https://launchpad.net/bzr Bazaar] * [https://github.com/boto/boto3 boto3] * [https://github.com/django/django Django] * [https://github.com/pallets/flask Flask] * [https://github.com/gevent/gevent gevent] * [https://www.mercurial-scm.org/downloads Mercurial] * [https://github.com/nltk/nltk NLTK] * [https://github.com/Pylons/pyramid Pyramid] * [https://github.com/reddit/reddit reddit] * [https://github.com/kennethreitz/requests Requests] * [https://github.com/zzzeek/sqlalchemy SQLAlchemy] * [https://github.com/kennethreitz/tablib Tablib] * [https://github.com/tornadoweb/tornado Tornado] * [http://trac.edgewall.org/browser/trunk/trac trac] * [https://github.com/twisted/twisted Twisted] * [https://github.com/rg3/youtube-dl youtube-dl] In addition to these, I keep a mental list of software with features I might want to emulate, even if I don't plan to study their code very thoroughly: * [https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Mozilla/Developer_guide/Source_Code Firefox] - automatic updating; possibly its add-on architecture, if it ever settles down * [https://wordpress.org/download/source/ WordPress] - plugin hooks == Software development methodology == I'll start with some general principles that direct my thinking about software development in general. These are the ideas behind agile development practices. [https://www.agilealliance.org/agile101/ Agile software development] is a paradigm that was created to answer waterfall development, the approach of planning all the features of a piece of software in advance, an effort that often ends up wasted because the customer's needs change in the middle of the project, so the software has to be redesigned. So agile development was intended to prevent overplanning. But using any development methodology will help prevent the opposite problem, which is a complete ''lack'' of structure and discipline. This results in a code organization scheme called a [http://www.laputan.org/mud/ big ball of mud]. I don't think my programs were complete mud, but the fact that I was the only one seeing or using my code let me get by with a lot of slacking. Slacking does keep you from working too hard, but it fails to prevent other kinds of problems. Agile software development seems like a good middle ground. Agile development encompasses a lot of principles and practices, and it has a lot of varieties, but for me at this point, its most important practices are incremental development, test-driven development, and refactoring. === Incremental development === [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iterative_and_incremental_development Incremental development] is the approach of adding a few features per release rather than developing the whole program at once. It lets users begin using the software earlier, and it lets the feature roadmap change without wasting much development effort on the original design. It's different from iterative development, but they normally go together, so I'm using incremental as shorthand for both. If you're a developer working on your own, the habit of small, frequent releases also can add accountability to the development process. It'll at least hold you accountable to work on the project, since other people will notice when the releases stop coming. It might even encourage you to code each feature well. A short release cycle does mean there's less time to get the code right, but there's also less time to procrastinate on getting it to work, and if you implement good programming practices, you'll waste less of that time debugging. Small, frequent releases can also help the developer avoid procrastination, since the tasks for a small release feel more achievable, similar to writing a [http://volokh.com/posts/1182282037.shtml zeroth draft] of a manuscript. There's little concern for polish, so a zeroth draft has fewer requirements to worry about, and therefore it's more likely to get written. A related practice is to deliberately trim your feature list for each release, captured in the [http://wiki.c2.com/?ExtremeProgramming Extreme Programming] practice [http://wiki.c2.com/?YouArentGonnaNeedIt You Aren't Gonna Need It]. One practice that's helping me think in terms of incremental development is using [http://scottchacon.com/2011/08/31/github-flow.html GitHub flow] as my version control workflow. In GitHub flow the master branch is reserved for deployable code, so anything I'm actively developing goes into a topically named branch off of master. Once the code related to that branch is ready for deployment, I merge that branch back into master. This procedure gets me to plan in terms of small clusters of features. I'll talk more about version control in the next main section. === Test-driven development === * [https://martinfowler.com/bliki/TestDrivenDevelopment.html TestDrivenDevelopment - Martin Fowler] * [http://agiledata.org/essays/tdd.html Introduction to Test Driven Development (TDD) - Agile Data] * [https://www.facebook.com/notes/kent-beck/rip-tdd/750840194948847/ RIP TDD - Kent Beck - Facebook] To get myself into the habit of writing tests first, I'm including it as a subtask for each function I note in my task manager (I use [https://nirvanahq.com/ Nirvana], an app designed with [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Getting_Things_Done GTD] in mind). I have a template for these subtasks, which I copy into the description of the tasks. At the moment the template looks like this: <pre> - Document - Test - Code - Commit </pre> Really I'll move back and forth between documenting, testing, and coding, but I'll check them off when I've completed the first instance of each of those subtasks for that function. A practice I'm starting to explore that takes TDD a step further is behavior-driven development. It allows you to derive tests from documentation that's both human readable and executable. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Behavior-driven_development Behavior-driven development - Wikipedia] * [https://github.com/cucumber/cucumber/wiki/Python Python - cucumber Wiki] - A short list of Cucumber alternatives for Python. === Refactoring === * [https://martinfowler.com/books/refactoring.html Refactoring - Martin Fowler] I don't have a specific refactoring procedure in place. I just do it when I notice the need. I'm hoping to study Fowler's book and learn to think in terms of the structures that refactoring creates. That way I can create them as I code and reduce the need to refactor. Some IDEs have tools to aid refactoring. I'm planning to test using the Sublime Text plugin [https://packagecontrol.io/packages/PyRefactor PyRefactor] for refactoring Python. == Version control == * [http://guides.beanstalkapp.com/version-control/intro-to-version-control.html An introduction to version control - Beanstalk Guides] I'm hosting my projects on GitHub (see the Distribution section), which means I'm using Git as my version control system. (Before that I was using Subversion via TortoiseSVN, which I still use for some non-GitHub projects.) I learned how to use Git from ''Git Essentials'' by Ferdinando Santacroce, and I try to follow its advice. For a reference I use ''Git Pocket Guide'' by Richard Silverman. Rather than typing all the Git commands myself, I'm lazy and use the GUI tool [https://www.gitkraken.com/ GitKraken]. As I said above, I use the GitHub flow workflow to organize my commits. GitHub has as [https://guides.github.com/introduction/flow/ guide] for it. == Coding style == * [https://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-0008/ PEP 8 -- Style Guide for Python Code - Python.org] I've picked up my coding style from various sources, including ''Perl Best Practices'', but PEP 8 is a good starting point that's specifically geared toward Python. == Project structure == * [http://docs.python-guide.org/en/latest/writing/structure/ Structuring Your Project - The Hitchhiker's Guide to Python] * [https://learnpythonthehardway.org/book/ex46.html Exercise 46: A Project Skeleton - Learn Python the Hard Way] I make a directory on my local machine named whatever I'm using for the GitHub URL (e.g., math-student-sim), and I create this structure inside it: <pre> docs/ <package>/ tests/ app.py LICENSE.md MANIFEST.in README.md setup.py </pre> My package name is usually the project name without the hyphens (e.g., mathstudentsim). I'll fill in more of the details in later sections. == Distribution == To distribute your code you need somewhere to host it, and I've chosen GitHub, since it's the one I hear the most about. * [http://kbroman.org/github_tutorial/ git/github guide - Karl Broman] == Installation == I haven't completely wrapped my mind around Python code distribution and installation, but for now I'm relying on people downloading the source from GitHub and running the setup script. Here are some more details on some of the issues that came up for me in the project structure guides above. * [https://docs.python.org/3/distutils/setupscript.html Writing the Setup Script - Distributing Python Modules (Legacy version)] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/9949420/how-to-configure-setup-py-to-have-pip-install-from-github-master How to configure setup.py to have pip install from GitHub master? - Stack Overflow] * [https://caremad.io/posts/2013/07/setup-vs-requirement/ setup.py vs requirements.txt - caremad] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/7923509/how-to-include-docs-directory-in-python-distribution How to include docs directory in python distribution - Stack Overflow] == Metadata == Users of your project will need certain information about it, and you'll need to keep this information somewhere. For Python modules this is in the setup script. * [https://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-0345/ PEP 345 -- Metadata for Python Software Packages 1.2 - Python.org] === Version numbers === * [https://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-0396/ PEP 396 -- Module Version Numbers - Python.org] * [http://semver.org/ Semantic Versioning] * [https://git-scm.com/book/en/v2/Git-Basics-Tagging Git Basics - Tagging - Git] * [https://help.github.com/articles/creating-releases/ Creating Releases - GitHub Help] I'm just following the guidelines in those articles. === License === * [http://choosealicense.com/ Choose an open source license] I've picked MIT as my default to give people freedom to use the code however they want and because I don't expect to have patents to license. == Tests == Based on the advice in ''Learn Python the Hard Way'', I've chosen nose as a test management tool, but since the [http://nose.readthedocs.io/en/latest/ future of nose] is uncertain, I'm using [https://github.com/nose-devs/nose2 nose2]. == User interface == === Command line === To make my projects usable quickly, I'm starting most of them with a command line interface. * [https://wiki.python.org/moin/CmdModule CmdModule - The Python Wiki] * [https://docs.python.org/3/library/cmd.html cmd - The Python Standard Library] I'm placing the commands in <code>cli.py</code> within the package. == Documentation == When you're coding for yourself, it's easy to forget about documentation, since you know how your code works and how to use it, and if you forget, you can reread it and figure it out. Deciphering your own code is annoying, but possibly less annoying than writing documentation. Usually when I'm in my lazy, non-documenting mode, I wait to comment pieces of the code during especially painful rereadings. I'd like to be nicer than that to people who aren't me. Documentation comes in several different kinds, based on its location, format, and intended audience. It might help to think of documentation as falling into two basic genres: cookbooks and references. References tell you how the project works, and cookbooks tell you how to navigate through the project to reach particular objectives. Tutorials, for example, are a type of cookbook. Audiences fall into about three main categories: end users, API users who are developers using the code to write plugins or outside apps, and project developers. As an overview, here's my take on the purpose and audience of documentation types you might find in Python projects, though most aren't limited to Python. Afterward I'll list links that discuss each type in more detail. * '''README''' - In a document in the root directory of the project. A cookbook that tells users and developers the basics of working with the project. * '''Docstrings''' - Mostly at the top of a function. A reference that tells API users how to use the function. * '''Command line help''' - In the docstrings of command handling functions and at the top of a script. A reference that tells the user how to use the script and its command. * '''Comments''' - Interspersed among lines of code. A reference that tells project developers what the code does and why. * '''Code self-documentation''' - Elements of coding style aimed at communicating the code's intentions. A reference that tells project developers and API users what the code does. Some developers try to substitute this technique for comments. * '''Project documentation''' - In documents separate from the code. A cookbook and reference that gives users and developers thorough information for working with the project. * '''Literate programming''' - Interspersed among chunks of code. A reference that gives developers detailed explanations of the reasoning behind the code. This type of documentation isn't common, but it could be a good idea for some projects. === General advice === * [http://docs.python-guide.org/en/latest/writing/documentation/ Documentation - The Hitchhiker's Guide to Python] - Covers a lot of these documentation types. * [https://docs.python.org/devguide/documenting.html Documenting Python - Python Developer's Guide - Python.org] - A style guide for the Python source code, which could be adopted for other projects. === README === Here's a recommendation of what to put in a README: * [http://www.writethedocs.org/guide/writing/beginners-guide-to-docs/ A beginner’s guide to writing documentation - Write the Docs] Here are some example READMEs that have helped me plan mine: * [https://gist.github.com/jxson/1784669 jxson/README.md] * [https://gist.github.com/PurpleBooth/109311bb0361f32d87a2 PurpleBooth/README-Template.md] * [https://gist.github.com/zenorocha/4526327 zenorocha/README.md] Here are some other lists of READMEs: * [https://changelog.com/posts/a-beginners-guide-to-creating-a-readme A Beginner's Guide to Creating a README] * [https://github.com/matiassingers/awesome-readme matiassingers/awesome-readme] * [https://github.com/repat/README-template repat/README-template] The initial README I came up with is [https://github.com/thinkulum/math-student-sim/blob/master/README.md here]. === Docstrings === Here are discussions of what to put in a docstring: * [https://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-0257/ PEP 257 -- Docstring Conventions - Python.org] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/3898572/what-is-the-standard-python-docstring-format What is the standard Python docstring format? - Stack Overflow] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Javadoc Javadoc - Wikipedia] - A documentation generator for Java code. The conventions Javadoc understands can be adapted for other languages. I'm evaluating tools for processing Python docstrings that use this format. My snippets for functions and modules will include docstring outlines. Then you need a tool to present the docstrings to the reader. For now I'm going with Sphinx, since Python developers seem to prefer it. Since it formats more than just docstrings, I've put its links in the "Project documentation" section below. === Command line help === Traditional command-line programs are run from the OS command line, and their help statement is called a usage message. On Unix-like OSes they may also have a man (manual) page. I'll talk about man pages in the "Project documentation" section. Python has the <code>cmd</code> module for creating a command-line interpreter within your program, and each of your program's commands can also have a help message, contained in the command function's docstring. My snippets for scripts and command functions will include outlines for usage and help messages. ==== Usage message ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Usage_message Usage message - Wikipedia] * [http://courses.cms.caltech.edu/cs11/material/general/usage.html How to write usage statements - CS 11 - Caltech] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/17314872/shell-scripts-conventions-to-write-usage-text-for-parameters Shell scripts: conventions to write usage text for parameters? - Stack Overflow] * [https://github.com/docopt/docopt docopt (Python implementation)] - A library that checks the user's command line arguments by parsing the script's usage message. Even if you're not using docopt, it gives you a convenient set of conventions for formatting usage messages. * [https://docs.python.org/3/library/argparse.html argparse - Python.org] - Moves in the opposite direction from docopt, generating a usage message from a specification. ==== Command help ==== I haven't found any conventions for <code>cmd</code> help text, and the examples I've seen have been free-form descriptions. Maybe it would make sense to treat each command as a separate program and use usage message conventions for its help. === Comments and self-documentation === Comments and self-documentation are the two sides of the code clarity coin. Code comments are one of the [http://www.hacker-dictionary.com/terms/holy-wars holy wars] of programming--everyone has a strongly held view and debates it vigorously. I basically agree with the views in these articles: * [https://visualstudiomagazine.com/articles/2013/06/01/roc-rocks.aspx Why You Shouldn't Comment (or Document) Code - Visual Studio Magazine] * [https://sourcemaking.com/refactoring/smells/comments Comments - Source Making] * [https://www.pluralsight.com/blog/software-development/code-comments-dos-and-donts Code comments: A quick guide on when (and when not) to use them - Pluralsight] That is, comments are a liability, so for the most part write them as little as possible, and update them when you update the code. Make your code as clear as you can (see the self-documentation section), and comment only to communicate what the code can't on its own, such as its purpose and the reasoning behind your choices in implementing it. If nothing else, comments can be a good indication of places that need refactoring. I don't think it's necessary to stick to one procedure for commenting, but generally when I've commented more, it's because I've paused after a chunk of coding time, such as when I've finished a function. I code in paragraphs, sets of related lines separated by a blank line. In the commenting phase I reread the code I've just written and try to summarize or justify each paragraph, if needed. Stepping back from the code to state things in English sometimes leads to improvements in the code--refactoring or bug fixes. Here are some in-depth discussions on making code self-documenting: * [http://wiki.c2.com/?SelfDocumentingCode Self Documenting Code - WikiWikiWeb] * [http://wiki.c2.com/?SystemMetaphor System Metaphor - WikiWikiWeb] * [https://m.signalvnoise.com/hunting-for-great-names-in-programming-16f624c8fc03 Hunting for great names in programming - Signal v. Noise] Every solution has its own problems. Self-documentation can go wrong too, and in some of the same ways comments can. For example, your function name doesn't have to have anything to do with its contents. Here are a bunch of tricks for wrecking your code's clarity: * [http://mindprod.com/jgloss/unmain.html unmaintainable code - Java Glossary] On the problem that documentation isn't executable, behavior-driven development might give us a partial solution. See the links in the test-driven development section above. === Project documentation === READMEs give the reader a basic intro to your project, but at some point they'll need more extensive information. I'm calling this in-depth treatment the project documentation. ==== Documentation generation ==== Some documentation is freeform writing, but using [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Documentation_generator documentation generators] a lot of it can be collected from specialized comments and formatted automatically. You'd mainly use this to document your API. Sphinx is a popular Python tool for this purpose. It handles both types of documentation. * [http://www.sphinx-doc.org/en/stable/ Sphinx] My default Sphinx setup will be in my cookiecutter templates. ==== Content ==== I didn't find many guides to writing user or developer guides beyond the README, so I may have to write my own at some point, based on an examination of well-documented projects. But here's one guide that covers some of the information developers will need: * [https://www.ctl.io/developers/blog/post/how-to-document-a-project How to Document a Project - CenturyLink Cloud Developer Center] One source of insight for documenters might be the content of man pages. Man (manual) pages are the documentation for Unix tools, and they have a fairly standard format. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Man_page man page - Wikipedia] * [https://liw.fi/manpages/ Writing manual pages - Lars Wirzenius] * [http://www.schweikhardt.net/man_page_howto.html The Linux Man Page How-to - Jens Schweikhardt] === Literate programming === In spite of what I said about comments and self-documentation, sometimes I really want to expound on the meaning of my code, and literate programming is the way to do it. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Literate_programming Literate programming - Wikipedia] * [http://akkartik.name/post/literate-programming Literate programming: Knuth is doing it wrong - Kartik Agaram] Python tools: * [https://sourceforge.net/projects/pywebtool/ pyWeb] - After glancing at a few, I chose pyWeb as probably the closest to what I was looking for. * [http://mpastell.com/pweave/ Pweave] - A feature-rich tool I might try at some point. My first attempt at literate programming is my [https://github.com/thinkulum/math-student-sim Math Student Simulator]. See the README for basic details on writing and processing the source files. == Configuration == When you're coding for yourself, it's easy to keep all the variables inside the code files, since you can just open the files and change the values whenever you want. But when you have outside users, you don't necessarily want them changing the code, and if the code is compiled into binary executables, they can't change it anyway. Plus, separating code and data makes your program easier to think about. So you'll want to put the user-settable data in external files. There are at least two questions to answer: what format to store the settings in and where to store them. === Format === Here are some discussions that cover several formats: * [http://pyvideo.org/pycon-us-2009/pycon-2009--a-configuration-comparison-in-python-.html A Configuration Comparison in Python - PyCon 2009 - PyVideo] (video). * [https://martin-thoma.com/configuration-files-in-python/ Configuration files in Python - Martin Thoma] - Examples of most of the formats I'm listing here. * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/8225954/python-configuration-file-any-file-format-recommendation-ini-format-still-appr Python configuration file: Any file format recommendation? INI format still appropriate? Seems quite old school - Stack Overflow] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/5055042/whats-the-best-practice-using-a-settings-file-in-python What's the best practice using a settings file in Python? - Stack Overflow] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/186916/configuration-file-with-list-of-key-value-pairs-in-python Configuration file with list of key-value pairs in python - Stack Overflow] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/1726802/what-is-the-difference-between-yaml-and-json-when-to-prefer-one-over-the-other What is the difference between YAML and JSON? When to prefer one over the other - Stack Overflow] * [http://www.robg3d.com/2012/06/why-bother-with-python-and-config-files/ Why bother with python and config files? - RobG3d] I've sorted these formats roughly in order of increasing complexity. ==== CSV ==== * [https://docs.python.org/3/library/csv.html csv - The Python Standard Library] Pros: * It's simple. * Some version of it is supported in many languages. * It's fairly easy to import and export. Cons: * It's a little hard to read, especially when the lines get long. * It's limited to simple data. * It doesn't enforce data types. * It doesn't have a standard format. ==== INI ==== * [https://docs.python.org/3/library/configparser.html configparser - The Python Standard Library] * [https://pypi.python.org/pypi/configobj/ ConfigObj - PyPI] - This one has a few more features than configparser. Pros: * It's easy to read. * It's easy to avoid syntax errors (given a particular format). * Some version of it is supported in many languages. * It's easy to import and export. Cons: * It's limited to simple data. * It doesn't enforce data types (unless you use ConfigObj). * It doesn't have a standard format. ==== JSON ==== * [https://docs.python.org/3/library/json.html json - The Python Standard Library] Pros: * It enables multiple data types. * It enables complex data structures. * It's supported in many languages. * It's easy to import and export. Cons: * It's easy to commit syntax errors, especially if you're not familiar with the format. * It can be hard to read, especially if it's not pretty printed or if it uses complex data structures. ==== YAML ==== * [http://pyyaml.org/ PyYAML] Pros: * It enables multiple data types. * It enables complex data structures. * It's supported in many languages. * It's easy to import and export. * It's easy to read if you stick to simple data structures. Cons: * It can be hard to write if you use its more complex features. I'm trying out YAML as my default choice. ==== XML ==== There are a few major Python tools for working with XML: * [http://lxml.de/tutorial.html lxml.etree Tutorial - lxml] * [https://www.crummy.com/software/BeautifulSoup/ Beautiful Soup - Crummy: The Site] - It's mainly meant for HTML, but it parses XML too. * [https://docs.python.org/3/library/xml.etree.elementtree.html xml.etree.ElementTree - The Python Standard Library ] Here's some discussion of the use of XML for configuration: * [https://commons.apache.org/proper/commons-configuration/userguide/howto_hierarchical.html Hierarchical Configurations - Apache Commons Configuration User Guide] Pros: * It enables multiple data types. * It enables complex data structures. * It's supported in many languages. * It's easy to import. Cons: * It doesn't have a standard format for representing configuration. * It can be hard to read. * It can be hard to export if the starting format isn't compatible. * Enforcing data types requires an additional schema. ==== Python ==== You can use regular Python code to define settings, usually by putting them in their own module. I'd personally only use Python for configuration in special cases. Here are some recommendations and warnings: * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/10439486/loading-settings-py-config-file-into-a-dict Loading settings.py config file into a dict - Stack Overflow] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/2259427/load-python-code-at-runtime load python code at runtime - Stack Overflow] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/6198372/most-pythonic-way-to-provide-global-configuration-variables-in-config-py Most Pythonic way to provide global configuration variables in config.py? - Stack Overflow] * [https://pypi.python.org/pypi/pyconfig pyconfig - PyPI] * [https://ralsina.me/posts/python-is-not-a-configuration-file-format.html Python is Not a Configuration File Format - Lateral Opinion] Pros: * It enables multiple data types. * It enables complex data structures. * It enables using conditions to set values. * If your code is already in Python, it doesn't require learning an additional language. * Importing is very easy. Cons: * It mixes code and data, which makes the program harder to think about. * It can create a security risk, since users can add arbitrary code to the configuration file for the program to run. * Exporting can be hard or impossible. * It can be hard to read, depending on the code. * It doesn't have a standard format for representing configuration. * It can be easy to commit syntax errors. ==== Database ==== The formats I've already covered are plain text formats that a human can read and edit. Another option is putting the settings in a binary database and accessing them through a separate UI. The advantages are that you can enforce data types and the user isn't editing the settings file directly, which leaves it less open to syntax errors. For settings to be set by non-technical end users, this is probably the best option. * [https://docs.python.org/3/library/sqlite3.html sqlite3 - The Python Standard Library] Pros: * It's hard for the user to commit syntax errors. * It enables multiple data types. * You can control access to the settings. * It's supported in many languages. * It can be easy to import and export. Cons: * Complex data structures are hard to represent, or they require an additional format. * You have to code a UI for viewing and setting values. === Location === Where should you put your config file? Depending on the circumstances, you might need more than one file, and they might need to go in different locations. Generally speaking, you might separate global and user settings into different files. Global settings might go in the app's root directory or a config subdirectory, and user settings somewhere in a user directory. * [https://pypi.python.org/pypi/appdirs appdirs - PyPI] - A Python module for finding various directories across platforms, such as the user data, a possible location for a config file. == Logging == You need some kind of reporting even when you're coding for yourself, because to debug your program, you have to know what's going on as it runs. But when you're coding for yourself, you can usually afford to be minimal and undisciplined about it. When you might get bug reports from outside users, among other reasons, your program needs to write relevant state and event information to a file they can share. * [https://docs.python.org/3/library/logging.html logging - The Python Standard Library] * [http://python-guide-pt-br.readthedocs.io/en/latest/writing/logging/ Logging - The Hitchhiker's Guide to Python] * [https://www.blog.pythonlibrary.org/2012/08/02/python-101-an-intro-to-logging/ Python 101: An Intro to logging - Mouse vs Python] * [https://fangpenlin.com/posts/2012/08/26/good-logging-practice-in-python/ Good logging practice in Python - Fang's coding note] [More sections to come] <disqus/> [[Category:Programming]] [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Developing]] acad5c993dfa7ca527a47ebb71ced10a06d1c75c 0 117 313 2017-09-24T06:02:45Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the article. wikitext text/x-wiki Science is a continual march forward. The past is a mass of ignorance and superstition. Looking back is a mistake. Right? Well, maybe not completely. It turns out some thinkers of the past still have things to say. On this page I'm collecting examples of researchers who are using modern techniques to reexamine the work of past scientists and scholars. Feel free to suggest other examples in the comments. == Sciences == === Physics === ==== Robert Grosseteste (c. 1170-1253) ==== * [https://ordered-universe.com/about-the-ordered-universe/ About the Ordered Universe - Ordered Universe] - "Bringing together a unique configuration of natural scientists, social scientists and arts and humanities scholars, the project integrates the conceptual tools of modern science with the textual methods of the humanities to explore the richness of Grosseteste’s thought. ... We have challenged academic and public preconceptions regarding the value of past science as ‘irrelevant’. To the contrary: the team has published new science (on rainbows, colour and cosmology) inspired by engaging with another thinker from eight centuries ago." * [https://www.newscientist.com/article/dn25223-medieval-multiverse-heralded-modern-cosmic-conundrums/ Medieval multiverse heralded modern cosmic conundrums - New Scientist] - An example of the Ordered Universe project's work. "When physicists translated a 13th-century Latin text into modern equations, they discovered that the English theologian who wrote it had unwittingly predicted the idea of the multiverse in 1225. While the work probably won’t advance current models, it does show that some of the philosophical conundrums posed by cosmology are surprisingly pervasive." === Chemistry === ==== Alchemy ==== * [http://pubs.acs.org/cen/science/89/8935sci4.html Lawrence Principe - Chemical & Engineering News] - "Principe, a professor of both organic chemistry and the history of science at Johns Hopkins University, researches and reconstructs the lab work of late-medieval and early-modern alchemists with the goal of understanding their motives, what they actually knew, and how they helped shape modern-day chemistry." * [http://cenblog.org/newscripts/2011/08/reconstructing-alchemical-experiments/ Reconstructing Alchemical Experiments - Chemical & Engineering News] - An example of Principe's work, discovering the conditions for reproducing George Starkey's "tree" of gold. These studies are on the edge of my definition of ancient thought mining. Principe's purpose is primarily historical, but along the way he makes some surprising finds that could add some knowledge to modern chemistry. === Biology === ==== Medieval medicine ==== * [https://recipes.hypotheses.org/8728 Ancientbiotics: Medieval Medicines for Modern Infections - The Recipes Project] - The Ancientbiotics project surveys and tests remedies from past centuries in order to combat antimicrobial resistance. "As a truly interdisciplinary effort between the Arts and Sciences, the Ancientbiotics project has opened new and significant pathways to antimicrobial drug discovery, but it has also challenged the popular categorization of the medieval period as a ‘Dark Age,’ and the centuries-long pattern of dismissing medieval medical texts as ‘unenlightened’ by reason and scientific discovery." === Psychology === ==== The seven deadly sins tradition ==== * [https://www.amazon.com/Dangerous-Passions-Deadly-Sins-Psychology/dp/1587433532/ Dennis Okholm, ''Dangerous Passions, Deadly Sins: Learning from the Psychology of Ancient Monks''] - "My contention is that ascetic theologians and monastics of the fourth through seventh centuries (particularly Evagrius, Cassian, and Gregory) provide the church with a psychology which is not only specifically Christian in its orientation, but relevant to modern people if taken seriously. At the same time, quite often the claims ascetic theologians and monastics make about life issues are borne out by the empirical observations of contemporary psychology." (8) == Humanities == Drawing from the past is fairly common in the humanities. Some scholars, though, are especially purposeful about it. === Philosophy === ==== Natural law theory ==== * [http://newbooksnetwork.com/alejandra-mancilla-the-right-of-necessity-moral-cosmopolitanism-and-global-poverty-rowman-and-littlefield-2016/ Alejandra Mancilla, ''The Right of Necessity: Moral Cosmopolitanism and Global Poverty'' (Rowman and Littlefield 2016) - New Books in Global Ethics and Politics] - Mancilla draws from the work of older thinkers such as Grotius and Samuel von Pufendorf to examine the rights of the poor in meeting their own needs. "Grotius's project nowadays has been rescued and ... some people have tried to separate his ideas from this theological background ... [I]f you take Pufendorf's discourse, it's quite easy to cache it out in contemporary terms in the language of human rights. For Grotius that is not such an easy step to take. So ... contra Alisdair MacIntyre, for example, who would be totally opposed to taking old concepts and reapplying them to contemporary contexts, ... I think that so long as you keep in mind the different contexts and the different discussions, it is very useful, and it is very illuminating to bring old concepts back and see what they can do for us." (28:01) * [http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/japp.12170/full What the Old Right of Necessity Can Do for the Contemporary Global Poor - Journal of Applied Philosophy] - An article summarizing Mancilla's book. "Some may point out that one need not go all the way back to the medieval and early modern accounts of the right of necessity, considering that this right is already recognised in most penal codes around the world ... On the contrary, as I said above, the point of reviving the medieval and early modern conception of the right of necessity is that it expands both the origin and kind of need that make its exercise permissible." === Religion === ==== Retrieval theology ==== * [https://www.amazon.com/Theology-Retrieval-Receiving-Renewing-Church/dp/0830824677/ W. David Buschart and Kent Eilers, ''Theology as Retrieval: Receiving the Past, Renewing the Church''] - "As we use the term, 'retrieval' names a ''mode or style of theological discernment'' that looks back in order to move forward. ... Thus, while the moment at hand faces the theologian with challenges and opportunities, her response is generated by unembarrassed recourse to the doctrinal, liturgical, and spiritual assets of the Christian tradition. Such recourse is many times not uncritical, but it is nonetheless caused by the theologian's mindfulness of her place in the middle of a tradition of faith from which forgotten, lost or unappreciated resources wait to be recruited. ... In this way, theologies of retrieval are not doing anything fundamentally novel; rather they ''intensify'' an element of Christian theological method present from its inception." (12, 13, 21) * [https://www.amazon.com/Invitation-Analytic-Christian-Theology/dp/0830840958/ Thomas H. McCall, ''An Invitation to Analytic Christian Theology''] - "''[A]nalytic theology'' signifies a commitment to employ the conceptual tools of analytic philosophy where those tools might be helpful in the work of constructive Christian theology. ... [While some analytic theology studies the work of past centuries using analytic tools,] [o]ther analytic theology listens closely and respectfully to the tradition but seeks to go beyond exposition and explanation. This work actively evaluates various theological proposals from the tradition, and does so critically as it tries to mine the riches of the tradition for theological materials that will be useful in constructive work. " (Kindle locations 128-129, 1288-1291) <disqus/> [[Category:STEM]] [[Category:Social science]] [[Category:Religion]] [[Category:Philosophy]] [[Category:Lists]] [[Category:Ongoing]] 18d4c41292ae63fcf62b8940122db108344e61f3 14 118 314 2017-09-24T06:06:24Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the category. wikitext text/x-wiki These are short articles I mean to expand, analogous to Wikipedia's [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Stub stubs]. [[Category:Statuses]] 8700e093ce39dce5353cc528a7827c9982ce91da 14 119 315 2017-09-24T06:10:15Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the category. wikitext text/x-wiki These are articles that don't necessarily have a final state, such as a list that could be extended indefinitely. 7b7682f1aed447a360c55f476790f1a13997743c 0 101 316 272 2017-09-24T06:12:16Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the Lists and Ongoing categories. wikitext text/x-wiki == General resources == === Articles === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Fringe_theory Category: Fringe theory - Wikipedia] === Forums === * [https://www.reddit.com/r/FringeTheory/ Fringe Theory - Reddit] === Podcasts === * [http://www.stufftheydontwantyoutoknow.com/ Stuff They Don't Want You to Know] == Skeptics == === Websites === * [http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Main_Page RationalWiki] * [http://www.skepdic.com/ The Skeptic's Dictionary] * [http://www.snopes.com/ Snopes] === Podcasts === * [http://www.yrad.com/cs/ The Conspiracy Skeptic] * [https://pseudoastro.wordpress.com/ Exposing PseudoAstronomy] * [http://edgydoc.com/about-ba/ QuackCast] * [http://www.trcpodcast.com/ The Reality Check] == Alternative science == === General === * [http://www.dmoz.org/Science/Anomalies_and_Alternative_Science/ Anomalies and Alternative Science - DMOZ] === Physics === ==== The Reciprocal System of Theory ==== * [http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Reciprocal_Theory Reciprocal Theory - RationalWiki] === Cosmology === ==== The Flat Earth ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modern_flat_Earth_societies Modern flat Earth societies - Wikipedia] * [https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLltxIX4B8_URNUzDE2sXctnUAEXgEDDGn Flat Earth Clues (playlist) - Mark Sargent - YouTube] === History === ==== General ==== * [https://www.reddit.com/r/AlternativeHistory/ Alternative History - Reddit] ==== The Great Sphinx of Giza ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sphinx_water_erosion_hypothesis Sphinx water erosion hypothesis - Wikipedia] === Cryptozoology === ==== Cryptids ==== ===== The Bridgewater Triangle ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bridgewater_Triangle Bridgewater Triangle - Wikipedia] * [http://spookysouthcoast.com/ Spooky Southcoast] - A paranormal radio show located near the Bridgewater Triangle. Each year they have an episode about it. ===== Living dinosaurs ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Living_dinosaur Living dinosaur - Wikipedia] ===== The Jersey Devil ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jersey_Devil Jersey Devil - Wikipedia] ===== Skinwalker Ranch ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skinwalker_Ranch Skinwalker Ranch - Wikipedia] ===== The Mothman ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mothman Mothman - Wikipedia] ===== The Loch Ness Monster ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loch_Ness_Monster Loch Ness Monster - Wikipedia] ===== Bigfoot ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patterson–Gimlin_film Patterson–Gimlin film - Wikipedia] - I don't care much about Bigfoot in general, but this film is intriguing. ==== Cryptid researchers ==== ===== Loren Coleman ===== * [http://cryptomundo.com/lorencoleman/ Bio of Loren Coleman - Cryptomundo] ===== JC Johnson ===== * [https://www.youtube.com/user/cryptofourcorners JC Johnson - YouTube] * [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f33Ccevaez4 Ahhh Real Monsters!!! Stories Of Cryptozoology With Jc Johnson - TruthSeekah - YouTube] === Psychology === ==== ESP ==== ===== Diane Hennacy Powell ===== * [http://dianehennacypowell.com/consciousness/telepathy-project/ The Telepathy Project - Diane Hennacy Powell] ===== Rupert Sheldrake ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rupert_Sheldrake Rupert Sheldrake - Wikipedia] ==== The pineal gland ==== * [http://www.stufftheydontwantyoutoknow.com/podcasts/pineal-gland-eye/ The Pineal Gland: A Third Eye? - Stuff They Don't Want You to Know Podcast] * [http://www.vice.com/read/dmt-you-cannot-imagine-a-stranger-drug-or-a-stranger-experience-365 DMT: You Cannot Imagine a Stranger Drug or a Stranger Experience - Vice] - I don't condone the illegal use of hallucinogens and have no plans to try them, but this research is interesting. == Conspiracies == === General === * [http://www.dmoz.org/Society/Issues/Conspiracy/ Conspiracy - DMOZ] * [https://www.reddit.com/r/conspiracy/ Conspiracy - Reddit] * [http://www.conspiracyanddemocracy.org/ Conspiracy and Democracy - Cambridge University] - An academic project to study the nature of conspiracy theories, how they work, and their role in society. * Burnett, Thom. [http://www.worldcat.org/title/conspiracy-encyclopedia-the-encyclopedia-of-conspiracy-theories/oclc/62162975 ''Conspiracy Encyclopedia'']. New York: Chamberlain Bros., 2005. * Weishaupt, Isaac. [https://www.amazon.com/Grand-Unified-Conspiracy-Theory-Illuminati-ebook/dp/B00CR0Z38U ''A Grand Unified Conspiracy Theory: The Illuminati, Ancient Aliens, and Pop Culture'']. 2013. === The Illuminati === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Illuminati Illuminati - Wikipedia] * [http://www.podcastchart.com/podcasts/out-of-darkness-into-the-light/episodes/illuminati-agent-alex-jones-was-comedian-bill-hicks-says-mark-jungwirth Out of Darkness, Into the Light] (podcast) === The New World Order === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_World_Order_(conspiracy_theory) New World Order (conspiracy theory) - Wikipedia] === The shadow government === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shadow_government_(conspiracy) Shadow government (conspiracy) - Wikipedia] === The Watchers === * [http://kingdomintelligencebriefing.com/ Kingdom Intelligence Briefing] (podcast) === The JFK assassination === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assassination_of_John_F._Kennedy Assassination of John F. Kennedy - Wikipedia] == UFOs and aliens == === General === * [http://ufos.about.com/ UFOs and Aliens - About.com] * [http://www.whoswhointhecosmiczoo.com/ Who's Who in the Cosmic Zoo?] === UFO sightings === ==== The Phoenix Lights ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phoenix_Lights Phoenix Lights - Wikipedia] ==== The 2006 O'Hare International Airport UFO sighting ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2006_O%27Hare_International_Airport_UFO_sighting 2006 O'Hare International Airport UFO sighting - Wikipedia] === UFO researchers === ==== Jacques Vallée ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacques_Vallée Jacques Vallée - Wikipedia] ==== Hugh Ross ==== * [http://www.toledoblade.com/Religion/2003/01/04/Astronomer-links-UFOs-to-occultism.html Astronomer links UFOs to occultism - Toledo Blade] ==== Steven Greer ==== * [http://www.disclosureproject.org/ The Disclosure Project] === Alien races === ==== The Dutch ==== It is widely known that the Netherlands is on another planet and that the country's border is a portal to that planet. The Dutch, contrary to popular belief, are not humans who colonized this alien planet long ago but are aliens who visit Earth whenever they travel to other countries. * [http://ask.fm/Togedi3/answer/127837053174 Do you deny that you Dutch are aliens? - Togedi3 - Ask.fm] [[Category:Weirdness]] [[Category:Lists]] [[Category:Ongoing]] d12d13b9c0efac435dc66a9129224d7a8582c4d1 0 63 317 270 2017-09-24T06:12:49Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the Lists and Ongoing categories. wikitext text/x-wiki These are strange events, people, places, objects, and ideas that especially interest me. I don't necessarily ''like'' them (some of them are about murder, for example), and I'm skeptical of a lot of them, but I'm interested in my reactions to them and in the issues they involve. This list is for historical mysteries and the paranormal, aside from aliens. Aliens, fringe science, and conspiracies are in [[Fringe Theories]]. Philosophical and religious weirdness and strange fiction will go in other lists. == Finding weird cases == There's no shortage of places on the Internet to find weird things. Here are a few I like. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Mysteries Category:Mysteries - Wikipedia] * [http://www.dmoz.org/Society/Paranormal/ Paranormal - DMOZ] * [http://paranormal.about.com/ Paranormal Phenomena - About.com] * [http://www.reddit.com/r/UnresolvedMysteries/ Unresolved Mysteries - Reddit] * [http://boards.4chan.org/x/ /x/ (Paranormal) - 4chan] ** [http://www.dailydot.com/lifestyle/4chan-x-paranormal-board-creepy-pronunciation-book-mysteries/ Meet 4chan's /x/philes, investigators of the Internet's strangest mysteries] - The article that led me to the board. * [https://www.youtube.com/user/StrangeMysteries Strange Mysteries - YouTube] == Mysterious people == === Deaths === ==== The Taman Shud Case ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taman_Shud_Case Taman Shud Case - Wikipedia] ==== The Lead Masks Case ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lead_Masks_Case Lead Masks Case - Wikipedia] ==== Elisa Lam ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_of_Elisa_Lam Death of Elisa Lam - Wikipedia] ==== The Ourang Medan ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ourang_Medan Ourang Medan - Wikipedia] ==== Isdal Woman ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isdal_Woman Isdal Woman - Wikipedia] ==== The Dyatlov Pass Incident ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dyatlov_Pass_incident Dyatlov Pass incident - Wikipedia] === Disappearances === ==== The Bermuda Triangle ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bermuda_Triangle Bermuda Triangle - Wikipedia] * [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nnLaDvxgmwg 5 Terrifying & Mysterious Bermuda Triangle Stories - Top5s - YouTube] * [http://www.electronicfog.com/ Bruce Gernon's electronic fog theory] ==== Frederick Valentich ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disappearance_of_Frederick_Valentich Disappearance of Frederick Valentich - Wikipedia] === Unknown identities === ==== Benjaman Kyle ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benjaman_Kyle Benjaman Kyle - Wikipedia] === Time travelers === ==== John Titor ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Titor John Titor - Wikipedia] == Mysterious artifacts == === Toynbee tiles === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toynbee_tiles Toynbee tiles - Wikipedia] === Georgia Guidestones === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georgia_Guidestones Georgia Guidestones - Wikipedia] === Bouvet Island lifeboat === * [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1heSaBKgaeg Abandoned Boat Baffles Scientists for 70 Years - Strange Mysteries - YouTube] * [https://allkindsofhistory.wordpress.com/2011/02/13/an-abandoned-lifeboat-at-worlds-end/ An abandoned lifeboat at world's end - A Blast from the Past] == Mysterious places == === Oak Island === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oak_Island Oak Island - Wikipedia] == Codes and puzzles == === The Voynich manuscript === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voynich_manuscript Voynich manuscript - Wikipedia] * [https://www.amazon.com/dp/1599865556 The Voynich Manuscript: Full Color Photographic Edition - Amazon] - A print replica you can buy. === Kryptos === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kryptos Kryptos - Wikipedia] === Numbers stations === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Numbers_station Numbers station - Wikipedia] === Reddit codes === * [http://www.reddit.com/r/Solving_A858/ Solving A858 - Reddit] * [http://www.reddit.com/r/Solving_Reddit_Codes Solving Reddit Codes - Reddit] === Cicada 3301 === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cicada_3301 Cicada 3301 - Wikipedia] * [http://www.fastcompany.com/3025785/meet-the-man-who-solved-the-mysterious-cicada-3301-puzzle Meet The Man Who Solved The Mysterious Cicada 3301 Puzzle - Fast Company] == Crime == === The Dark Web === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dark_Web Dark Web - Wikipedia] * [http://www.wired.com/2015/06/dark-web-know-myth/ The Dark Web as You Know It Is a Myth - Wired] == Spirit beings == === Ghosts === ==== Country House Restaurant in Clarendon Hills ==== A local haunting. Chicagoland doesn't seem to have many. * [http://www.burgerone.com/clarendon/ghost-story.html Ghost Story - Clarendon Hills Country House] ==== Bachelor's Grove Cemetery ==== Another Chicagoland haunting. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bachelor%27s_Grove_Cemetery Bachelor's Grove Cemetery] ==== Cecilia Carrasco ==== * [https://uk.news.yahoo.com/paranormal-push--woman-claims-she-was-shoved-by-a-ghost-132640541.html Paranormal push? Watch moment woman claims she was shoved by a GHOST - Yahoo! News UK] == Related blog posts == * [http://www.thinkulum.net/blog/2015/06/25/weird-things-are-fun/ 2015/06/25: Weird things are fun] [[Category:Weirdness]] [[Category:Lists]] [[Category:Ongoing]] 32c038867d57c8c294a68a62f98b457eac7979d9 14 120 319 2017-09-24T06:16:31Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the category. wikitext text/x-wiki These are the wiki's top-level categories. f043efecba36c1a392ca0958bce37eb387d8f537 0 121 320 2018-01-27T23:13:43Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the article. wikitext text/x-wiki The purpose of this article is to spell out the method of analysis I've developed over the years. The purpose of doing that is to help myself use the method more often and with a more consistent procedure and to come up with ways to teach it to anyone who's interested. The article is a work in progress, as is the method. == Definition == I'm calling this article "Analysis," because that's the term I usually use, but I hardly ever think about analysis on its own. My idea of analysis pulls along with it synthesis, in the form of modeling and systems thinking. But I use the term analysis to cover all of it. If I had to pick another one, I'd call it systematizing. Traditionally analysis is seen as being about conceptually taking apart the subject matter, separating it into its components, and synthesis is about assembling the parts. But with my question-asking approach, I really do both at about the same time. It's more a process of clarifying and exploring than disassembly and reassembly. == Goals == What are the goals of analysis in this method? There are two stages to think about in an analytical journey: the product of the analysis itself and the purposes that product can be used for. The product I intend from an analysis is a model of the object I'm observing. The representation of the model can take various forms, such as a diagram, an essay, or a computer program. The model itself is an abstraction, though it will always have to take some form, if only as a set of ideas in the mind. Another metaphor I use for this product is a map. This article, for example, is a representation of a map of my analytical method. This is appropriate for my journey metaphor. The second stage of travel is the use you'll put the model to. To name some key examples, the model could be a basis for learning information or a skill, for creating other content, or for making a decision or solving a problem. Why are we interested in knowing the goals of analysis? First, the goal determines what aspects of the material we're analyzing are important. So it's key to defining the model and also to directing our attention and maximizing our use of time. In this case, these goals will define our model of analysis. Second, knowing the point of what we're doing is a great motivator. Sometimes it can make the difference between persevering and giving up. [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Seeds]] [[Category:Developing]] [[Category:Philosophy]] 262807fa07583d0c3f8943dbdea69b3b640643a4 321 320 2018-01-28T04:22:04Z Andy Culbertson 1 Deleted the Seeds category. wikitext text/x-wiki The purpose of this article is to spell out the method of analysis I've developed over the years. The purpose of doing that is to help myself use the method more often and with a more consistent procedure and to come up with ways to teach it to anyone who's interested. The article is a work in progress, as is the method. == Definition == I'm calling this article "Analysis," because that's the term I usually use, but I hardly ever think about analysis on its own. My idea of analysis pulls along with it synthesis, in the form of modeling and systems thinking. But I use the term analysis to cover all of it. If I had to pick another one, I'd call it systematizing. Traditionally analysis is seen as being about conceptually taking apart the subject matter, separating it into its components, and synthesis is about assembling the parts. But with my question-asking approach, I really do both at about the same time. It's more a process of clarifying and exploring than disassembly and reassembly. == Goals == What are the goals of analysis in this method? There are two stages to think about in an analytical journey: the product of the analysis itself and the purposes that product can be used for. The product I intend from an analysis is a model of the object I'm observing. The representation of the model can take various forms, such as a diagram, an essay, or a computer program. The model itself is an abstraction, though it will always have to take some form, if only as a set of ideas in the mind. Another metaphor I use for this product is a map. This article, for example, is a representation of a map of my analytical method. This is appropriate for my journey metaphor. The second stage of travel is the use you'll put the model to. To name some key examples, the model could be a basis for learning information or a skill, for creating other content, or for making a decision or solving a problem. Why are we interested in knowing the goals of analysis? First, the goal determines what aspects of the material we're analyzing are important. So it's key to defining the model and also to directing our attention and maximizing our use of time. In this case, these goals will define our model of analysis. Second, knowing the point of what we're doing is a great motivator. Sometimes it can make the difference between persevering and giving up. [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Developing]] [[Category:Philosophy]] 76cbccd9c9d65178959dc34b1d45486b20c0cb68 322 321 2018-02-04T05:41:13Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the "Objects of study" section. wikitext text/x-wiki The purpose of this article is to spell out the method of analysis I've developed over the years. The purpose of doing that is to help myself use the method more often and with a more thorough and consistent procedure and to come up with ways to teach it to anyone who's interested. The article is a work in progress, as is the method. == Definition == I'm calling this article "Analysis," because that's the term I usually use, but I hardly ever think about analysis on its own. My idea of analysis pulls along with it synthesis, in the form of modeling and systems thinking. But I use the term analysis to cover all of it. If I had to pick another one, I'd call it systematizing. Traditionally analysis is seen as being about conceptually taking apart the subject matter, separating it into its components, and synthesis is about assembling the parts. But with my question-asking approach, I really do both at about the same time. It's more a process of clarifying and exploring than disassembly and reassembly. == Goals == What are the goals of analysis in this method? There are two stages to think about in an analytical journey: the product of the analysis itself and the purposes that product can be used for. The product I intend from an analysis is a model of the object I'm observing. The representation of the model can take various forms, such as a diagram, an essay, or a computer program. The model itself is an abstraction, though it will always have to take some form, if only as a set of ideas in the mind. Another metaphor I use for this product is a map. This article, for example, is a representation of a map of my analytical method. This is appropriate for my journey metaphor. The second stage of travel is the use you'll put the model to. To name some key examples, the model could be a basis for learning information or a skill, for creating other content, or for making a decision or solving a problem. In this case our purpose is to have a general analytical procedure to apply. Why are we interested in knowing the goals of analysis? First, the goal determines what aspects of the material we're analyzing are important. So it's key to defining the model and also to directing our attention and maximizing our use of time. In this case, these goals will define our model of analysis. Second, knowing the point of what we're doing is a great motivator. Sometimes it can make the difference between persevering and giving up. == Objects of study == Any analysis will have an object that's being analyzed, which I'll call the object of study. It helps to survey what objects these can be. You can analyze just about anything. But you might not think of something as a thing that can be analyzed. And when thinking through a general analytical procedure, your ideas about the procedure might be too limited if you don't keep in mind the range of possible objects. So what kinds of analyzable objects are there? They can be classified a number of ways that might affect the ways you analyze them. I'll list a few categories here that could be grouped and contrasted in various ways and an example or two of each: static (images) vs. dynamic (videos, procedures); concrete (concrete) vs. abstract (equations); individual (employees, birds) vs. collective (businesses, ecosystems); discrete (social networks) vs. continuous (temperatures); visual (dances), auditory (room acoustics), tactile (paper textures), textual (scientific articles), etc.; objective (nerve impulses) vs. subjective (intuitions, sensations); causal (geological processes) vs. purposeful (engines). Each object can be placed into more than one category. Additionally, you'll be analyzing particular dimensions of the object depending on your purpose. For example, a film could be analyzed for its dialog, cinematography, music, acting, directing, its influences, impact on society, and so on. [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Developing]] [[Category:Philosophy]] 80aface40b35113d83ab8720a4134e558e299fff 323 322 2018-02-08T04:18:33Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the Representation section. wikitext text/x-wiki The purpose of this article is to spell out the method of analysis I've developed over the years. The purpose of doing that is to help myself use the method more often and with a more thorough and consistent procedure and to come up with ways to teach it to anyone who's interested. The article is a work in progress, as is the method. == Definition == I'm calling this article "Analysis," because that's the term I usually use, but I hardly ever think about analysis on its own. My idea of analysis pulls along with it synthesis, in the form of modeling and systems thinking. But I use the term analysis to cover all of it. If I had to pick another one, I'd call it systematizing. Traditionally analysis is seen as being about conceptually taking apart the subject matter, separating it into its components, and synthesis is about assembling the parts. But with my question-asking approach, I really do both at about the same time. It's more a process of clarifying and exploring than disassembly and reassembly. == Goals == What are the goals of analysis in this method? There are two stages to think about in an analytical journey: the product of the analysis itself and the purposes that product can be used for. The product I intend from an analysis is a model of the object I'm observing. The representation of the model can take various forms, such as a diagram, an essay, or a computer program. The model itself is an abstraction, though it will always have to take some form, if only as a set of ideas in the mind. Another metaphor I use for this product is a map. This article, for example, is a representation of a map of my analytical method. This is appropriate for my journey metaphor. The second stage of travel is the use you'll put the model to. To name some key examples, the model could be a basis for learning information or a skill, for creating other content, or for making a decision or solving a problem. In this case our purpose is to have a general analytical procedure to apply. Why are we interested in knowing the goals of analysis? First, the goal determines what aspects of the material we're analyzing are important. So it's key to defining the model and also to directing our attention and maximizing our use of time. In this case, these goals will define our model of analysis. Second, knowing the point of what we're doing is a great motivator. Sometimes it can make the difference between persevering and giving up. == Objects of study == Any analysis will have an object that's being analyzed, which I'll call the object of study. It helps to survey what objects these can be. You can analyze just about anything. But you might not think of something as a thing that can be analyzed. And when thinking through a general analytical procedure, your ideas about the procedure might be too limited if you don't keep in mind the range of possible objects. So what kinds of analyzable objects are there? They can be classified a number of ways that might affect the ways you analyze them. I'll list a few categories here that could be grouped and contrasted in various ways and an example or two of each: static (images) vs. dynamic (videos, procedures); concrete (concrete) vs. abstract (equations); individual (employees, birds) vs. collective (businesses, ecosystems); discrete (social networks) vs. continuous (temperatures); visual (dances), auditory (room acoustics), tactile (paper textures), textual (scientific articles), etc.; objective (nerve impulses) vs. subjective (intuitions, sensations); causal (geological processes) vs. purposeful (engines). Each object can be placed into more than one category. Additionally, you'll be analyzing particular dimensions of the object depending on your purpose. For example, a film could be analyzed for its dialog, cinematography, music, acting, directing, its influences, impact on society, and so on. == Representation == The models we build are abstractions, but to communicate them and work with them effectively, we have to give them concrete representations. These take the form of various media types. Some of the most common are written or spoken text, information visualizations such as maps and graphs, and computer file formats such as software and data files. There may be other effective representation formats in auditory, haptic, and other modes. It's important to distinguish the representation from the model itself. It means you can switch to a different representation if it better communicates the model or fits the needs of the audience. Another representation might also make the model easier for you to explore or manipulate as you're developing it. [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Developing]] [[Category:Philosophy]] 4dc4db0320108a82d6ae98f5d9d7c8eb017b1d8e 324 323 2018-03-09T09:43:15Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the Procedure, Examples, and Roadmap sections. wikitext text/x-wiki The purpose of this article is to spell out the method of analysis I've developed over the years. The purpose of doing that is to help myself use the method more often and with a more thorough and consistent procedure and to come up with ways to teach it to anyone who's interested. The article is a work in progress, as is the method. == Definition == I'm calling this article "Analysis," because that's the term I usually use, but I hardly ever think about analysis on its own. My idea of analysis pulls along with it synthesis, in the form of modeling and systems thinking. But I use the term analysis to cover all of it. Traditionally analysis is seen as being about conceptually taking apart the subject matter, separating it into its components, and synthesis is about assembling the parts. But with my question-asking approach, I really do both at about the same time. It's more a process of clarifying and exploring than disassembly and reassembly. I might rename the article modeling. == Goals == What are the goals of analysis in this method? There are two stages to think about in an analytical journey: the product of the analysis itself and the purposes that product can be used for. The product I intend from an analysis is a model of the object I'm observing. The representation of the model can take various forms, such as a diagram, an essay, or a computer program. The model itself is an abstraction, though it will always have to take some form, if only as a set of ideas in the mind. Another metaphor I use for this product is a map. This article, for example, is a representation of a map of my analytical method. This is appropriate for my journey metaphor. The second stage of travel is the use you'll put the model to. To name some key examples, the model could be a basis for learning information or a skill, for creating other content, or for making a decision or solving a problem. In this case our purpose is to have a general analytical procedure to apply. Why are we interested in knowing the goals of analysis? First, the goal determines what aspects of the material we're analyzing are important. So it's key to defining the model and also to directing our attention and maximizing our use of time. In this case, these goals will define our model of analysis. Second, knowing the point of what we're doing is a great motivator. Sometimes it can make the difference between persevering and giving up. == Objects of study == Any analysis will have an object that's being analyzed, which I'll call the object of study. It helps to survey what objects these can be. You can analyze just about anything. But you might not think of something as a thing that can be analyzed. And when thinking through a general analytical procedure, your ideas about the procedure might be too limited if you don't keep in mind the range of possible objects. So what kinds of analyzable objects are there? They can be classified a number of ways that might affect the ways you analyze them. I'll list a few categories here that could be grouped and contrasted in various ways and an example or two of each: static (images) vs. dynamic (videos, procedures); concrete (concrete) vs. abstract (equations); individual (employees, birds) vs. collective (businesses, ecosystems); discrete (social networks) vs. continuous (temperatures); visual (dances), auditory (room acoustics), tactile (paper textures), textual (scientific articles), etc.; objective (nerve impulses) vs. subjective (intuitions, sensations); causal (geological processes) vs. purposeful (engines). Each object can be placed into more than one category. Additionally, you'll be analyzing particular dimensions of the object depending on your purpose. For example, a film could be analyzed for its dialog, cinematography, music, acting, directing, its influences, impact on society, and so on. == Representation == The models we build are abstractions, but to communicate them and work with them effectively, we have to give them concrete representations. These take the form of various media types. Some of the most common are written or spoken text, information visualizations such as maps and graphs, and computer file formats such as software and data files. There may be other effective representation formats in auditory, haptic, and other modes. It's important to distinguish the representation from the model itself. It means you can switch to a different representation if it better communicates the model or fits the needs of the audience. Another representation might also make the model easier for you to explore or manipulate as you're developing it. == Procedure == Here I'll describe my current analytical process. One main purpose of writing this essay is to work out a more refined version of this process, but I'll start with what I do now. That way I don't misrepresent myself too badly and I don't lose as much potentially useful information about the method. === Subject matter === The process starts when I run across a subject I feel the need to understand. Usually it's because I want to use it to do something, or I just feel confused by it. Sometimes I feel like it's something I ''should'' understand, as if no self-respecting me would remain ignorant of it (film criticism, for example, though I haven't gotten around to studying that one). Sometimes it's a subject that comes from sources outside myself (e.g., memory improvement, math); sometimes the source is me (e.g., this analytical method, my religious beliefs). My output mostly takes the form of writing, and it has two broad stages: processing (one or more rounds of notes and journaling, for lack of a better term) and communicating (one or more essays). === Processing === Most of my processing output is in the form of paragraphs and headings. Sometimes it takes the form of outlines, with hierarchies of related points. Sometimes I make lists or tables, occasionally a flowchart, usually in the form of an outline. Once in a while I try making a diagram, but I quickly run into problems laying it out or knowing how to represent the kinds of information I want. I tend to start the processing stage by writing some introductory remarks to capture the reasons I'm looking at this subject and what I want to get out of it. I do this in the hope that it'll focus and direct my analysis. I'm not sure how much it does. ==== Note-taking ==== I've found my mind doesn't work well in a vacuum, so to jump start my thinking I need material to respond to. This takes the form of things like notes on sources, memories of processes or experiences, and preliminary outlines based on my conception of the subject matter. Note-taking mostly takes the form of prose statements pulling out whatever information from my source seems significant. Often I like to just quote the source, since that saves time in the moment. One of my long-term battles is taking in a source efficiently. Many things can bog this process down, such as having to paraphrase (though paraphrasing into a more useful form could be worth the drawbacks). ==== Journaling ==== Journaling takes the form of writing my thoughts on the subject in semi-organized fashion. The journaling step represents several passes through various parts of the material, capturing my assessments of its characteristics, parts, and inner workings. I compose my writing mentally in chunks. I think for a while about what I want to say, usually points I want to make around one or two ideas, and then I write it somewhat carefully. I try to arrange the points in a logical order so that they flow into each other and communicate clearly, even though in this stage I'm only really writing for myself. Sometimes I only do enough thinking beforehand to feel that I have a good starting point, and I do the rest of my thinking as I'm writing. One statement will spawn new thoughts to capture. This happens even if I think I'm starting with my whole set of thoughts on the idea. If I have a thought on a point but no time to flesh it out, I write a brief reminder of it wherever I am in the journal, or sometimes in a logical spot among my other thoughts, on a separate line that starts with a hyphen so I can find it again. My journaling is only loosely organized. I give it headings as I go so it's easier to find earlier thoughts again and reorganize them if it helps me think about them. As I think through the subject matter, I'm generally looking for what its parts are, how it works, and how I can make use of it. To that end I find myself asking these kinds of questions, more or less consciously, of the pieces I find: * '''Definition:''' What is this? How could I identify the answer (e.g., in choosing between interpretations of X)? * '''Properties:''' What is this like? What are this item's properties? * '''Contrasts:''' What are the contrasts within X? How is this different from other things? * '''Naming:''' What keyword or name identifies this for me? * '''Categorization:''' What kind of thing is this? Why this category? What kinds of things are here? What can I generalize from this? What's this about? What's the topic of this model? * '''Whole-part:''' What are its parts? What’s an example of this? What are all the options? What if we group these and treat them as a new whole? * '''Causality:''' How does this work? How did that happen? Why is this here? What's the bigger picture? What are the conditions (necessary and sufficient) for this? What would need to be true? * '''Function:''' What is this doing? What does this do? How is this used? How do I do that? * '''Sequence:''' What then? * '''Implication:''' So what? What does this imply about X? * '''Purpose:''' What's the point? What is the purpose of this model? What's instigating it? * '''Counterfactuals:''' What about X? What if X? Why wouldn’t X happen? Why this one and not a different one? * '''Patterns:''' How are these arranged? What predefined structure or grammar could help me organize and extend my observations? What rules seem to govern this? How can this type of item (node, relationship, pattern) be applied to other parts of the model? * '''Introspection:''' What's unusual about this? What doesn't make sense about this? What’s funny (sad, angering, scary, surprising, interesting, confusing, etc.) about this? What's easy or hard to understand here? * '''Logic:''' Does that question make sense here? * '''Rationality:''' How do you know? Are these uses of X (and maybe overlapping terms) really the same? What's really going on? * '''Priority:''' What's important here? * '''Concerns:''' What are the concerns (values, worries) here? * '''Next steps:''' What do I do next? What am I missing? Where do I start? What do I notice? What would be satisfying to know about? How would I answer this? * '''Dimensions:''' What dimensions of this component should I notice? What other dimension of this topic should I look at? What new way should I think about this? As I go, I try to develop a [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Controlled_vocabulary controlled vocabulary] for the model. That is, I try to come up with a single term to use whenever I'm talking about a concept rather than using several synonyms throughout the discussion. This makes the writing more boring and repetitive but hopefully clearer. It at least helps me think about it more clearly. I make haphazard progress through the processing stage. I'm guided by certain intuitions based on my semi-conscious concerns and my underlying ideas of how models are structured, but I find myself getting stuck more often than I'd like. My procedures for getting unstuck are very poorly defined and I think take longer than they should. I'm hoping that formalizing my method somewhat will solve this problem. === Communicating === The communicating stage is basically a revision of the journaling where I assemble my thoughts into something people can hopefully follow, even if it's not very exciting to read. I usually start my writing with a general outline in mind to make sure I cover all the subject matter and do it in a logical order that's fairly easy to grasp. This outline usually gets revised as I write, because as I progress I find out the material actually falls more naturally into another organization. This is annoying but almost inevitable. It seems my thinking on a subject never stops, at least until I stop writing about it. At the end of the writing, I read it a few times to revise and put on the finishing touches you normally need when writing for an audience--making sure sources are cited correctly, all the formatting looks right, and so on. == Examples == From this site: * [[On Being an Agnostic Christian]] * [[A Framework and Agenda for Memory Improvement]] * [[Navigating the World of Comics]] * [[Math Relearning/Fundamentals]] * [[Math Relearning/Number Sense]] * [[Math Relearning/Math Student Simulator/Introduction]] - A discussion of learning by programming. * [[Book Weeding Criteria]] From other authors who seem to take a similar approach: * [https://www.amazon.com/Visualization-Analysis-Design-AK-Peters/dp/1466508914 Visualization Analysis and Design] by Tamara Munzner == Roadmap == Here, in general terms, are the improvements I have in mind for this essay. * Articulate and expand my metamodel. * Articulate the intuitions to follow. * Formalize a procedure. * Articulate a supporting model of the mind. * Expand the method to cover group processes. * Expand it to cover evaluation of claims. * Articulate the essential and distinctive features of my approach. * Expand my library of model patterns. * Expand my library of indirect questions. * Incorporate a programming approach. * Develop arguments for studying modeling. [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Developing]] [[Category:Philosophy]] cbf211ffcfab16b16747f5b12410e64f7ac576c6 329 324 2018-03-31T03:53:34Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the "Potential sources" section. wikitext text/x-wiki The purpose of this article is to spell out the method of analysis I've developed over the years. The purpose of doing that is to help myself use the method more often and with a more thorough and consistent procedure and to come up with ways to teach it to anyone who's interested. The article is a work in progress, as is the method. == Definition == I'm calling this article "Analysis," because that's the term I usually use, but I hardly ever think about analysis on its own. My idea of analysis pulls along with it synthesis, in the form of modeling and systems thinking. But I use the term analysis to cover all of it. Traditionally analysis is seen as being about conceptually taking apart the subject matter, separating it into its components, and synthesis is about assembling the parts. But with my question-asking approach, I really do both at about the same time. It's more a process of clarifying and exploring than disassembly and reassembly. I might rename the article modeling. == Goals == What are the goals of analysis in this method? There are two stages to think about in an analytical journey: the product of the analysis itself and the purposes that product can be used for. The product I intend from an analysis is a model of the object I'm observing. The representation of the model can take various forms, such as a diagram, an essay, or a computer program. The model itself is an abstraction, though it will always have to take some form, if only as a set of ideas in the mind. Another metaphor I use for this product is a map. This article, for example, is a representation of a map of my analytical method. This is appropriate for my journey metaphor. The second stage of travel is the use you'll put the model to. To name some key examples, the model could be a basis for learning information or a skill, for creating other content, or for making a decision or solving a problem. In this case our purpose is to have a general analytical procedure to apply. Why are we interested in knowing the goals of analysis? First, the goal determines what aspects of the material we're analyzing are important. So it's key to defining the model and also to directing our attention and maximizing our use of time. In this case, these goals will define our model of analysis. Second, knowing the point of what we're doing is a great motivator. Sometimes it can make the difference between persevering and giving up. == Objects of study == Any analysis will have an object that's being analyzed, which I'll call the object of study. It helps to survey what objects these can be. You can analyze just about anything. But you might not think of something as a thing that can be analyzed. And when thinking through a general analytical procedure, your ideas about the procedure might be too limited if you don't keep in mind the range of possible objects. So what kinds of analyzable objects are there? They can be classified a number of ways that might affect the ways you analyze them. I'll list a few categories here that could be grouped and contrasted in various ways and an example or two of each: static (images) vs. dynamic (videos, procedures); concrete (concrete) vs. abstract (equations); individual (employees, birds) vs. collective (businesses, ecosystems); discrete (social networks) vs. continuous (temperatures); visual (dances), auditory (room acoustics), tactile (paper textures), textual (scientific articles), etc.; objective (nerve impulses) vs. subjective (intuitions, sensations); causal (geological processes) vs. purposeful (engines). Each object can be placed into more than one category. Additionally, you'll be analyzing particular dimensions of the object depending on your purpose. For example, a film could be analyzed for its dialog, cinematography, music, acting, directing, its influences, impact on society, and so on. == Representation == The models we build are abstractions, but to communicate them and work with them effectively, we have to give them concrete representations. These take the form of various media types. Some of the most common are written or spoken text, information visualizations such as maps and graphs, and computer file formats such as software and data files. There may be other effective representation formats in auditory, haptic, and other modes. It's important to distinguish the representation from the model itself. It means you can switch to a different representation if it better communicates the model or fits the needs of the audience. Another representation might also make the model easier for you to explore or manipulate as you're developing it. == Procedure == Here I'll describe my current analytical process. One main purpose of writing this essay is to work out a more refined version of this process, but I'll start with what I do now. That way I don't misrepresent myself too badly and I don't lose as much potentially useful information about the method. === Subject matter === The process starts when I run across a subject I feel the need to understand. Usually it's because I want to use it to do something, or I just feel confused by it. Sometimes I feel like it's something I ''should'' understand, as if no self-respecting me would remain ignorant of it (film criticism, for example, though I haven't gotten around to studying that one). Sometimes it's a subject that comes from sources outside myself (e.g., memory improvement, math); sometimes the source is me (e.g., this analytical method, my religious beliefs). My output mostly takes the form of writing, and it has two broad stages: processing (one or more rounds of notes and journaling, for lack of a better term) and communicating (one or more essays). === Processing === Most of my processing output is in the form of paragraphs and headings. Sometimes it takes the form of outlines, with hierarchies of related points. Sometimes I make lists or tables, occasionally a flowchart, usually in the form of an outline. Once in a while I try making a diagram, but I quickly run into problems laying it out or knowing how to represent the kinds of information I want. I tend to start the processing stage by writing some introductory remarks to capture the reasons I'm looking at this subject and what I want to get out of it. I do this in the hope that it'll focus and direct my analysis. I'm not sure how much it does. ==== Note-taking ==== I've found my mind doesn't work well in a vacuum, so to jump start my thinking I need material to respond to. This takes the form of things like notes on sources, memories of processes or experiences, and preliminary outlines based on my conception of the subject matter. Note-taking mostly takes the form of prose statements pulling out whatever information from my source seems significant. Often I like to just quote the source, since that saves time in the moment. One of my long-term battles is taking in a source efficiently. Many things can bog this process down, such as having to paraphrase (though paraphrasing into a more useful form could be worth the drawbacks). ==== Journaling ==== Journaling takes the form of writing my thoughts on the subject in semi-organized fashion. The journaling step represents several passes through various parts of the material, capturing my assessments of its characteristics, parts, and inner workings. I compose my writing mentally in chunks. I think for a while about what I want to say, usually points I want to make around one or two ideas, and then I write it somewhat carefully. I try to arrange the points in a logical order so that they flow into each other and communicate clearly, even though in this stage I'm only really writing for myself. Sometimes I only do enough thinking beforehand to feel that I have a good starting point, and I do the rest of my thinking as I'm writing. One statement will spawn new thoughts to capture. This happens even if I think I'm starting with my whole set of thoughts on the idea. If I have a thought on a point but no time to flesh it out, I write a brief reminder of it wherever I am in the journal, or sometimes in a logical spot among my other thoughts, on a separate line that starts with a hyphen so I can find it again. My journaling is only loosely organized. I give it headings as I go so it's easier to find earlier thoughts again and reorganize them if it helps me think about them. As I think through the subject matter, I'm generally looking for what its parts are, how it works, and how I can make use of it. To that end I find myself asking these kinds of questions, more or less consciously, of the pieces I find: * '''Definition:''' What is this? How could I identify the answer (e.g., in choosing between interpretations of X)? * '''Properties:''' What is this like? What are this item's properties? * '''Contrasts:''' What are the contrasts within X? How is this different from other things? * '''Naming:''' What keyword or name identifies this for me? * '''Categorization:''' What kind of thing is this? Why this category? What kinds of things are here? What can I generalize from this? What's this about? What's the topic of this model? * '''Whole-part:''' What are its parts? What’s an example of this? What are all the options? What if we group these and treat them as a new whole? * '''Causality:''' How does this work? How did that happen? Why is this here? What's the bigger picture? What are the conditions (necessary and sufficient) for this? What would need to be true? * '''Function:''' What is this doing? What does this do? How is this used? How do I do that? * '''Sequence:''' What then? * '''Implication:''' So what? What does this imply about X? * '''Purpose:''' What's the point? What is the purpose of this model? What's instigating it? * '''Counterfactuals:''' What about X? What if X? Why wouldn’t X happen? Why this one and not a different one? * '''Patterns:''' How are these arranged? What predefined structure or grammar could help me organize and extend my observations? What rules seem to govern this? How can this type of item (node, relationship, pattern) be applied to other parts of the model? * '''Introspection:''' What's unusual about this? What doesn't make sense about this? What’s funny (sad, angering, scary, surprising, interesting, confusing, etc.) about this? What's easy or hard to understand here? * '''Logic:''' Does that question make sense here? * '''Rationality:''' How do you know? Are these uses of X (and maybe overlapping terms) really the same? What's really going on? * '''Priority:''' What's important here? * '''Concerns:''' What are the concerns (values, worries) here? * '''Next steps:''' What do I do next? What am I missing? Where do I start? What do I notice? What would be satisfying to know about? How would I answer this? * '''Dimensions:''' What dimensions of this component should I notice? What other dimension of this topic should I look at? What new way should I think about this? As I go, I try to develop a [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Controlled_vocabulary controlled vocabulary] for the model. That is, I try to come up with a single term to use whenever I'm talking about a concept rather than using several synonyms throughout the discussion. This makes the writing more boring and repetitive but hopefully clearer. It at least helps me think about it more clearly. I make haphazard progress through the processing stage. I'm guided by certain intuitions based on my semi-conscious concerns and my underlying ideas of how models are structured, but I find myself getting stuck more often than I'd like. My procedures for getting unstuck are very poorly defined and I think take longer than they should. I'm hoping that formalizing my method somewhat will solve this problem. === Communicating === The communicating stage is basically a revision of the journaling where I assemble my thoughts into something people can hopefully follow, even if it's not very exciting to read. I usually start my writing with a general outline in mind to make sure I cover all the subject matter and do it in a logical order that's fairly easy to grasp. This outline usually gets revised as I write, because as I progress I find out the material actually falls more naturally into another organization. This is annoying but almost inevitable. It seems my thinking on a subject never stops, at least until I stop writing about it. At the end of the writing, I read it a few times to revise and put on the finishing touches you normally need when writing for an audience--making sure sources are cited correctly, all the formatting looks right, and so on. == Examples == From this site: * [[On Being an Agnostic Christian]] * [[A Framework and Agenda for Memory Improvement]] * [[Navigating the World of Comics]] * [[Math Relearning/Fundamentals]] * [[Math Relearning/Number Sense]] * [[Math Relearning/Math Student Simulator/Introduction]] - A discussion of learning by programming. * [[Book Weeding Criteria]] From other authors who seem to take a similar approach: * [https://www.amazon.com/Visualization-Analysis-Design-AK-Peters/dp/1466508914 Visualization Analysis and Design] by Tamara Munzner == Roadmap == Here, in general terms, are the improvements I have in mind for this essay. * Articulate and expand my metamodel. * Articulate the intuitions to follow. * Formalize a procedure. * Articulate a supporting model of the mind. * Expand the method to cover group processes. * Expand it to cover evaluation of claims. * Articulate the essential and distinctive features of my approach. * Expand my library of model patterns. * Expand my library of indirect questions. * Incorporate a programming approach. * Develop arguments for studying modeling. == Potential sources == Alexander, Christopher, and Christopher Alexander. ''The Process of Creating Life: An Essay on the Art of Building and the Nature of the Universe''. The Center for Environmental Structure Series, v. 10. Berkeley, CA: Center for Environmental Structure, 2002. Bernard, H. Russell, Amber Wutich, and Gery Wayne Ryan. ''Analyzing Qualitative Data: Systematic Approaches''. 2nd ed. Los Angeles: SAGE, 2017. Britt, David W. ''A Conceptual Introduction to Modeling: Qualitative and Quantitative Perspectives''. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, 1997. Checkland, Peter. ''Systems Thinking, Systems Practice: Includes a 30-Year Retrospective''. Chichester; New York: John Wiley, 1999. Cooper, Alan. ''About Face: The Essentials of Interaction Design''. 4th ed. Indianapolis, IN: John Wiley and Sons, 2014. Evans, Eric. ''Domain-Driven Design: Tackling Complexity in the Heart of Software''. Boston: Addison-Wesley, 2004. Flood, Robert L. ''Rethinking the Fifth Discipline: Learning within the Unknowable''. London; New York: Routledge, 1999. Halpin, T. A., and A. J. Morgan. ''Information Modeling and Relational Databases''. 2nd ed. Morgan Kaufmann Series in Data Management Systems. Burlington, MA: Elsevier/Morgan Kaufman Publishers, 2008. Herman, Amy. ''Visual Intelligence: Sharpen Your Perception, Change Your Life''. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2016. Heuer, Richards J., and Randolph H. Pherson. ''Structured Analytic Techniques for Intelligence Analysis''. 2nd ed. Washington, DC: CQ Press, 2015. Horton, Susan R. ''Thinking through Writing''. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1982. Huddleston, Rodney D., and Geoffrey K. Pullum. ''A Student’s Introduction to English Grammar''. Cambridge, UK; New York: Cambridge University Press, 2005. Lesh, Richard A., and Helen M. Doerr, eds. ''Beyond Constructivism: Models and Modeling Perspectives on Mathematics Problem Solving, Learning, and Teaching''. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, 2003. McDonald, Kent J. ''Beyond Requirements: Analysis with an Agile Mindset''. New York: Addison-Wesley, 2016. Michalko, Michael. ''Thinkertoys: A Handbook of Creative-Thinking Techniques''. 2nd ed. Berkeley, CA: Ten Speed Press, 2006. Munzner, Tamara. ''Visualization Analysis and Design''. A.K. Peters Visualization Series. Boca Raton: CRC Press, Taylor & Francis Group, CRC Press is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business, 2015. Osborne, Grant R. ''The Hermeneutical Spiral: A Comprehensive Introduction to Biblical Interpretation''. 2nd ed. Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2006. Porter, Bruce, Vladimir Lifschitz, and Frank Van Harmelen, eds. ''Handbook of Knowledge Representation''. 1st ed. Foundations of Artificial Intelligence. Amsterdam; Boston: Elsevier, 2008. Rosenfeld, Louis, Peter Morville, and Jorge Arango. ''Information Architecture: For the Web and Beyond''. 4th ed. Sebastopol, CA: O’Reilly Media, Inc, 2015. Saeed, John I. ''Semantics''. 4th ed. Introducing Linguistics 2. Chichester, West Sussex [England]; Malden, MA: Wiley Blackwell, 2016. [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Developing]] [[Category:Philosophy]] aed1b091a194893d3569916c3c033ad542eee899 336 329 2018-06-20T18:08:56Z Andy Culbertson 1 Andy Culbertson moved page [[Analysis]] to [[Conceptual Modeling]]: Renamed the page's topic. wikitext text/x-wiki The purpose of this article is to spell out the method of analysis I've developed over the years. The purpose of doing that is to help myself use the method more often and with a more thorough and consistent procedure and to come up with ways to teach it to anyone who's interested. The article is a work in progress, as is the method. == Definition == I'm calling this article "Analysis," because that's the term I usually use, but I hardly ever think about analysis on its own. My idea of analysis pulls along with it synthesis, in the form of modeling and systems thinking. But I use the term analysis to cover all of it. Traditionally analysis is seen as being about conceptually taking apart the subject matter, separating it into its components, and synthesis is about assembling the parts. But with my question-asking approach, I really do both at about the same time. It's more a process of clarifying and exploring than disassembly and reassembly. I might rename the article modeling. == Goals == What are the goals of analysis in this method? There are two stages to think about in an analytical journey: the product of the analysis itself and the purposes that product can be used for. The product I intend from an analysis is a model of the object I'm observing. The representation of the model can take various forms, such as a diagram, an essay, or a computer program. The model itself is an abstraction, though it will always have to take some form, if only as a set of ideas in the mind. Another metaphor I use for this product is a map. This article, for example, is a representation of a map of my analytical method. This is appropriate for my journey metaphor. The second stage of travel is the use you'll put the model to. To name some key examples, the model could be a basis for learning information or a skill, for creating other content, or for making a decision or solving a problem. In this case our purpose is to have a general analytical procedure to apply. Why are we interested in knowing the goals of analysis? First, the goal determines what aspects of the material we're analyzing are important. So it's key to defining the model and also to directing our attention and maximizing our use of time. In this case, these goals will define our model of analysis. Second, knowing the point of what we're doing is a great motivator. Sometimes it can make the difference between persevering and giving up. == Objects of study == Any analysis will have an object that's being analyzed, which I'll call the object of study. It helps to survey what objects these can be. You can analyze just about anything. But you might not think of something as a thing that can be analyzed. And when thinking through a general analytical procedure, your ideas about the procedure might be too limited if you don't keep in mind the range of possible objects. So what kinds of analyzable objects are there? They can be classified a number of ways that might affect the ways you analyze them. I'll list a few categories here that could be grouped and contrasted in various ways and an example or two of each: static (images) vs. dynamic (videos, procedures); concrete (concrete) vs. abstract (equations); individual (employees, birds) vs. collective (businesses, ecosystems); discrete (social networks) vs. continuous (temperatures); visual (dances), auditory (room acoustics), tactile (paper textures), textual (scientific articles), etc.; objective (nerve impulses) vs. subjective (intuitions, sensations); causal (geological processes) vs. purposeful (engines). Each object can be placed into more than one category. Additionally, you'll be analyzing particular dimensions of the object depending on your purpose. For example, a film could be analyzed for its dialog, cinematography, music, acting, directing, its influences, impact on society, and so on. == Representation == The models we build are abstractions, but to communicate them and work with them effectively, we have to give them concrete representations. These take the form of various media types. Some of the most common are written or spoken text, information visualizations such as maps and graphs, and computer file formats such as software and data files. There may be other effective representation formats in auditory, haptic, and other modes. It's important to distinguish the representation from the model itself. It means you can switch to a different representation if it better communicates the model or fits the needs of the audience. Another representation might also make the model easier for you to explore or manipulate as you're developing it. == Procedure == Here I'll describe my current analytical process. One main purpose of writing this essay is to work out a more refined version of this process, but I'll start with what I do now. That way I don't misrepresent myself too badly and I don't lose as much potentially useful information about the method. === Subject matter === The process starts when I run across a subject I feel the need to understand. Usually it's because I want to use it to do something, or I just feel confused by it. Sometimes I feel like it's something I ''should'' understand, as if no self-respecting me would remain ignorant of it (film criticism, for example, though I haven't gotten around to studying that one). Sometimes it's a subject that comes from sources outside myself (e.g., memory improvement, math); sometimes the source is me (e.g., this analytical method, my religious beliefs). My output mostly takes the form of writing, and it has two broad stages: processing (one or more rounds of notes and journaling, for lack of a better term) and communicating (one or more essays). === Processing === Most of my processing output is in the form of paragraphs and headings. Sometimes it takes the form of outlines, with hierarchies of related points. Sometimes I make lists or tables, occasionally a flowchart, usually in the form of an outline. Once in a while I try making a diagram, but I quickly run into problems laying it out or knowing how to represent the kinds of information I want. I tend to start the processing stage by writing some introductory remarks to capture the reasons I'm looking at this subject and what I want to get out of it. I do this in the hope that it'll focus and direct my analysis. I'm not sure how much it does. ==== Note-taking ==== I've found my mind doesn't work well in a vacuum, so to jump start my thinking I need material to respond to. This takes the form of things like notes on sources, memories of processes or experiences, and preliminary outlines based on my conception of the subject matter. Note-taking mostly takes the form of prose statements pulling out whatever information from my source seems significant. Often I like to just quote the source, since that saves time in the moment. One of my long-term battles is taking in a source efficiently. Many things can bog this process down, such as having to paraphrase (though paraphrasing into a more useful form could be worth the drawbacks). ==== Journaling ==== Journaling takes the form of writing my thoughts on the subject in semi-organized fashion. The journaling step represents several passes through various parts of the material, capturing my assessments of its characteristics, parts, and inner workings. I compose my writing mentally in chunks. I think for a while about what I want to say, usually points I want to make around one or two ideas, and then I write it somewhat carefully. I try to arrange the points in a logical order so that they flow into each other and communicate clearly, even though in this stage I'm only really writing for myself. Sometimes I only do enough thinking beforehand to feel that I have a good starting point, and I do the rest of my thinking as I'm writing. One statement will spawn new thoughts to capture. This happens even if I think I'm starting with my whole set of thoughts on the idea. If I have a thought on a point but no time to flesh it out, I write a brief reminder of it wherever I am in the journal, or sometimes in a logical spot among my other thoughts, on a separate line that starts with a hyphen so I can find it again. My journaling is only loosely organized. I give it headings as I go so it's easier to find earlier thoughts again and reorganize them if it helps me think about them. As I think through the subject matter, I'm generally looking for what its parts are, how it works, and how I can make use of it. To that end I find myself asking these kinds of questions, more or less consciously, of the pieces I find: * '''Definition:''' What is this? How could I identify the answer (e.g., in choosing between interpretations of X)? * '''Properties:''' What is this like? What are this item's properties? * '''Contrasts:''' What are the contrasts within X? How is this different from other things? * '''Naming:''' What keyword or name identifies this for me? * '''Categorization:''' What kind of thing is this? Why this category? What kinds of things are here? What can I generalize from this? What's this about? What's the topic of this model? * '''Whole-part:''' What are its parts? What’s an example of this? What are all the options? What if we group these and treat them as a new whole? * '''Causality:''' How does this work? How did that happen? Why is this here? What's the bigger picture? What are the conditions (necessary and sufficient) for this? What would need to be true? * '''Function:''' What is this doing? What does this do? How is this used? How do I do that? * '''Sequence:''' What then? * '''Implication:''' So what? What does this imply about X? * '''Purpose:''' What's the point? What is the purpose of this model? What's instigating it? * '''Counterfactuals:''' What about X? What if X? Why wouldn’t X happen? Why this one and not a different one? * '''Patterns:''' How are these arranged? What predefined structure or grammar could help me organize and extend my observations? What rules seem to govern this? How can this type of item (node, relationship, pattern) be applied to other parts of the model? * '''Introspection:''' What's unusual about this? What doesn't make sense about this? What’s funny (sad, angering, scary, surprising, interesting, confusing, etc.) about this? What's easy or hard to understand here? * '''Logic:''' Does that question make sense here? * '''Rationality:''' How do you know? Are these uses of X (and maybe overlapping terms) really the same? What's really going on? * '''Priority:''' What's important here? * '''Concerns:''' What are the concerns (values, worries) here? * '''Next steps:''' What do I do next? What am I missing? Where do I start? What do I notice? What would be satisfying to know about? How would I answer this? * '''Dimensions:''' What dimensions of this component should I notice? What other dimension of this topic should I look at? What new way should I think about this? As I go, I try to develop a [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Controlled_vocabulary controlled vocabulary] for the model. That is, I try to come up with a single term to use whenever I'm talking about a concept rather than using several synonyms throughout the discussion. This makes the writing more boring and repetitive but hopefully clearer. It at least helps me think about it more clearly. I make haphazard progress through the processing stage. I'm guided by certain intuitions based on my semi-conscious concerns and my underlying ideas of how models are structured, but I find myself getting stuck more often than I'd like. My procedures for getting unstuck are very poorly defined and I think take longer than they should. I'm hoping that formalizing my method somewhat will solve this problem. === Communicating === The communicating stage is basically a revision of the journaling where I assemble my thoughts into something people can hopefully follow, even if it's not very exciting to read. I usually start my writing with a general outline in mind to make sure I cover all the subject matter and do it in a logical order that's fairly easy to grasp. This outline usually gets revised as I write, because as I progress I find out the material actually falls more naturally into another organization. This is annoying but almost inevitable. It seems my thinking on a subject never stops, at least until I stop writing about it. At the end of the writing, I read it a few times to revise and put on the finishing touches you normally need when writing for an audience--making sure sources are cited correctly, all the formatting looks right, and so on. == Examples == From this site: * [[On Being an Agnostic Christian]] * [[A Framework and Agenda for Memory Improvement]] * [[Navigating the World of Comics]] * [[Math Relearning/Fundamentals]] * [[Math Relearning/Number Sense]] * [[Math Relearning/Math Student Simulator/Introduction]] - A discussion of learning by programming. * [[Book Weeding Criteria]] From other authors who seem to take a similar approach: * [https://www.amazon.com/Visualization-Analysis-Design-AK-Peters/dp/1466508914 Visualization Analysis and Design] by Tamara Munzner == Roadmap == Here, in general terms, are the improvements I have in mind for this essay. * Articulate and expand my metamodel. * Articulate the intuitions to follow. * Formalize a procedure. * Articulate a supporting model of the mind. * Expand the method to cover group processes. * Expand it to cover evaluation of claims. * Articulate the essential and distinctive features of my approach. * Expand my library of model patterns. * Expand my library of indirect questions. * Incorporate a programming approach. * Develop arguments for studying modeling. == Potential sources == Alexander, Christopher, and Christopher Alexander. ''The Process of Creating Life: An Essay on the Art of Building and the Nature of the Universe''. The Center for Environmental Structure Series, v. 10. Berkeley, CA: Center for Environmental Structure, 2002. Bernard, H. Russell, Amber Wutich, and Gery Wayne Ryan. ''Analyzing Qualitative Data: Systematic Approaches''. 2nd ed. Los Angeles: SAGE, 2017. Britt, David W. ''A Conceptual Introduction to Modeling: Qualitative and Quantitative Perspectives''. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, 1997. Checkland, Peter. ''Systems Thinking, Systems Practice: Includes a 30-Year Retrospective''. Chichester; New York: John Wiley, 1999. Cooper, Alan. ''About Face: The Essentials of Interaction Design''. 4th ed. Indianapolis, IN: John Wiley and Sons, 2014. Evans, Eric. ''Domain-Driven Design: Tackling Complexity in the Heart of Software''. Boston: Addison-Wesley, 2004. Flood, Robert L. ''Rethinking the Fifth Discipline: Learning within the Unknowable''. London; New York: Routledge, 1999. Halpin, T. A., and A. J. Morgan. ''Information Modeling and Relational Databases''. 2nd ed. Morgan Kaufmann Series in Data Management Systems. Burlington, MA: Elsevier/Morgan Kaufman Publishers, 2008. Herman, Amy. ''Visual Intelligence: Sharpen Your Perception, Change Your Life''. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2016. Heuer, Richards J., and Randolph H. Pherson. ''Structured Analytic Techniques for Intelligence Analysis''. 2nd ed. Washington, DC: CQ Press, 2015. Horton, Susan R. ''Thinking through Writing''. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1982. Huddleston, Rodney D., and Geoffrey K. Pullum. ''A Student’s Introduction to English Grammar''. Cambridge, UK; New York: Cambridge University Press, 2005. Lesh, Richard A., and Helen M. Doerr, eds. ''Beyond Constructivism: Models and Modeling Perspectives on Mathematics Problem Solving, Learning, and Teaching''. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, 2003. McDonald, Kent J. ''Beyond Requirements: Analysis with an Agile Mindset''. New York: Addison-Wesley, 2016. Michalko, Michael. ''Thinkertoys: A Handbook of Creative-Thinking Techniques''. 2nd ed. Berkeley, CA: Ten Speed Press, 2006. Munzner, Tamara. ''Visualization Analysis and Design''. A.K. Peters Visualization Series. Boca Raton: CRC Press, Taylor & Francis Group, CRC Press is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business, 2015. Osborne, Grant R. ''The Hermeneutical Spiral: A Comprehensive Introduction to Biblical Interpretation''. 2nd ed. Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2006. Porter, Bruce, Vladimir Lifschitz, and Frank Van Harmelen, eds. ''Handbook of Knowledge Representation''. 1st ed. Foundations of Artificial Intelligence. Amsterdam; Boston: Elsevier, 2008. Rosenfeld, Louis, Peter Morville, and Jorge Arango. ''Information Architecture: For the Web and Beyond''. 4th ed. Sebastopol, CA: O’Reilly Media, Inc, 2015. Saeed, John I. ''Semantics''. 4th ed. Introducing Linguistics 2. Chichester, West Sussex [England]; Malden, MA: Wiley Blackwell, 2016. [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Developing]] [[Category:Philosophy]] aed1b091a194893d3569916c3c033ad542eee899 338 336 2018-06-20T18:14:23Z Andy Culbertson 1 Updated the contents to match the change from analysis to conceptual modeling. Added a version number. wikitext text/x-wiki Version 0.1.0, 6/20/2018 The purpose of this article is to develop a method of conceptual modeling based on the techniques I've practiced over the years. The purpose of doing that is to help myself use the method more often and with a more thorough and consistent procedure and to come up with ways to teach it to anyone who's interested. The article is a work in progress, as is the method. == Definition == Conceptual modeling is a process of clarifying the structure and dynamics of a system of concepts that describe a situation. Procedurally the process takes different forms, but logically it divides into two types of activities--separating the subject matter into its components in analysis, and reassembling the parts by identifying their relationships in synthesis. == Goals == What are the goals of modeling in this method? There are two stages to think about in a modeling journey: the product of the modeling itself and the purposes that product can be used for. The product I intend from a modeling project is a model of the subject I'm observing. The representation of the model can take various forms, such as a diagram, an essay, or a computer program. The model itself is an abstraction, though it will always have to take some form, if only as a set of ideas in the mind. Another metaphor I use for this product is a map. This article, for example, is a representation of a map of my modeling method. This is appropriate for my journey metaphor. The second stage of travel is the use you'll put the model to. To name some key examples, the model could be a basis for learning information or a skill, for creating other content, or for making a decision or solving a problem. In this case our purpose is to have a general modeling procedure to apply. Why are we interested in knowing the goals of modeling? First, the goal determines what aspects of the material we're modeling are important. So it's key to defining the model and also to directing our attention and maximizing our use of time. In this case, these goals will define our model of modeling. Second, knowing the point of what we're doing is a great motivator. Sometimes it can make the difference between persevering and giving up. == Subjects of study == Any modeling project will have a subject that's being modeled, which I'll call the subject of study. It helps to survey what subjects these can be. You can model just about anything. But you might not think of something as a thing that can be modeled. And when thinking through a general modeling procedure, your ideas about the procedure might be too limited if you don't keep in mind the range of possible subjects. So what kinds of modelable objects are there? They can be classified a number of ways that might affect the ways you model them. I'll list a few categories here that could be grouped and contrasted in various ways and an example or two of each: static (images) vs. dynamic (videos, procedures); concrete (concrete) vs. abstract (equations); individual (employees, birds) vs. collective (businesses, ecosystems); discrete (social networks) vs. continuous (temperatures); visual (dances), auditory (room acoustics), tactile (paper textures), textual (scientific articles), etc.; objective (nerve impulses) vs. subjective (intuitions, sensations); causal (geological processes) vs. purposeful (engines). Each subject can be placed into more than one category. Additionally, you'll be modeling particular dimensions of the object depending on your purpose. For example, a film could be analyzed for its dialog, cinematography, music, acting, directing, its influences, impact on society, and so on. == Representation == The models we build are abstractions, but to communicate them and work with them effectively, we have to give them concrete representations. These take the form of various media types. Some of the most common are written or spoken text, information visualizations such as maps and graphs, and computer file formats such as software and data files. There may be other effective representation formats in auditory, haptic, and other modes. It's important to distinguish the representation from the model itself. It means you can switch to a different representation if it better communicates the model or fits the needs of the audience. Another representation might also make the model easier for you to explore or manipulate as you're developing it. == Procedure == Here I'll describe my current modeling process. One main purpose of writing this essay is to work out a more refined version of this process, but I'll start with what I do now. That way I don't misrepresent myself too badly and I don't lose as much potentially useful information about the method. === Subject matter === The process starts when I run across a subject I feel the need to understand. Usually it's because I want to use it to do something, or I just feel confused by it. Sometimes I feel like it's something I ''should'' understand, as if no self-respecting me would remain ignorant of it (film criticism, for example, though I haven't gotten around to studying that one). Sometimes it's a subject that comes from sources outside myself (e.g., memory improvement, math); sometimes the source is me (e.g., this modeling method, my religious beliefs). My output mostly takes the form of writing, and it has two broad stages: processing (one or more rounds of notes and journaling, for lack of a better term) and communicating (one or more essays). === Processing === Most of my processing output is in the form of paragraphs and headings. Sometimes it takes the form of outlines, with hierarchies of related points. Sometimes I make lists or tables, occasionally a flowchart, usually in the form of an outline. Once in a while I try making a diagram, but I quickly run into problems laying it out or knowing how to represent the kinds of information I want. I tend to start the processing stage by writing some introductory remarks to capture the reasons I'm looking at this subject and what I want to get out of it. I do this in the hope that it'll focus and direct my analysis. I'm not sure how much it does. ==== Note-taking ==== I've found my mind doesn't work well in a vacuum, so to jump start my thinking I need material to respond to. This takes the form of things like notes on sources, memories of processes or experiences, and preliminary outlines based on my conception of the subject matter. Note-taking mostly takes the form of prose statements pulling out whatever information from my source seems significant. Often I like to just quote the source, since that saves time in the moment. One of my long-term battles is taking in a source efficiently. Many things can bog this process down, such as having to paraphrase (though paraphrasing into a more useful form could be worth the drawbacks). ==== Journaling ==== Journaling takes the form of writing my thoughts on the subject in semi-organized fashion. The journaling step represents several passes through various parts of the material, capturing my assessments of its characteristics, parts, and inner workings. I compose my writing mentally in chunks. I think for a while about what I want to say, usually points I want to make around one or two ideas, and then I write it somewhat carefully. I try to arrange the points in a logical order so that they flow into each other and communicate clearly, even though in this stage I'm only really writing for myself. Sometimes I only do enough thinking beforehand to feel that I have a good starting point, and I do the rest of my thinking as I'm writing. One statement will spawn new thoughts to capture. This happens even if I think I'm starting with my whole set of thoughts on the idea. If I have a thought on a point but no time to flesh it out, I write a brief reminder of it wherever I am in the journal, or sometimes in a logical spot among my other thoughts, on a separate line that starts with a hyphen so I can find it again. My journaling is only loosely organized. I give it headings as I go so it's easier to find earlier thoughts again and reorganize them if it helps me think about them. As I think through the subject matter, I'm generally looking for what its parts are, how it works, and how I can make use of it. To that end I find myself asking these kinds of questions, more or less consciously, of the pieces I find: * '''Definition:''' What is this? How could I identify the answer (e.g., in choosing between interpretations of X)? * '''Properties:''' What is this like? What are this item's properties? * '''Contrasts:''' What are the contrasts within X? How is this different from other things? * '''Naming:''' What keyword or name identifies this for me? * '''Categorization:''' What kind of thing is this? Why this category? What kinds of things are here? What can I generalize from this? What's this about? What's the topic of this model? * '''Whole-part:''' What are its parts? What’s an example of this? What are all the options? What if we group these and treat them as a new whole? * '''Causality:''' How does this work? How did that happen? Why is this here? What's the bigger picture? What are the conditions (necessary and sufficient) for this? What would need to be true? * '''Function:''' What is this doing? What does this do? How is this used? How do I do that? * '''Sequence:''' What then? * '''Implication:''' So what? What does this imply about X? * '''Purpose:''' What's the point? What is the purpose of this model? What's instigating it? * '''Counterfactuals:''' What about X? What if X? Why wouldn’t X happen? Why this one and not a different one? * '''Patterns:''' How are these arranged? What predefined structure or grammar could help me organize and extend my observations? What rules seem to govern this? How can this type of item (node, relationship, pattern) be applied to other parts of the model? * '''Introspection:''' What's unusual about this? What doesn't make sense about this? What’s funny (sad, angering, scary, surprising, interesting, confusing, etc.) about this? What's easy or hard to understand here? * '''Logic:''' Does that question make sense here? * '''Rationality:''' How do you know? Are these uses of X (and maybe overlapping terms) really the same? What's really going on? * '''Priority:''' What's important here? * '''Concerns:''' What are the concerns (values, worries) here? * '''Next steps:''' What do I do next? What am I missing? Where do I start? What do I notice? What would be satisfying to know about? How would I answer this? * '''Dimensions:''' What dimensions of this component should I notice? What other dimension of this topic should I look at? What new way should I think about this? As I go, I try to develop a [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Controlled_vocabulary controlled vocabulary] for the model. That is, I try to come up with a single term to use whenever I'm talking about a concept rather than using several synonyms throughout the discussion. This makes the writing more boring and repetitive but hopefully clearer. It at least helps me think about it more clearly. I make haphazard progress through the processing stage. I'm guided by certain intuitions based on my semi-conscious concerns and my underlying ideas of how models are structured, but I find myself getting stuck more often than I'd like. My procedures for getting unstuck are very poorly defined and I think take longer than they should. I'm hoping that formalizing my method somewhat will solve this problem. === Communicating === The communicating stage is basically a revision of the journaling where I assemble my thoughts into something people can hopefully follow, even if it's not very exciting to read. I usually start my writing with a general outline in mind to make sure I cover all the subject matter and do it in a logical order that's fairly easy to grasp. This outline usually gets revised as I write, because as I progress I find out the material actually falls more naturally into another organization. This is annoying but almost inevitable. It seems my thinking on a subject never stops, at least until I stop writing about it. At the end of the writing, I read it a few times to revise and put on the finishing touches you normally need when writing for an audience--making sure sources are cited correctly, all the formatting looks right, and so on. == Examples == From this site: * [[On Being an Agnostic Christian]] * [[A Framework and Agenda for Memory Improvement]] * [[Navigating the World of Comics]] * [[Math Relearning/Fundamentals]] * [[Math Relearning/Number Sense]] * [[Math Relearning/Math Student Simulator/Introduction]] - A discussion of learning by programming. * [[Book Weeding Criteria]] From other authors who seem to take a similar approach: * [https://www.amazon.com/Visualization-Analysis-Design-AK-Peters/dp/1466508914 Visualization Analysis and Design] by Tamara Munzner == Roadmap == Here, in general terms, are the improvements I have in mind for this essay. * Articulate and expand my metamodel. * Articulate the intuitions to follow. * Formalize a procedure. * Articulate a supporting model of the mind. * Expand the method to cover group processes. * Expand it to cover evaluation of claims. * Articulate the essential and distinctive features of my approach. * Expand my library of model patterns. * Expand my library of indirect questions. * Incorporate a programming approach. * Develop arguments for studying modeling. == Potential sources == Alexander, Christopher, and Christopher Alexander. ''The Process of Creating Life: An Essay on the Art of Building and the Nature of the Universe''. The Center for Environmental Structure Series, v. 10. Berkeley, CA: Center for Environmental Structure, 2002. Bernard, H. Russell, Amber Wutich, and Gery Wayne Ryan. ''Analyzing Qualitative Data: Systematic Approaches''. 2nd ed. Los Angeles: SAGE, 2017. Britt, David W. ''A Conceptual Introduction to Modeling: Qualitative and Quantitative Perspectives''. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, 1997. Checkland, Peter. ''Systems Thinking, Systems Practice: Includes a 30-Year Retrospective''. Chichester; New York: John Wiley, 1999. Cooper, Alan. ''About Face: The Essentials of Interaction Design''. 4th ed. Indianapolis, IN: John Wiley and Sons, 2014. Evans, Eric. ''Domain-Driven Design: Tackling Complexity in the Heart of Software''. Boston: Addison-Wesley, 2004. Flood, Robert L. ''Rethinking the Fifth Discipline: Learning within the Unknowable''. London; New York: Routledge, 1999. Halpin, T. A., and A. J. Morgan. ''Information Modeling and Relational Databases''. 2nd ed. Morgan Kaufmann Series in Data Management Systems. Burlington, MA: Elsevier/Morgan Kaufman Publishers, 2008. Herman, Amy. ''Visual Intelligence: Sharpen Your Perception, Change Your Life''. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2016. Heuer, Richards J., and Randolph H. Pherson. ''Structured Analytic Techniques for Intelligence Analysis''. 2nd ed. Washington, DC: CQ Press, 2015. Horton, Susan R. ''Thinking through Writing''. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1982. Huddleston, Rodney D., and Geoffrey K. Pullum. ''A Student’s Introduction to English Grammar''. Cambridge, UK; New York: Cambridge University Press, 2005. Lesh, Richard A., and Helen M. Doerr, eds. ''Beyond Constructivism: Models and Modeling Perspectives on Mathematics Problem Solving, Learning, and Teaching''. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, 2003. McDonald, Kent J. ''Beyond Requirements: Analysis with an Agile Mindset''. New York: Addison-Wesley, 2016. Michalko, Michael. ''Thinkertoys: A Handbook of Creative-Thinking Techniques''. 2nd ed. Berkeley, CA: Ten Speed Press, 2006. Munzner, Tamara. ''Visualization Analysis and Design''. A.K. Peters Visualization Series. Boca Raton: CRC Press, Taylor & Francis Group, CRC Press is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business, 2015. Osborne, Grant R. ''The Hermeneutical Spiral: A Comprehensive Introduction to Biblical Interpretation''. 2nd ed. Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2006. Porter, Bruce, Vladimir Lifschitz, and Frank Van Harmelen, eds. ''Handbook of Knowledge Representation''. 1st ed. Foundations of Artificial Intelligence. Amsterdam; Boston: Elsevier, 2008. Rosenfeld, Louis, Peter Morville, and Jorge Arango. ''Information Architecture: For the Web and Beyond''. 4th ed. Sebastopol, CA: O’Reilly Media, Inc, 2015. Saeed, John I. ''Semantics''. 4th ed. Introducing Linguistics 2. Chichester, West Sussex [England]; Malden, MA: Wiley Blackwell, 2016. [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Developing]] [[Category:Philosophy]] 589ea7fcf174bca641b7e9196f31ccd4320ba591 4 122 334 2018-05-29T00:20:39Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the Privacy Policy and Privacy Tools links. wikitext text/x-wiki * [https://www.thinkulum.net/blog/privacy-policy/ Privacy Policy] * [https://www.thinkulum.net/blog/privacy-tools/ Privacy Tools] fffbf0dc257e1b3e913afa9ec07c918bf121db0c 335 334 2018-05-29T00:21:45Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the Terms of Service link. wikitext text/x-wiki * [https://www.thinkulum.net/blog/terms-of-service-terms/ Terms of Service] * [https://www.thinkulum.net/blog/privacy-policy/ Privacy Policy] * [https://www.thinkulum.net/blog/privacy-tools/ Privacy Tools] 8ecc512f791a560ba29e32998bc7246d8e14cef5 0 123 337 2018-06-20T18:08:56Z Andy Culbertson 1 Andy Culbertson moved page [[Analysis]] to [[Conceptual Modeling]]: Renamed the page's topic. wikitext text/x-wiki #REDIRECT [[Conceptual Modeling]] 37304eabaedad2003b26a6d3def169a3f781a972 0 124 339 2018-09-23T06:59:07Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the article. wikitext text/x-wiki I used to write music when I was a kid. Now, many years later, I've come back to it, inspired by participating in my church's worship ministry. Based on recommendations from the [https://www.reddit.com/r/composer/ r/composer] subreddit, I've chosen William Russo's ''Composing Music: A New Approach'' (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall, 1983) as a way to wade back in and develop my skills. On this set of pages I'll link to my uploaded exercises and write some observations. There are 191 exercises, so I'm splitting the list into separate pages by chapter. * [[/Chapter 1/]] * Chapter 2 * Chapter 3 * Chapter 4 * Chapter 5 * Chapter 6 * Chapter 7 * Chapter 8 * Chapter 9 * Chapter 10 * Chapter 11 * Chapter 12 * Chapter 13 * Chapter 14 * Chapter 15 * Chapter 16 [[Category:Music]] [[Category:Lists]] [[Category:Developing]] afad442542a5ae1c4039b77b3c8ce6c91ce11ec3 344 339 2018-09-23T07:20:02Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the project category. wikitext text/x-wiki I used to write music when I was a kid. Now, many years later, I've come back to it, inspired by participating in my church's worship ministry. Based on recommendations from the [https://www.reddit.com/r/composer/ r/composer] subreddit, I've chosen William Russo's ''Composing Music: A New Approach'' (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall, 1983) as a way to wade back in and develop my skills. On this set of pages I'll link to my uploaded exercises and write some observations. There are 191 exercises, so I'm splitting the list into separate pages by chapter. * [[/Chapter 1/]] * Chapter 2 * Chapter 3 * Chapter 4 * Chapter 5 * Chapter 6 * Chapter 7 * Chapter 8 * Chapter 9 * Chapter 10 * Chapter 11 * Chapter 12 * Chapter 13 * Chapter 14 * Chapter 15 * Chapter 16 [[Category:Music]] [[Category:Exercises from Composing Music: A New Approach]] [[Category:Lists]] [[Category:Developing]] 2f37f8daa1dc33de42d46b64cf738082a97dcd2c 347 344 2018-09-23T07:40:49Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the link to my tracking spreadsheet. wikitext text/x-wiki I used to write music when I was a kid. Now, many years later, I've come back to it, inspired by participating in my church's worship ministry. Based on recommendations from the [https://www.reddit.com/r/composer/ r/composer] subreddit, I've chosen William Russo's ''Composing Music: A New Approach'' (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall, 1983) as a way to wade back in and develop my skills. On this set of pages I'll link to my uploaded exercises and write some observations. There are 191 exercises, so I'm splitting the list into separate pages by chapter. I'm tracking my progress through the exercises on [https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1dF3AU1fM9JQeEPWSEm_SYYnt6PXUdcEF43ciyi4m5VU/edit?usp=sharing this spreadsheet]. * [[/Chapter 1/]] * Chapter 2 * Chapter 3 * Chapter 4 * Chapter 5 * Chapter 6 * Chapter 7 * Chapter 8 * Chapter 9 * Chapter 10 * Chapter 11 * Chapter 12 * Chapter 13 * Chapter 14 * Chapter 15 * Chapter 16 [[Category:Music]] [[Category:Exercises from Composing Music: A New Approach]] [[Category:Lists]] [[Category:Developing]] 2cdf474e2a33dfa99d81a6855654338bb519def3 348 347 2018-09-30T13:01:24Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the general rules and some headings. wikitext text/x-wiki I used to write music when I was a kid. Now, many years later, I've come back to it, inspired by participating in my church's worship ministry. Based on recommendations from the [https://www.reddit.com/r/composer/ r/composer] subreddit, I've chosen William Russo's ''Composing Music: A New Approach'' (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall, 1983) as a way to wade back in and develop my skills. On this set of pages I'll link to my uploaded exercises and write some observations. There are 191 exercises, so I'm splitting the list into separate pages by chapter. I'm tracking my progress through the exercises on [https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1dF3AU1fM9JQeEPWSEm_SYYnt6PXUdcEF43ciyi4m5VU/edit?usp=sharing this spreadsheet]. == General rules == The book's approach is to give each exercise restrictive rules so you can focus on the specific musical resources the exercise is teaching. There are additional rules that apply to all the exercises (pp. 1-3). Here's my summary of those: # Prepare to concentrate on the exercise. # Compose by singing. This will train your inner ear. # Start and end melody-only exercises on the tonic in the same octave. Start a melody with harmony or accompaniment on any tone, and end it on a tonic below the starting tone. This will shape your melodies and help you stay in one key. # Use intervals of mainly 2nds and 3rds. Singing is the origin of all melody, and this rule will make your melodies easier to sing. # Write for instruments you can play and have access to. This will keep your music playable and give you the excitement of hearing your music performed. # Write for string or wind instruments. These can play simple melodies more expressively than the piano. In most cases you may write harmonies or accompaniment for piano or guitar. # Include tempo, dynamics, and articulation. These complete the music and make it ready to perform. # Give the exercise a descriptive title if it's longer than six measures. This will give the piece life and unify its mood for the performer and the listener. # Use a 4/4 or 3/4 meter for most exercises. Use only what Russo calls the Basic Note Values: half note, quarter, pairs of eighth notes, sets of four sixteenths, quarter rests in groups of one or two. This rule will reduce the beginner's risk of trouble. Use only two or three rhythms in an exercise. On rarer occasions you may use 5/4 or 7/4. Group the beats of 5/4 meter into patterns of 2 + 3 or 3 + 2, and use only one pattern in an exercise, though the rhythms within the pattern may vary. Similarly, for 7/4 choose a pattern of 3 + 4 or 4 + 3. # Use notes and other musical elements sparingly, and include rests. Restraint and silence contribute to the music. == Chapters == * [[/Chapter 1/]] * Chapter 2 * Chapter 3 * Chapter 4 * Chapter 5 * Chapter 6 * Chapter 7 * Chapter 8 * Chapter 9 * Chapter 10 * Chapter 11 * Chapter 12 * Chapter 13 * Chapter 14 * Chapter 15 * Chapter 16 [[Category:Music]] [[Category:Exercises from Composing Music: A New Approach]] [[Category:Lists]] [[Category:Developing]] 202a3f39d2451661b37fdf69f4155bcfacbcc732 0 125 340 2018-09-23T07:00:56Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the article. wikitext text/x-wiki == Exercise 1 == == Exercise 2 == == Exercise 3 == == Exercise 4 == == Exercise 5 == == Exercise 6 == == Exercise 7 == == Exercise 8 == [[Category:Music]] [[Category:Lists]] [[Category:Developing]] 0b675b8844f4b7260bd127bf504bd04ff4eeda8c 341 340 2018-09-23T07:14:28Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added links to exercises 1-3. wikitext text/x-wiki == Exercise 1 == [https://musescore.com/user/29710706/scores/5243406 I Hang Up My Harp] == Exercise 2 == [https://musescore.com/user/29710706/scores/5243409 Dance, Lydia!] == Exercise 3 == [https://musescore.com/user/29710706/scores/5243411 March of the Marmots] == Exercise 4 == == Exercise 5 == == Exercise 6 == == Exercise 7 == == Exercise 8 == [[Category:Music]] [[Category:Lists]] [[Category:Developing]] fc7dc70ec8231d75bb76ba61a905dae3b1982acb 345 341 2018-09-23T07:20:08Z Andy Culbertson 1 Fixed the parent category. wikitext text/x-wiki == Exercise 1 == [https://musescore.com/user/29710706/scores/5243406 I Hang Up My Harp] == Exercise 2 == [https://musescore.com/user/29710706/scores/5243409 Dance, Lydia!] == Exercise 3 == [https://musescore.com/user/29710706/scores/5243411 March of the Marmots] == Exercise 4 == == Exercise 5 == == Exercise 6 == == Exercise 7 == == Exercise 8 == [[Category:Exercises from Composing Music: A New Approach]] [[Category:Lists]] [[Category:Developing]] fe8115ccf16b40479635b9538139d449679f84f6 349 345 2018-09-30T13:09:20Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the rules for exercises 1-3. Added the exercise details template for the others. wikitext text/x-wiki == Exercise 1 == '''Result:''' [https://musescore.com/user/29710706/scores/5243406 I Hang Up My Harp] '''Exercise concept:''' Pitch limitation, using a restricted set of tones for a composition. This will be the basis for many exercises. '''Rules:''' # Compose a melody. Use only the tones E4, G4, A4, and B4. # Use 5/4 meter and only the rhythm quarter, quarter, quarter, half. # Choose measures to use more than once, either separated or adjacently. This will unify and shape the melody. # Omit one or more tones in some measures. Study the melodic relationships between all the tones. '''Title concept:''' Russo gives this exercise a backstory. Your captor, Edrevol, ruler of the Lorac, will let you live if you write a melody for the Imperial Flute that pleases him. The flute can only play the four tones of the exercise. '''Observations:''' == Exercise 2 == '''Result:''' [https://musescore.com/user/29710706/scores/5243409 Dance, Lydia!] '''Exercise concept:''' The cell, a limited set of pitches, available in every octave. '''Rules:''' # Compose a melody. Use only the tones F, A, B, and C, in any octave. # Use 4/4 meter and only these rhythms: (a) four eights, two quarters; (b) two quarters, two eighths, quarter. # Use some measures more than once. '''Title concept:''' '''Observations:''' == Exercise 3 == '''Result:''' [https://musescore.com/user/29710706/scores/5243411 March of the Marmots] '''Exercise concept:''' The row, a strict sequence of a limited set of pitches, available in every octave. Each pitch may be repeated one or more times before the next pitch in the sequence. '''Rules:''' # Compose a melody of 6 to 10 measures. Use the sequence D, A, F, E, C, in any octave. # Use 4/4 and only these rhythms: (a) quarter, two eighths, half; (b) quarter rest, three quarters. # Near each note, write its number in the sequence. '''Title concept:''' '''Observations:''' == Exercise 4 == '''Result:''' '''Exercise concept:''' '''Rules:''' '''Title concept:''' '''Observations:''' == Exercise 5 == '''Result:''' '''Exercise concept:''' '''Rules:''' '''Title concept:''' '''Observations:''' == Exercise 6 == '''Result:''' '''Exercise concept:''' '''Rules:''' '''Title concept:''' '''Observations:''' == Exercise 7 == '''Result:''' '''Exercise concept:''' '''Rules:''' '''Title concept:''' '''Observations:''' == Exercise 8 == '''Result:''' '''Exercise concept:''' '''Rules:''' '''Title concept:''' '''Observations:''' [[Category:Music]] [[Category:Lists]] [[Category:Developing]] cb6ee322e094cdde965ee16aaa9990d07337ba0b 14 126 342 2018-09-23T07:16:30Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the category. wikitext text/x-wiki [[Category:The arts]] d380ac1c69d62718a8d6f9845e017783cf51f281 343 342 2018-09-23T07:17:06Z Andy Culbertson 1 Fixed the parent category. wikitext text/x-wiki [[Category:Arts]] d1506439f9d51e39e313798ac6599a2cee896a8e 14 127 346 2018-09-23T07:20:30Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the category. wikitext text/x-wiki [[Category:Music]] 58024dc5d46934e63746732340d917d2f6fba1a3 6 128 350 2018-09-30T13:22:54Z Andy Culbertson 1 Mission Scope diagram. A set of overlapping circles representing the range of topics, skills, tools, and dispositions encompassed by each of my missions in life. The life mission surrounds the career mission. The foundational mission overlaps both of t... wikitext text/x-wiki Mission Scope diagram. A set of overlapping circles representing the range of topics, skills, tools, and dispositions encompassed by each of my missions in life. The life mission surrounds the career mission. The foundational mission overlaps both of them. The ultimate mission surrounds all the others. dbb2e51f2902aca703e64254d9fdf31d2d5ad003 6 128 351 350 2018-09-30T13:24:44Z Andy Culbertson 1 Andy Culbertson uploaded a new version of &quot;[[File:Mission-Scope.png]]&quot; wikitext text/x-wiki Mission Scope diagram. A set of overlapping circles representing the range of topics, skills, tools, and dispositions encompassed by each of my missions in life. The life mission surrounds the career mission. The foundational mission overlaps both of them. The ultimate mission surrounds all the others. dbb2e51f2902aca703e64254d9fdf31d2d5ad003 366 351 2018-10-24T03:27:38Z Andy Culbertson 1 Andy Culbertson uploaded a new version of &quot;[[File:Mission-Scope.png]]&quot; wikitext text/x-wiki Mission Scope diagram. A set of overlapping circles representing the range of topics, skills, tools, and dispositions encompassed by each of my missions in life. The life mission surrounds the career mission. The foundational mission overlaps both of them. The ultimate mission surrounds all the others. dbb2e51f2902aca703e64254d9fdf31d2d5ad003 0 129 352 2018-09-30T13:50:18Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the article. wikitext text/x-wiki Life can be complicated. It helps to have a plan. If you've read much of this site, you might notice my interests are all over the place. This might get confusing. It confuses me too. I start projects left and right, usually without finishing, but all along having this hunch that they all fit together somehow. I've spent a lot of time trying to figure it out. It's an ongoing process, and the emerging result is a map of my goals, interests, and projects. I have three purposes for making this map: * To help you make sense of my projects and how they fit into my life, if that's something you care about. If you know how each project relates to my other projects and my goals, you'll feel less lost. * To help me plan. Knowing how my project ideas relate to my goals and circumstances helps me strategize. * To offer you ideas if you'd like to create your own life agenda. Maybe you can pick up helpful tips from what I've come up with. == Missions == I've grouped my overall life goals into a set of missions. These missions have different scopes and serve different purposes. I'll list my statement for each mission from broadest to narrowest and then explain them in more detail. * Ultimate mission: Be good and enjoy life. * Foundational mission: Live comfortably and improve myself. * Life mission: Explore mental and relational potential. * Career mission: Contribute to developing artificial general intelligence. I also have an alternate career mission: Help resolve psychological problems through counseling. This one is waiting in the wings to replace or supplement my current career mission, if that becomes a good idea. These missions involve greatly overlapping sets of topics, skills, tools, and dispositions. These elements are the subject matter of my projects. Hence, a single project may serve more than one mission. The Mission Scope diagram gives a general sense of how the missions overlap. I'll cover these overlaps more in the descriptions below. [[File:Mission-Scope.png|200px|thumb|right|Mission Scope diagram]] === Ultimate mission === My ultimate mission is to be good and enjoy life. Why have I set this mission? It enables me to live a satisfying life. Technically this means the ultimate mission is only penultimate, because it serves that final purpose. But that goal is too general to be informative, so I haven't made it a separate mission. How will I accomplish this mission? * By fulfilling the other missions. * By doing any other relevant tasks that become important. === Foundational mission === My foundational mission is to live comfortably and improve myself. Why have I set this mission? * It supports the other missions by creating an environment in which I can pursue them and by establishing the skills and knowledge that will help me pursue them more effectively. ** Living comfortably gives me the freedom and resources to do everything else. ** Improving myself bridges the gap between the way I am and the person I want to be who can fulfill my other missions. * It creates a starting fulfillment of the ultimate mission by enabling me to be basically good and basically content. How will I accomplish this mission? * By managing resources to meet basic physical, social, financial, and other needs in a way that minimizes unnecessary stress and creates potential for enjoyment. * By training myself in the general dispositions, knowledge, and skills that will enable me to pursue all my missions. * By acquiring tools that will help me pursue it. === Life mission === My life mission is to explore mental and relational potential. Why have I set this mission? * Mental life and relationships are the features of the world and the activities I care the most about. The kinds of concepts I have in mind here are mental functions (consciousness, emotion, reasoning, problem solving, memory, attention, imagination, intuition), interaction and discovery, transformation, ethics, and relational dynamics (connection, cooperation, negotiation, conflict). * It will increase the well-being of myself and the people in my sphere of influence by applying reason and empathy to the challenges of life through the discovery and communication of knowledge, personal interaction, and the creation of art and technology. How will I accomplish this mission? * By reading, discussing, experiencing, writing, and programming about these topics. * By working to enrich people's lives in these areas using my particular skills and interests. The exploring part of the mission includes pursuing these potentials so that they become actual. This actualizing improves the world (ideally), is personally fulfilling, and enables further exploration. === Career mission === My career mission is to contribute to developing artificial general intelligence (AGI). Why have I set this mission? * AGI is the ultimate expression of certain concerns of mine: ** Exploring the mind. ** Maximizing competence. ** Generating discoveries and solutions. * It's a high-impact way I can apply my unique combination of interests and skills: ** The fields contributing to cognitive science, roughly these: psychology, neuroscience, linguistics, anthropology, philosophy, and computer science. ** Creative and critical thinking skills. ** Programming. How will I accomplish this mission? * By accomplish any necessary prerequisites. * By joining a group of people who are working toward AGI and filling whatever role they need that fits my strengths. === Alternate career mission === My alternate career mission is to help people with their psychological problems through counseling. Why have I set this mission? * I enjoy seeing people overcome their problems and participating in that process. * Transformed people positively affect their environments. I like the idea of harmony and well-being spreading from the people I've helped. How would I accomplish this mission? * By accomplishing any necessary prerequisites. * By filling a counseling role in some private practice or group context. == Planned updates == * Improve the mission descriptions. * Tie the missions to my projects. * Add a strategy for scheduling my projects. [[Category:Philosophy]] [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Developing]] d6181d31f85d6fddc95d81e6596dbb4036fdbe19 353 352 2018-10-04T01:46:06Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added a disclaimer that the map is a WIP. wikitext text/x-wiki Life can be complicated. It helps to have a plan. If you've read much of this site, you might notice my interests are all over the place. This might get confusing. It confuses me too. I start projects left and right, usually without finishing, but all along having this hunch that they all fit together somehow. I've spent a lot of time trying to figure it out. It's an ongoing process, and the emerging result is a map of my goals, interests, and projects. I have three purposes for making this map: * To help you make sense of my projects and how they fit into my life, if that's something you care about. If you know how each project relates to my other projects and my goals, you'll feel less lost. * To help me plan. Knowing how my project ideas relate to my goals and circumstances helps me strategize. * To offer you ideas if you'd like to create your own life agenda. Maybe you can pick up helpful tips from what I've come up with. The map is a work in progress. Each part of it is likely to be incomplete, imprecise, and inaccurate. == Missions == I've grouped my overall life goals into a set of missions. These missions have different scopes and serve different purposes. I'll list my statement for each mission from broadest to narrowest and then explain them in more detail. * Ultimate mission: Be good and enjoy life. * Foundational mission: Live comfortably and improve myself. * Life mission: Explore mental and relational potential. * Career mission: Contribute to developing artificial general intelligence. I also have an alternate career mission: Help resolve psychological problems through counseling. This one is waiting in the wings to replace or supplement my current career mission, if that becomes a good idea. These missions involve greatly overlapping sets of topics, skills, tools, and dispositions. These elements are the subject matter of my projects. Hence, a single project may serve more than one mission. The Mission Scope diagram gives a general sense of how the missions overlap. I'll cover these overlaps more in the descriptions below. [[File:Mission-Scope.png|200px|thumb|right|Mission Scope diagram]] === Ultimate mission === My ultimate mission is to be good and enjoy life. Why have I set this mission? It enables me to live a satisfying life. Technically this means the ultimate mission is only penultimate, because it serves that final purpose. But that goal is too general to be informative, so I haven't made it a separate mission. How will I accomplish this mission? * By fulfilling the other missions. * By doing any other relevant tasks that become important. === Foundational mission === My foundational mission is to live comfortably and improve myself. Why have I set this mission? * It supports the other missions by creating an environment in which I can pursue them and by establishing the skills and knowledge that will help me pursue them more effectively. ** Living comfortably gives me the freedom and resources to do everything else. ** Improving myself bridges the gap between the way I am and the person I want to be who can fulfill my other missions. * It creates a starting fulfillment of the ultimate mission by enabling me to be basically good and basically content. How will I accomplish this mission? * By managing resources to meet basic physical, social, financial, and other needs in a way that minimizes unnecessary stress and creates potential for enjoyment. * By training myself in the general dispositions, knowledge, and skills that will enable me to pursue all my missions. * By acquiring tools that will help me pursue it. === Life mission === My life mission is to explore mental and relational potential. Why have I set this mission? * Mental life and relationships are the features of the world and the activities I care the most about. The kinds of concepts I have in mind here are mental functions (consciousness, emotion, reasoning, problem solving, memory, attention, imagination, intuition), interaction and discovery, transformation, ethics, and relational dynamics (connection, cooperation, negotiation, conflict). * It will increase the well-being of myself and the people in my sphere of influence by applying reason and empathy to the challenges of life through the discovery and communication of knowledge, personal interaction, and the creation of art and technology. How will I accomplish this mission? * By reading, discussing, experiencing, writing, and programming about these topics. * By working to enrich people's lives in these areas using my particular skills and interests. The exploring part of the mission includes pursuing these potentials so that they become actual. This actualizing improves the world (ideally), is personally fulfilling, and enables further exploration. === Career mission === My career mission is to contribute to developing artificial general intelligence (AGI). Why have I set this mission? * AGI is the ultimate expression of certain concerns of mine: ** Exploring the mind. ** Maximizing competence. ** Generating discoveries and solutions. * It's a high-impact way I can apply my unique combination of interests and skills: ** The fields contributing to cognitive science, roughly these: psychology, neuroscience, linguistics, anthropology, philosophy, and computer science. ** Creative and critical thinking skills. ** Programming. How will I accomplish this mission? * By accomplish any necessary prerequisites. * By joining a group of people who are working toward AGI and filling whatever role they need that fits my strengths. === Alternate career mission === My alternate career mission is to help people with their psychological problems through counseling. Why have I set this mission? * I enjoy seeing people overcome their problems and participating in that process. * Transformed people positively affect their environments. I like the idea of harmony and well-being spreading from the people I've helped. How would I accomplish this mission? * By accomplishing any necessary prerequisites. * By filling a counseling role in some private practice or group context. == Planned updates == * Improve the mission descriptions. * Tie the missions to my projects. * Add a strategy for scheduling my projects. [[Category:Philosophy]] [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Developing]] fe3628f686884cc16249fa52f94605b7357beded 360 353 2018-10-07T00:21:13Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the "Journey as destination" section. wikitext text/x-wiki Life can be complicated. It helps to have a plan. If you've read much of this site, you might notice my interests are all over the place. This might get confusing. It confuses me too. I start projects left and right, usually without finishing, but all along having this hunch that they all fit together somehow. I've spent a lot of time trying to figure it out. It's an ongoing process, and the emerging result is a map of my goals, interests, and projects. I have three purposes for making this map: * To help you make sense of my projects and how they fit into my life, if that's something you care about. If you know how each project relates to my other projects and my goals, you'll feel less lost. * To help me plan. Knowing how my project ideas relate to my goals and circumstances helps me strategize. * To offer you ideas if you'd like to create your own life agenda. Maybe you can pick up helpful tips from what I've come up with. The map is a work in progress. Each part of it is likely to be incomplete, imprecise, and inaccurate. == Missions == I've grouped my overall life goals into a set of missions. These missions have different scopes and serve different purposes. I'll list my statement for each mission from broadest to narrowest and then explain them in more detail. * Ultimate mission: Be good and enjoy life. * Foundational mission: Live comfortably and improve myself. * Life mission: Explore mental and relational potential. * Career mission: Contribute to developing artificial general intelligence. I also have an alternate career mission: Help resolve psychological problems through counseling. This one is waiting in the wings to replace or supplement my current career mission, if that becomes a good idea. These missions involve greatly overlapping sets of topics, skills, tools, and dispositions. These elements are the subject matter of my projects. Hence, a single project may serve more than one mission. The Mission Scope diagram gives a general sense of how the missions overlap. I'll cover these overlaps more in the descriptions below. [[File:Mission-Scope.png|200px|thumb|right|Mission Scope diagram]] === Ultimate mission === My ultimate mission is to be good and enjoy life. Why have I set this mission? It enables me to live a satisfying life. Technically this means the ultimate mission is only penultimate, because it serves that final purpose. But that goal is too general to be informative, so I haven't made it a separate mission. How will I accomplish this mission? * By fulfilling the other missions. * By doing any other relevant tasks that become important. === Foundational mission === My foundational mission is to live comfortably and improve myself. Why have I set this mission? * It supports the other missions by creating an environment in which I can pursue them and by establishing the skills and knowledge that will help me pursue them more effectively. ** Living comfortably gives me the freedom and resources to do everything else. ** Improving myself bridges the gap between the way I am and the person I want to be who can fulfill my other missions. * It creates a starting fulfillment of the ultimate mission by enabling me to be basically good and basically content. How will I accomplish this mission? * By managing resources to meet basic physical, social, financial, and other needs in a way that minimizes unnecessary stress and creates potential for enjoyment. * By training myself in the general dispositions, knowledge, and skills that will enable me to pursue all my missions. * By acquiring tools that will help me pursue it. === Life mission === My life mission is to explore mental and relational potential. Why have I set this mission? * Mental life and relationships are the features of the world and the activities I care the most about. The kinds of concepts I have in mind here are mental functions (consciousness, emotion, reasoning, problem solving, memory, attention, imagination, intuition), interaction and discovery, transformation, ethics, and relational dynamics (connection, cooperation, negotiation, conflict). * It will increase the well-being of myself and the people in my sphere of influence by applying reason and empathy to the challenges of life through the discovery and communication of knowledge, personal interaction, and the creation of art and technology. How will I accomplish this mission? * By reading, discussing, experiencing, writing, and programming about these topics. * By working to enrich people's lives in these areas using my particular skills and interests. The exploring part of the mission includes pursuing these potentials so that they become actual. This actualizing improves the world (ideally), is personally fulfilling, and enables further exploration. === Career mission === My career mission is to contribute to developing artificial general intelligence (AGI). Why have I set this mission? * AGI is the ultimate expression of certain concerns of mine: ** Exploring the mind. ** Maximizing competence. ** Generating discoveries and solutions. * It's a high-impact way I can apply my unique combination of interests and skills: ** The fields contributing to cognitive science, roughly these: psychology, neuroscience, linguistics, anthropology, philosophy, and computer science. ** Creative and critical thinking skills. ** Programming. How will I accomplish this mission? * By accomplish any necessary prerequisites. * By joining a group of people who are working toward AGI and filling whatever role they need that fits my strengths. === Alternate career mission === My alternate career mission is to help people with their psychological problems through counseling. Why have I set this mission? * I enjoy seeing people overcome their problems and participating in that process. * Transformed people positively affect their environments. I like the idea of harmony and well-being spreading from the people I've helped. How would I accomplish this mission? * By accomplishing any necessary prerequisites. * By filling a counseling role in some private practice or group context. == Journey as destination == People take different approaches to pursuing goals. One dimension of these differences is their goal in pursuing goals. Is the destination their destination, or is the journey the destination? I see this distinction as a spectrum. People will emphasize one or the other of these approaches to varying degrees. I used to think of myself as very destination oriented, but these days I fall a little closer to the journey end of the spectrum. I definitely care about my chosen goals--they aren't just random MacGuffins--but over the years I've learned to set my sights lower so I don't have to wait years to achieve any satisfaction in life. What I care about now is incremental progress. If I'm further along today than I was yesterday, I'm happy. And a lot of the time I enjoy the process of making progress. That makes it easier to achieve the goal of enjoying life. Much of it happens while I'm pursuing the other goals. == Planned updates == * Improve the mission descriptions. * Tie the missions to my projects. * Add a strategy for scheduling my projects. [[Category:Philosophy]] [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Developing]] 5e0aa83a0734237fa3e736886797304d4ac16a39 361 360 2018-10-07T15:01:01Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added a qualification to the journey section. wikitext text/x-wiki Life can be complicated. It helps to have a plan. If you've read much of this site, you might notice my interests are all over the place. This might get confusing. It confuses me too. I start projects left and right, usually without finishing, but all along having this hunch that they all fit together somehow. I've spent a lot of time trying to figure it out. It's an ongoing process, and the emerging result is a map of my goals, interests, and projects. I have three purposes for making this map: * To help you make sense of my projects and how they fit into my life, if that's something you care about. If you know how each project relates to my other projects and my goals, you'll feel less lost. * To help me plan. Knowing how my project ideas relate to my goals and circumstances helps me strategize. * To offer you ideas if you'd like to create your own life agenda. Maybe you can pick up helpful tips from what I've come up with. The map is a work in progress. Each part of it is likely to be incomplete, imprecise, and inaccurate. == Missions == I've grouped my overall life goals into a set of missions. These missions have different scopes and serve different purposes. I'll list my statement for each mission from broadest to narrowest and then explain them in more detail. * Ultimate mission: Be good and enjoy life. * Foundational mission: Live comfortably and improve myself. * Life mission: Explore mental and relational potential. * Career mission: Contribute to developing artificial general intelligence. I also have an alternate career mission: Help resolve psychological problems through counseling. This one is waiting in the wings to replace or supplement my current career mission, if that becomes a good idea. These missions involve greatly overlapping sets of topics, skills, tools, and dispositions. These elements are the subject matter of my projects. Hence, a single project may serve more than one mission. The Mission Scope diagram gives a general sense of how the missions overlap. I'll cover these overlaps more in the descriptions below. [[File:Mission-Scope.png|200px|thumb|right|Mission Scope diagram]] === Ultimate mission === My ultimate mission is to be good and enjoy life. Why have I set this mission? It enables me to live a satisfying life. Technically this means the ultimate mission is only penultimate, because it serves that final purpose. But that goal is too general to be informative, so I haven't made it a separate mission. How will I accomplish this mission? * By fulfilling the other missions. * By doing any other relevant tasks that become important. === Foundational mission === My foundational mission is to live comfortably and improve myself. Why have I set this mission? * It supports the other missions by creating an environment in which I can pursue them and by establishing the skills and knowledge that will help me pursue them more effectively. ** Living comfortably gives me the freedom and resources to do everything else. ** Improving myself bridges the gap between the way I am and the person I want to be who can fulfill my other missions. * It creates a starting fulfillment of the ultimate mission by enabling me to be basically good and basically content. How will I accomplish this mission? * By managing resources to meet basic physical, social, financial, and other needs in a way that minimizes unnecessary stress and creates potential for enjoyment. * By training myself in the general dispositions, knowledge, and skills that will enable me to pursue all my missions. * By acquiring tools that will help me pursue it. === Life mission === My life mission is to explore mental and relational potential. Why have I set this mission? * Mental life and relationships are the features of the world and the activities I care the most about. The kinds of concepts I have in mind here are mental functions (consciousness, emotion, reasoning, problem solving, memory, attention, imagination, intuition), interaction and discovery, transformation, ethics, and relational dynamics (connection, cooperation, negotiation, conflict). * It will increase the well-being of myself and the people in my sphere of influence by applying reason and empathy to the challenges of life through the discovery and communication of knowledge, personal interaction, and the creation of art and technology. How will I accomplish this mission? * By reading, discussing, experiencing, writing, and programming about these topics. * By working to enrich people's lives in these areas using my particular skills and interests. The exploring part of the mission includes pursuing these potentials so that they become actual. This actualizing improves the world (ideally), is personally fulfilling, and enables further exploration. === Career mission === My career mission is to contribute to developing artificial general intelligence (AGI). Why have I set this mission? * AGI is the ultimate expression of certain concerns of mine: ** Exploring the mind. ** Maximizing competence. ** Generating discoveries and solutions. * It's a high-impact way I can apply my unique combination of interests and skills: ** The fields contributing to cognitive science, roughly these: psychology, neuroscience, linguistics, anthropology, philosophy, and computer science. ** Creative and critical thinking skills. ** Programming. How will I accomplish this mission? * By accomplish any necessary prerequisites. * By joining a group of people who are working toward AGI and filling whatever role they need that fits my strengths. === Alternate career mission === My alternate career mission is to help people with their psychological problems through counseling. Why have I set this mission? * I enjoy seeing people overcome their problems and participating in that process. * Transformed people positively affect their environments. I like the idea of harmony and well-being spreading from the people I've helped. How would I accomplish this mission? * By accomplishing any necessary prerequisites. * By filling a counseling role in some private practice or group context. == Journey as destination == People take different approaches to pursuing goals. One dimension of these differences is their goal in pursuing goals. Is the destination their destination, or is the journey the destination? I see this distinction as a spectrum. People will emphasize one or the other of these approaches to varying degrees. I used to think of myself as very destination oriented, but these days I fall a little closer to the journey end of the spectrum. I definitely care about my chosen goals--they aren't just random MacGuffins--but over the years I've learned to set my sights lower so I don't have to wait years to achieve any satisfaction in life. What I care about now is incremental progress. Aside from desperate needs, if I'm further along today than I was yesterday, I'm happy. And a lot of the time I enjoy the process of making progress. That makes it easier to achieve the goal of enjoying life. Much of it happens while I'm pursuing the other goals. == Planned updates == * Improve the mission descriptions. * Tie the missions to my projects. * Add a strategy for scheduling my projects. [[Category:Philosophy]] [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Developing]] 1092f58b1a3af872ff26bc7f9e238d89b4d054ab 0 125 354 349 2018-10-06T23:31:17Z Andy Culbertson 1 Andy Culbertson moved page [[Exercises from Composing Music: A New Approach/Chapter 1]] to [[Exercises from Composing Music: A New Approach/Chapter 1: The Cell, The Row, and Some Scales]]: Added the chapter title. wikitext text/x-wiki == Exercise 1 == '''Result:''' [https://musescore.com/user/29710706/scores/5243406 I Hang Up My Harp] '''Exercise concept:''' Pitch limitation, using a restricted set of tones for a composition. This will be the basis for many exercises. '''Rules:''' # Compose a melody. Use only the tones E4, G4, A4, and B4. # Use 5/4 meter and only the rhythm quarter, quarter, quarter, half. # Choose measures to use more than once, either separated or adjacently. This will unify and shape the melody. # Omit one or more tones in some measures. Study the melodic relationships between all the tones. '''Title concept:''' Russo gives this exercise a backstory. Your captor, Edrevol, ruler of the Lorac, will let you live if you write a melody for the Imperial Flute that pleases him. The flute can only play the four tones of the exercise. '''Observations:''' == Exercise 2 == '''Result:''' [https://musescore.com/user/29710706/scores/5243409 Dance, Lydia!] '''Exercise concept:''' The cell, a limited set of pitches, available in every octave. '''Rules:''' # Compose a melody. Use only the tones F, A, B, and C, in any octave. # Use 4/4 meter and only these rhythms: (a) four eights, two quarters; (b) two quarters, two eighths, quarter. # Use some measures more than once. '''Title concept:''' '''Observations:''' == Exercise 3 == '''Result:''' [https://musescore.com/user/29710706/scores/5243411 March of the Marmots] '''Exercise concept:''' The row, a strict sequence of a limited set of pitches, available in every octave. Each pitch may be repeated one or more times before the next pitch in the sequence. '''Rules:''' # Compose a melody of 6 to 10 measures. Use the sequence D, A, F, E, C, in any octave. # Use 4/4 and only these rhythms: (a) quarter, two eighths, half; (b) quarter rest, three quarters. # Near each note, write its number in the sequence. '''Title concept:''' '''Observations:''' == Exercise 4 == '''Result:''' '''Exercise concept:''' '''Rules:''' '''Title concept:''' '''Observations:''' == Exercise 5 == '''Result:''' '''Exercise concept:''' '''Rules:''' '''Title concept:''' '''Observations:''' == Exercise 6 == '''Result:''' '''Exercise concept:''' '''Rules:''' '''Title concept:''' '''Observations:''' == Exercise 7 == '''Result:''' '''Exercise concept:''' '''Rules:''' '''Title concept:''' '''Observations:''' == Exercise 8 == '''Result:''' '''Exercise concept:''' '''Rules:''' '''Title concept:''' '''Observations:''' [[Category:Music]] [[Category:Lists]] [[Category:Developing]] cb6ee322e094cdde965ee16aaa9990d07337ba0b 358 354 2018-10-06T23:47:49Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the rules for exercises 4-8. wikitext text/x-wiki == Exercise 1 == '''Result:''' [https://musescore.com/user/29710706/scores/5243406 I Hang Up My Harp] '''Exercise concept:''' Pitch limitation, using a restricted set of tones for a composition. This will be the basis for many exercises. '''Rules:''' # Compose a melody. Use only the tones E4, G4, A4, and B4. # Use 5/4 meter and only the rhythm quarter, quarter, quarter, half. # Choose measures to use more than once, either separated or adjacently. This will unify and shape the melody. # Omit one or more tones in some measures. Study the melodic relationships between all the tones. '''Title concept:''' Russo gives this exercise a backstory. Your captor, Edrevol, ruler of the Lorac, will let you live if you write a melody for the Imperial Flute that pleases him. The flute can only play the four tones of the exercise. '''Observations:''' == Exercise 2 == '''Result:''' [https://musescore.com/user/29710706/scores/5243409 Dance, Lydia!] '''Exercise concept:''' The cell, a limited set of pitches, available in every octave. '''Rules:''' # Compose a melody. Use only the tones F, A, B, and C, in any octave. # Use 4/4 meter and only these rhythms: (a) four eights, two quarters; (b) two quarters, two eighths, quarter. # Use some measures more than once. '''Title concept:''' '''Observations:''' == Exercise 3 == '''Result:''' [https://musescore.com/user/29710706/scores/5243411 March of the Marmots] '''Exercise concept:''' The row, a strict sequence of a limited set of pitches, available in every octave. Each pitch may be repeated one or more times before the next pitch in the sequence. '''Rules:''' # Compose a melody of 6 to 10 measures. Use the sequence D, A, F, E, C, in any octave. # Use 4/4 and only these rhythms: (a) quarter, two eighths, half; (b) quarter rest, three quarters. # Near each note, write its number in the sequence. '''Title concept:''' '''Observations:''' == Exercise 4 == '''Result:''' '''Exercise concept:''' Melody from the C major scale. '''Rules:''' # Compose a melody. Use only the tones in the C major scale, in any octave. Conceive of it as a single melody rather than a set of discrete measures. # Begin and end on C4. # Use 4/4 meter and only the rhythm quarter, two eighths, half. # Use some measures more than once. Write out all the notes individually in these cases. The extra effort will make you decide whether you really want the repetition. '''Title concept:''' '''Observations:''' == Exercise 5 == '''Result:''' '''Exercise concept:''' The Dorian scale, a scale that uses the same tones as the major scale one step below it. '''Rules:''' # Compose a melody of 6 to 10 measures that expresses the idea of some form of water. # Use only the tones in the D Dorian scale, in any octave. To establish the key, since the melody is unaccompanied, begin and end on the tone D, and return to D often. # Use 4/4 meter and only the rhythm quarter, two eighths, half. # Use some measures more than once. '''Title concept:''' '''Observations:''' == Exercise 6 == '''Result:''' '''Exercise concept:''' The Phrygian scale, a scale that uses the same tones as the major scale two steps below it. '''Rules:''' # Compose a melody of 6 to 10 measures that expresses a dark and ominous mood. # Use only the tones in the E Phrygian scale, in any octave. Center the melody on E. # Use 4/4 meter and only the rhythms (a) quarter, two eighths, two quarters; and (b) two quarters, half. '''Title concept:''' '''Observations:''' == Exercise 7 == '''Result:''' '''Exercise concept:''' Phrygian mistake exercise. '''Rules:''' # Base the exercise on exercise 6. # Break the rules everywhere. Especially break the rule about maintaining a tonic of E. # Label your mistakes. You can do this by writing a numbered list of the rules you've broken and writing the number from the list near the places you've broken it (see the example on p. 12). '''Title concept:''' '''Observations:''' == Exercise 8 == '''Result:''' '''Exercise concept:''' The Basic Note Values. '''Rules:''' # Compose 8 to 12 measures for an unpitched percussion instrument. You can use the second space from the top. Use X for the clef. Use only the Basic Note Values. Repeat some measures. Make each rhythm flow into the next (see the comments on p. 12). # Don't use an eighth rest followed by three eighths or the same pattern in sixteenths. # Don't follow two eighths or four sixteenths with a rest. These patterns are hard to perform. '''Title concept:''' '''Observations:''' [[Category:Music]] [[Category:Lists]] [[Category:Developing]] 825d8d566702e7daec566d074ef270c4c467dcb9 362 358 2018-10-14T04:27:58Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added exercise 4 and the title concepts for exercises 1-4. wikitext text/x-wiki == Exercise 1 == '''Result:''' [https://musescore.com/user/29710706/scores/5243406 I Hang Up My Harp] '''Exercise concept:''' Pitch limitation, using a restricted set of tones for a composition. This will be the basis for many exercises. '''Rules:''' # Compose a melody. Use only the tones E4, G4, A4, and B4. # Use 5/4 meter and only the rhythm quarter, quarter, quarter, half. # Choose measures to use more than once, either separated or adjacently. This will unify and shape the melody. # Omit one or more tones in some measures. Study the melodic relationships between all the tones. '''Title concept:''' Russo gives this exercise a backstory. Your captor, Edrevol, ruler of the Lorac, will let you live if you write a melody for the Imperial Flute that pleases him. The flute can only play the four tones of the exercise. The tune ended up kind of mournful, so I imagined the player consumed by longing for home. That reminded me of [https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Psalm+137&version=NRSV Psalm 137] where the Jewish people are lamenting their exile. The title is a reference to verse 2. I'm not sure Edrevol was pleased. '''Observations:''' == Exercise 2 == '''Result:''' [https://musescore.com/user/29710706/scores/5243409 Dance, Lydia!] '''Exercise concept:''' The cell, a limited set of pitches, available in every octave. '''Rules:''' # Compose a melody. Use only the tones F, A, B, and C, in any octave. # Use 4/4 meter and only these rhythms: (a) four eights, two quarters; (b) two quarters, two eighths, quarter. # Use some measures more than once. '''Title concept:''' I pictured an extended family gathering where a father is playing a lively tune on his violin while his young daughter dances around the room. The exercise is in Lydian mode, so ... '''Observations:''' == Exercise 3 == '''Result:''' [https://musescore.com/user/29710706/scores/5243411 March of the Marmots] '''Exercise concept:''' The row, a strict sequence of a limited set of pitches, available in every octave. Each pitch may be repeated one or more times before the next pitch in the sequence. '''Rules:''' # Compose a melody of 6 to 10 measures. Use the sequence D, A, F, E, C, in any octave. # Use 4/4 and only these rhythms: (a) quarter, two eighths, half; (b) quarter rest, three quarters. # Near each note, write its number in the sequence. '''Title concept:''' The melody sounded like a foreboding march. But I also felt there was a bit of comedy there, and I imagined it was an army of something small. So I looked for rodents that would alliterate with ''march''. Mice seemed a little cliché. '''Observations:''' == Exercise 4 == '''Result:''' [https://musescore.com/user/29710706/scores/5269423 Josephine's Picnic] '''Exercise concept:''' Melody from the C major scale. '''Rules:''' # Compose a melody. Use only the tones in the C major scale, in any octave. Conceive of it as a single melody rather than a set of discrete measures. # Begin and end on C4. # Use 4/4 meter and only the rhythm quarter, two eighths, half. # Use some measures more than once. Write out all the notes individually in these cases. The extra effort will make you decide whether you really want the repetition. '''Title concept:''' This tune turned out to be another lively one, but after exercise 2 it felt uncreative to put dance in the name. Luckily the melody brought to my mind a frolicky scene of woodland creatures, and I imagined Peter Rabbit's mother hosting a picnic for a group of friendly, energetic animals. '''Observations:''' == Exercise 5 == '''Result:''' '''Exercise concept:''' The Dorian scale, a scale that uses the same tones as the major scale one step below it. '''Rules:''' # Compose a melody of 6 to 10 measures that expresses the idea of some form of water. # Use only the tones in the D Dorian scale, in any octave. To establish the key, since the melody is unaccompanied, begin and end on the tone D, and return to D often. # Use 4/4 meter and only the rhythm quarter, two eighths, half. # Use some measures more than once. '''Title concept:''' '''Observations:''' == Exercise 6 == '''Result:''' '''Exercise concept:''' The Phrygian scale, a scale that uses the same tones as the major scale two steps below it. '''Rules:''' # Compose a melody of 6 to 10 measures that expresses a dark and ominous mood. # Use only the tones in the E Phrygian scale, in any octave. Center the melody on E. # Use 4/4 meter and only the rhythms (a) quarter, two eighths, two quarters; and (b) two quarters, half. '''Title concept:''' '''Observations:''' == Exercise 7 == '''Result:''' '''Exercise concept:''' Phrygian mistake exercise. '''Rules:''' # Base the exercise on exercise 6. # Break the rules everywhere. Especially break the rule about maintaining a tonic of E. # Label your mistakes. You can do this by writing a numbered list of the rules you've broken and writing the number from the list near the places you've broken it (see the example on p. 12). '''Title concept:''' '''Observations:''' == Exercise 8 == '''Result:''' '''Exercise concept:''' The Basic Note Values. '''Rules:''' # Compose 8 to 12 measures for an unpitched percussion instrument. You can use the second space from the top. Use X for the clef. Use only the Basic Note Values. Repeat some measures. Make each rhythm flow into the next (see the comments on p. 12). # Don't use an eighth rest followed by three eighths or the same pattern in sixteenths. # Don't follow two eighths or four sixteenths with a rest. These patterns are hard to perform. '''Title concept:''' '''Observations:''' [[Category:Music]] [[Category:Lists]] [[Category:Developing]] 7028fdd2fa814bf993a06f8db9fb98f753cbf1ba 364 362 2018-10-14T04:43:06Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added Wikipedia links for Lydian mode and Peter Rabbit. wikitext text/x-wiki == Exercise 1 == '''Result:''' [https://musescore.com/user/29710706/scores/5243406 I Hang Up My Harp] '''Exercise concept:''' Pitch limitation, using a restricted set of tones for a composition. This will be the basis for many exercises. '''Rules:''' # Compose a melody. Use only the tones E4, G4, A4, and B4. # Use 5/4 meter and only the rhythm quarter, quarter, quarter, half. # Choose measures to use more than once, either separated or adjacently. This will unify and shape the melody. # Omit one or more tones in some measures. Study the melodic relationships between all the tones. '''Title concept:''' Russo gives this exercise a backstory. Your captor, Edrevol, ruler of the Lorac, will let you live if you write a melody for the Imperial Flute that pleases him. The flute can only play the four tones of the exercise. The tune ended up kind of mournful, so I imagined the player consumed by longing for home. That reminded me of [https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Psalm+137&version=NRSV Psalm 137] where the Jewish people are lamenting their exile. The title is a reference to verse 2. I'm not sure Edrevol was pleased. '''Observations:''' == Exercise 2 == '''Result:''' [https://musescore.com/user/29710706/scores/5243409 Dance, Lydia!] '''Exercise concept:''' The cell, a limited set of pitches, available in every octave. '''Rules:''' # Compose a melody. Use only the tones F, A, B, and C, in any octave. # Use 4/4 meter and only these rhythms: (a) four eights, two quarters; (b) two quarters, two eighths, quarter. # Use some measures more than once. '''Title concept:''' I pictured an extended family gathering where a father is playing a lively tune on his violin while his young daughter dances around the room. The exercise is in [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lydian_mode Lydian mode], so ... '''Observations:''' == Exercise 3 == '''Result:''' [https://musescore.com/user/29710706/scores/5243411 March of the Marmots] '''Exercise concept:''' The row, a strict sequence of a limited set of pitches, available in every octave. Each pitch may be repeated one or more times before the next pitch in the sequence. '''Rules:''' # Compose a melody of 6 to 10 measures. Use the sequence D, A, F, E, C, in any octave. # Use 4/4 and only these rhythms: (a) quarter, two eighths, half; (b) quarter rest, three quarters. # Near each note, write its number in the sequence. '''Title concept:''' The melody sounded like a foreboding march. But I also felt there was a bit of comedy there, and I imagined it was an army of something small. So I looked for rodents that would alliterate with ''march''. Mice seemed a little cliché. '''Observations:''' == Exercise 4 == '''Result:''' [https://musescore.com/user/29710706/scores/5269423 Josephine's Picnic] '''Exercise concept:''' Melody from the C major scale. '''Rules:''' # Compose a melody. Use only the tones in the C major scale, in any octave. Conceive of it as a single melody rather than a set of discrete measures. # Begin and end on C4. # Use 4/4 meter and only the rhythm quarter, two eighths, half. # Use some measures more than once. Write out all the notes individually in these cases. The extra effort will make you decide whether you really want the repetition. '''Title concept:''' This tune turned out to be another lively one, but after exercise 2 it felt uncreative to put dance in the name. Luckily the melody brought to my mind a frolicky scene of woodland creatures, and I imagined [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Rabbit Peter Rabbit's] mother hosting a picnic for a group of friendly, energetic animals. '''Observations:''' == Exercise 5 == '''Result:''' '''Exercise concept:''' The Dorian scale, a scale that uses the same tones as the major scale one step below it. '''Rules:''' # Compose a melody of 6 to 10 measures that expresses the idea of some form of water. # Use only the tones in the D Dorian scale, in any octave. To establish the key, since the melody is unaccompanied, begin and end on the tone D, and return to D often. # Use 4/4 meter and only the rhythm quarter, two eighths, half. # Use some measures more than once. '''Title concept:''' '''Observations:''' == Exercise 6 == '''Result:''' '''Exercise concept:''' The Phrygian scale, a scale that uses the same tones as the major scale two steps below it. '''Rules:''' # Compose a melody of 6 to 10 measures that expresses a dark and ominous mood. # Use only the tones in the E Phrygian scale, in any octave. Center the melody on E. # Use 4/4 meter and only the rhythms (a) quarter, two eighths, two quarters; and (b) two quarters, half. '''Title concept:''' '''Observations:''' == Exercise 7 == '''Result:''' '''Exercise concept:''' Phrygian mistake exercise. '''Rules:''' # Base the exercise on exercise 6. # Break the rules everywhere. Especially break the rule about maintaining a tonic of E. # Label your mistakes. You can do this by writing a numbered list of the rules you've broken and writing the number from the list near the places you've broken it (see the example on p. 12). '''Title concept:''' '''Observations:''' == Exercise 8 == '''Result:''' '''Exercise concept:''' The Basic Note Values. '''Rules:''' # Compose 8 to 12 measures for an unpitched percussion instrument. You can use the second space from the top. Use X for the clef. Use only the Basic Note Values. Repeat some measures. Make each rhythm flow into the next (see the comments on p. 12). # Don't use an eighth rest followed by three eighths or the same pattern in sixteenths. # Don't follow two eighths or four sixteenths with a rest. These patterns are hard to perform. '''Title concept:''' '''Observations:''' [[Category:Music]] [[Category:Lists]] [[Category:Developing]] 8693dc7b2f9cb894692640fb0be53f2fb3b4f35b 367 364 2018-10-25T03:18:53Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the observations to exercises 1-4. wikitext text/x-wiki == Exercise 1 == '''Result:''' [https://musescore.com/user/29710706/scores/5243406 I Hang Up My Harp] '''Exercise concept:''' Pitch limitation, using a restricted set of tones for a composition. This will be the basis for many exercises. '''Rules:''' # Compose a melody. Use only the tones E4, G4, A4, and B4. # Use 5/4 meter and only the rhythm quarter, quarter, quarter, half. # Choose measures to use more than once, either separated or adjacently. This will unify and shape the melody. # Omit one or more tones in some measures. Study the melodic relationships between all the tones. '''Title concept:''' Russo gives this exercise a backstory. Your captor, Edrevol, ruler of the Lorac, will let you live if you write a melody for the Imperial Flute that pleases him. The flute can only play the four tones of the exercise. The tune ended up kind of mournful, so I imagined the player consumed by longing for home. That reminded me of [https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Psalm+137&version=NRSV Psalm 137] where the Jewish people are lamenting their exile. The title is a reference to verse 2. I'm not sure Edrevol was pleased. '''Observations:''' * Restricting your resources really does help. I didn't feel overwhelmed with options, and I was able to pay closer attention to the few components I had. * I was surprised at how interesting the exercise was. Within the restrictions I still had some freedom to explore and be expressive. More on that in the points below. * I was aware of harmony. This was part of the surprising interest and was one of the ways restrictions helped me learn. I found out how even a simple melodic line can imply a harmony and how pursuing an implied harmony can make the melody more interesting. In this case I thought of A as the most harmonically interesting note, because the others were part of the tonic triad, so I made sure to land on A occasionally rather than using it only as a passing tone. * Adding dynamics, articulation, tempo, and a title really does make it look and feel more like real music. It was also the hardest part for me, other than the tempo. At first I tried making the first note of most phrases staccato and slurring the rest of the phrase, but that seemed possibly weird. I also didn't know how long I should make the phrases. So I opted for simplicity and just slurred all of each measure as a separate phrase. On dynamics, at first I wondered why it wouldn't just be obvious to the performer, but since I was supposed to put something, I tried to notate my sense of the melody's general trends rather than micromanaging the dynamic changes, and I found I had to somewhat exaggerate what I was feeling. I guess my intuitions about dynamics aren't very pronounced. * I like how Russo drops us into less-basic situations like 5/4 meter. I would've started with a very traditional 4/4. But I get the impression Russo wants us to know we're in the 20th century (at the time he wrote the book), and we have a lot of musical possibilities. * The rule to repeat measures was helpful. Repeating anchored the melody so it wasn't wandering all over the place while also drawing out the variety that comes from positioning. For example, measures 7-8 are the same as 3-4, but 7 feels different from 3 because they're coming off of different statements in the previous measures. Measure 8 feels more like a repetition of 4, I assume because we've reached enough distance from m. 6. * I have the sense I'm using typical melodic techniques, but I don't know what they're called. With four notes to work with, I can't really do sequence or retrograde. But the general idea is to repeat some of the elements while varying others. For instance, in m. 2 I repeated m. 1 but changed the second note. In m. 10 I repeated m. 6 but changed the first note. At this point I'm doing this by feel, but later I'd like to understand why these variations feel right (or why they're actually wrong). Watching myself use these techniques was another part of the surprise interest. == Exercise 2 == '''Result:''' [https://musescore.com/user/29710706/scores/5243409 Dance, Lydia!] '''Exercise concept:''' The cell, a limited set of pitches, available in every octave. '''Rules:''' # Compose a melody. Use only the tones F, A, B, and C, in any octave. # Use 4/4 meter and only these rhythms: (a) four eights, two quarters; (b) two quarters, two eighths, quarter. # Use some measures more than once. '''Title concept:''' I pictured an extended family gathering where a father is playing a lively tune on his violin while his young daughter dances around the room. The exercise is in [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lydian_mode Lydian mode], so ... '''Observations:''' * Lydian is my favorite mode that I've learned about. There's something about the raised 4th degree. * Deciding on the staccatos was hard. I still don't trust my intuitions about how the articulation should feel, and I haven't paid enough attention to it in other people's music. * It gets a little lost in line 2. Measure 7 feels extraneous. * I'm glad we had two rhythms to work with. Rhythm can easily make a song feel monotonous, and having two gave me an extra, small degree of freedom in which to exercise choice. * I had to remind myself to use other octaves, and they seemed to help the melody. In m. 4 the upper octave gave the melody somewhere to go so I could use something like a sequence. In m. 10 the lower octave let me use a downward motion to complement the upwardness of the previous measure while letting me use a nice leading tone to move upward again to the C4, which feels like it belongs there. * It's funny how these little exercises get stuck in my head. I think their enforced simplicity has something to do with it. == Exercise 3 == '''Result:''' [https://musescore.com/user/29710706/scores/5243411 March of the Marmots] '''Exercise concept:''' The row, a strict sequence of a limited set of pitches, available in every octave. Each pitch may be repeated one or more times before the next pitch in the sequence. '''Rules:''' # Compose a melody of 6 to 10 measures. Use the sequence D, A, F, E, C, in any octave. # Use 4/4 and only these rhythms: (a) quarter, two eighths, half; (b) quarter rest, three quarters. # Near each note, write its number in the sequence. '''Title concept:''' The melody sounded like a foreboding march. But I also felt there was a bit of comedy there, and I imagined it was an army of something small. So I looked for rodents that would alliterate with ''march''. Mice seemed a little cliché. '''Observations:''' * I was surprised at how well this worked, and it was easier than I expected. I'm sure it's not always that easy. It didn't sound too monotonous, and thanks to the rule allowing repetitions within a sequence, I was able to time the notes to make the implied harmonies work. For instance, in m. 2 I repeated note 3 from the previous measure so I could end on the leading tone (note 5) to bring me back to the tonic (note 1) at the start of m. 3. * I was proud of myself for getting the song to end on the tonic in a natural fashion. I remembered reading in Allen Forte's ''Tonal Harmony in Concept and Practice'' that skipping an octave can add power to a voice's line, so I took advantage of that option to follow the rule about ending on the beginning tone. * Even just changing octaves can make the notes feel different. Throwing the melody into a higher octave in m. 7 not only brings the overall build-up to a head, it adds some interest because they sound like new scale degrees to me. It takes a little effort to convince myself the notes are equivalent to the lower F, E, and C I used in earlier measures. == Exercise 4 == '''Result:''' [https://musescore.com/user/29710706/scores/5269423 Josephine's Picnic] '''Exercise concept:''' Melody from the C major scale. '''Rules:''' # Compose a melody. Use only the tones in the C major scale, in any octave. Conceive of it as a single melody rather than a set of discrete measures. # Begin and end on C4. # Use 4/4 meter and only the rhythm quarter, two eighths, half. # Use some measures more than once. Write out all the notes individually in these cases. The extra effort will make you decide whether you really want the repetition. '''Title concept:''' This tune turned out to be another lively one, but after exercise 2 it felt uncreative to put dance in the name. Luckily the melody brought to my mind a frolicky scene of woodland creatures, and I imagined [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Rabbit Peter Rabbit's] mother hosting a picnic for a group of friendly, energetic animals. '''Observations:''' * I was a little intimidated by having a whole scale to work with. Fortunately the general rule about favoring 2nds and 3rds helped. I didn't have to pick the next note from the whole scale. * I'm starting to feel a little stuck in a rut. The melody and overall style feel like they're derived from earlier exercises. * I worried I was plagiarizing something in the second measure. In my head I could hear a similar snippet from some recording, but since this is only a melody and only an exercise, and I don't know how the recording progressed after that or if I was even remembering it right, I decided not to worry about it. * I'm still puzzling through the articulations. I don't know what sounds better or worse. I was going for a little variety in the second line. Does it make sense to hold the first note in those measures, or should I stick to the same staccato pattern? I came back to it in m. 8 because I was transitioning to the last line, which is sort of a return to the first. * I like how m. 11 is m. 2 but in a different role, leading to the end rather than leading away from the beginning. * I think m. 10 was originally G4 F4 G4 A4, which sounded dull to me, so I decided to take advantage of another octave, which I think sounds more expressive and leads more naturally to m. 11. == Exercise 5 == '''Result:''' '''Exercise concept:''' The Dorian scale, a scale that uses the same tones as the major scale one step below it. '''Rules:''' # Compose a melody of 6 to 10 measures that expresses the idea of some form of water. # Use only the tones in the D Dorian scale, in any octave. To establish the key, since the melody is unaccompanied, begin and end on the tone D, and return to D often. # Use 4/4 meter and only the rhythm quarter, two eighths, half. # Use some measures more than once. '''Title concept:''' '''Observations:''' == Exercise 6 == '''Result:''' '''Exercise concept:''' The Phrygian scale, a scale that uses the same tones as the major scale two steps below it. '''Rules:''' # Compose a melody of 6 to 10 measures that expresses a dark and ominous mood. # Use only the tones in the E Phrygian scale, in any octave. Center the melody on E. # Use 4/4 meter and only the rhythms (a) quarter, two eighths, two quarters; and (b) two quarters, half. '''Title concept:''' '''Observations:''' == Exercise 7 == '''Result:''' '''Exercise concept:''' Phrygian mistake exercise. '''Rules:''' # Base the exercise on exercise 6. # Break the rules everywhere. Especially break the rule about maintaining a tonic of E. # Label your mistakes. You can do this by writing a numbered list of the rules you've broken and writing the number from the list near the places you've broken it (see the example on p. 12). '''Title concept:''' '''Observations:''' == Exercise 8 == '''Result:''' '''Exercise concept:''' The Basic Note Values. '''Rules:''' # Compose 8 to 12 measures for an unpitched percussion instrument. You can use the second space from the top. Use X for the clef. Use only the Basic Note Values. Repeat some measures. Make each rhythm flow into the next (see the comments on p. 12). # Don't use an eighth rest followed by three eighths or the same pattern in sixteenths. # Don't follow two eighths or four sixteenths with a rest. These patterns are hard to perform. '''Title concept:''' '''Observations:''' [[Category:Music]] [[Category:Lists]] [[Category:Developing]] 06ee9997703b2406e37ded1e050345d259a1500f 0 130 355 2018-10-06T23:31:17Z Andy Culbertson 1 Andy Culbertson moved page [[Exercises from Composing Music: A New Approach/Chapter 1]] to [[Exercises from Composing Music: A New Approach/Chapter 1: The Cell, The Row, and Some Scales]]: Added the chapter title. wikitext text/x-wiki #REDIRECT [[Exercises from Composing Music: A New Approach/Chapter 1: The Cell, The Row, and Some Scales]] 859c5fe7e74fa9c1d65875de4feb0ff17051aa3c 0 124 356 348 2018-10-06T23:36:38Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the chapter titles. wikitext text/x-wiki I used to write music when I was a kid. Now, many years later, I've come back to it, inspired by participating in my church's worship ministry. Based on recommendations from the [https://www.reddit.com/r/composer/ r/composer] subreddit, I've chosen William Russo's ''Composing Music: A New Approach'' (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall, 1983) as a way to wade back in and develop my skills. On this set of pages I'll link to my uploaded exercises and write some observations. There are 191 exercises, so I'm splitting the list into separate pages by chapter. I'm tracking my progress through the exercises on [https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1dF3AU1fM9JQeEPWSEm_SYYnt6PXUdcEF43ciyi4m5VU/edit?usp=sharing this spreadsheet]. == General rules == The book's approach is to give each exercise restrictive rules so you can focus on the specific musical resources the exercise is teaching. There are additional rules that apply to all the exercises (pp. 1-3). Here's my summary of those: # Prepare to concentrate on the exercise. # Compose by singing. This will train your inner ear. # Start and end melody-only exercises on the tonic in the same octave. Start a melody with harmony or accompaniment on any tone, and end it on a tonic below the starting tone. This will shape your melodies and help you stay in one key. # Use intervals of mainly 2nds and 3rds. Singing is the origin of all melody, and this rule will make your melodies easier to sing. # Write for instruments you can play and have access to. This will keep your music playable and give you the excitement of hearing your music performed. # Write for string or wind instruments. These can play simple melodies more expressively than the piano. In most cases you may write harmonies or accompaniment for piano or guitar. # Include tempo, dynamics, and articulation. These complete the music and make it ready to perform. # Give the exercise a descriptive title if it's longer than six measures. This will give the piece life and unify its mood for the performer and the listener. # Use a 4/4 or 3/4 meter for most exercises. Use only what Russo calls the Basic Note Values: half note, quarter, pairs of eighth notes, sets of four sixteenths, quarter rests in groups of one or two. This rule will reduce the beginner's risk of trouble. Use only two or three rhythms in an exercise. On rarer occasions you may use 5/4 or 7/4. Group the beats of 5/4 meter into patterns of 2 + 3 or 3 + 2, and use only one pattern in an exercise, though the rhythms within the pattern may vary. Similarly, for 7/4 choose a pattern of 3 + 4 or 4 + 3. # Use notes and other musical elements sparingly, and include rests. Restraint and silence contribute to the music. == Chapters == * [[/Chapter 1: The Cell, The Row, and Some Scales/]] * Chapter 2: Harmony (I) * Chapter 3: Transformation * Chapter 4: The Small Theme and the Large Theme * Chapter 5: More Scales and the 12-tone Row * Chapter 6: Isomelody and Isorhythm, Combined * Chapter 7: Ostinato * Chapter 8: Accompaniment Procedures * Chapter 9: Harmony (II) * Chapter 10: Counterpoint * Chapter 11: Organum * Chapter 12: Imitation: a Useful Game * Chapter 13: Words and Music * Chapter 14: Picture Music * Chapter 15: Popular Music as a Source * Chapter 16: Minimalism [[Category:Music]] [[Category:Exercises from Composing Music: A New Approach]] [[Category:Lists]] [[Category:Developing]] 516b4e4b7fd245bf6a7e58cb0f623d2d2482bb1b 357 356 2018-10-06T23:44:17Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added a note on skipping rote exercises. wikitext text/x-wiki I used to write music when I was a kid. Now, many years later, I've come back to it, inspired by participating in my church's worship ministry. Based on recommendations from the [https://www.reddit.com/r/composer/ r/composer] subreddit, I've chosen William Russo's ''Composing Music: A New Approach'' (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall, 1983) as a way to wade back in and develop my skills. On this set of pages I'll link to my uploaded exercises and write some observations. There are 191 exercises, so I'm splitting the list into separate pages by chapter. I'm only uploading exercises that involve composition. The ones I skip are simple, rote exercises meant to teach a specific mechanic, such as notating chords based on their symbols. I'm tracking my progress through the exercises on [https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1dF3AU1fM9JQeEPWSEm_SYYnt6PXUdcEF43ciyi4m5VU/edit?usp=sharing this spreadsheet]. == General rules == The book's approach is to give each exercise restrictive rules so you can focus on the specific musical resources the exercise is teaching. There are additional rules that apply to all the exercises (pp. 1-3). Here's my summary of those: # Prepare to concentrate on the exercise. # Compose by singing. This will train your inner ear. # Start and end melody-only exercises on the tonic in the same octave. Start a melody with harmony or accompaniment on any tone, and end it on a tonic below the starting tone. This will shape your melodies and help you stay in one key. # Use intervals of mainly 2nds and 3rds. Singing is the origin of all melody, and this rule will make your melodies easier to sing. # Write for instruments you can play and have access to. This will keep your music playable and give you the excitement of hearing your music performed. # Write for string or wind instruments. These can play simple melodies more expressively than the piano. In most cases you may write harmonies or accompaniment for piano or guitar. # Include tempo, dynamics, and articulation. These complete the music and make it ready to perform. # Give the exercise a descriptive title if it's longer than six measures. This will give the piece life and unify its mood for the performer and the listener. # Use a 4/4 or 3/4 meter for most exercises. Use only what Russo calls the Basic Note Values: half note, quarter, pairs of eighth notes, sets of four sixteenths, quarter rests in groups of one or two. This rule will reduce the beginner's risk of trouble. Use only two or three rhythms in an exercise. On rarer occasions you may use 5/4 or 7/4. Group the beats of 5/4 meter into patterns of 2 + 3 or 3 + 2, and use only one pattern in an exercise, though the rhythms within the pattern may vary. Similarly, for 7/4 choose a pattern of 3 + 4 or 4 + 3. # Use notes and other musical elements sparingly, and include rests. Restraint and silence contribute to the music. == Chapters == * [[/Chapter 1: The Cell, The Row, and Some Scales/]] * Chapter 2: Harmony (I) * Chapter 3: Transformation * Chapter 4: The Small Theme and the Large Theme * Chapter 5: More Scales and the 12-tone Row * Chapter 6: Isomelody and Isorhythm, Combined * Chapter 7: Ostinato * Chapter 8: Accompaniment Procedures * Chapter 9: Harmony (II) * Chapter 10: Counterpoint * Chapter 11: Organum * Chapter 12: Imitation: a Useful Game * Chapter 13: Words and Music * Chapter 14: Picture Music * Chapter 15: Popular Music as a Source * Chapter 16: Minimalism [[Category:Music]] [[Category:Exercises from Composing Music: A New Approach]] [[Category:Lists]] [[Category:Developing]] 9598d26d94475e7f76ab3e01ba7a96827789dc5b 359 357 2018-10-06T23:49:35Z Andy Culbertson 1 Reformatted the rhythm rules and added one. wikitext text/x-wiki I used to write music when I was a kid. Now, many years later, I've come back to it, inspired by participating in my church's worship ministry. Based on recommendations from the [https://www.reddit.com/r/composer/ r/composer] subreddit, I've chosen William Russo's ''Composing Music: A New Approach'' (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall, 1983) as a way to wade back in and develop my skills. On this set of pages I'll link to my uploaded exercises and write some observations. There are 191 exercises, so I'm splitting the list into separate pages by chapter. I'm only uploading exercises that involve composition. The ones I skip are simple, rote exercises meant to teach a specific mechanic, such as notating chords based on their symbols. I'm tracking my progress through the exercises on [https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1dF3AU1fM9JQeEPWSEm_SYYnt6PXUdcEF43ciyi4m5VU/edit?usp=sharing this spreadsheet]. == General rules == The book's approach is to give each exercise restrictive rules so you can focus on the specific musical resources the exercise is teaching. There are additional rules that apply to all the exercises (pp. 1-3). Here's my summary of those: # Prepare to concentrate on the exercise. # Compose by singing. This will train your inner ear. # Start and end melody-only exercises on the tonic in the same octave. Start a melody with harmony or accompaniment on any tone, and end it on a tonic below the starting tone. This will shape your melodies and help you stay in one key. # Use intervals of mainly 2nds and 3rds. Singing is the origin of all melody, and this rule will make your melodies easier to sing. # Write for instruments you can play and have access to. This will keep your music playable and give you the excitement of hearing your music performed. # Write for string or wind instruments. These can play simple melodies more expressively than the piano. In most cases you may write harmonies or accompaniment for piano or guitar. # Include tempo, dynamics, and articulation. These complete the music and make it ready to perform. # Give the exercise a descriptive title if it's longer than six measures. This will give the piece life and unify its mood for the performer and the listener. # Rhythm rules: ## Use a 4/4 or 3/4 meter for most exercises. ## Use only what Russo calls the Basic Note Values: half note, quarter, pairs of eighth notes (no eighths or rest following), sets of four sixteenths (no sixteenths or rest following), quarter rests in groups of one or two. This rule will reduce the beginner's risk of trouble. ## Use only two or three rhythms in an exercise. ## On rarer occasions you may use 5/4 or 7/4. Group the beats of 5/4 meter into patterns of 2 + 3 or 3 + 2, and use only one pattern in an exercise, though the rhythms within the pattern may vary. Similarly, for 7/4 choose a pattern of 3 + 4 or 4 + 3. ## Don't use ties. (p. 12) # Use notes and other musical elements sparingly, and include rests. Restraint and silence contribute to the music. == Chapters == * [[/Chapter 1: The Cell, The Row, and Some Scales/]] * Chapter 2: Harmony (I) * Chapter 3: Transformation * Chapter 4: The Small Theme and the Large Theme * Chapter 5: More Scales and the 12-tone Row * Chapter 6: Isomelody and Isorhythm, Combined * Chapter 7: Ostinato * Chapter 8: Accompaniment Procedures * Chapter 9: Harmony (II) * Chapter 10: Counterpoint * Chapter 11: Organum * Chapter 12: Imitation: a Useful Game * Chapter 13: Words and Music * Chapter 14: Picture Music * Chapter 15: Popular Music as a Source * Chapter 16: Minimalism [[Category:Music]] [[Category:Exercises from Composing Music: A New Approach]] [[Category:Lists]] [[Category:Developing]] e3a3a8ea47f6817dc6d5977264bbf385d1ba2329 363 359 2018-10-14T04:40:02Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added a link to William Russo's Wikipedia article. wikitext text/x-wiki I used to write music when I was a kid. Now, many years later, I've come back to it, inspired by participating in my church's worship ministry. Based on recommendations from the [https://www.reddit.com/r/composer/ r/composer] subreddit, I've chosen [https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Russo_(musician) William Russo's] ''Composing Music: A New Approach'' (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall, 1983) as a way to wade back in and develop my skills. On this set of pages I'll link to my uploaded exercises and write some observations. There are 191 exercises, so I'm splitting the list into separate pages by chapter. I'm only uploading exercises that involve composition. The ones I skip are simple, rote exercises meant to teach a specific mechanic, such as notating chords based on their symbols. I'm tracking my progress through the exercises on [https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1dF3AU1fM9JQeEPWSEm_SYYnt6PXUdcEF43ciyi4m5VU/edit?usp=sharing this spreadsheet]. == General rules == The book's approach is to give each exercise restrictive rules so you can focus on the specific musical resources the exercise is teaching. There are additional rules that apply to all the exercises (pp. 1-3). Here's my summary of those: # Prepare to concentrate on the exercise. # Compose by singing. This will train your inner ear. # Start and end melody-only exercises on the tonic in the same octave. Start a melody with harmony or accompaniment on any tone, and end it on a tonic below the starting tone. This will shape your melodies and help you stay in one key. # Use intervals of mainly 2nds and 3rds. Singing is the origin of all melody, and this rule will make your melodies easier to sing. # Write for instruments you can play and have access to. This will keep your music playable and give you the excitement of hearing your music performed. # Write for string or wind instruments. These can play simple melodies more expressively than the piano. In most cases you may write harmonies or accompaniment for piano or guitar. # Include tempo, dynamics, and articulation. These complete the music and make it ready to perform. # Give the exercise a descriptive title if it's longer than six measures. This will give the piece life and unify its mood for the performer and the listener. # Rhythm rules: ## Use a 4/4 or 3/4 meter for most exercises. ## Use only what Russo calls the Basic Note Values: half note, quarter, pairs of eighth notes (no eighths or rest following), sets of four sixteenths (no sixteenths or rest following), quarter rests in groups of one or two. This rule will reduce the beginner's risk of trouble. ## Use only two or three rhythms in an exercise. ## On rarer occasions you may use 5/4 or 7/4. Group the beats of 5/4 meter into patterns of 2 + 3 or 3 + 2, and use only one pattern in an exercise, though the rhythms within the pattern may vary. Similarly, for 7/4 choose a pattern of 3 + 4 or 4 + 3. ## Don't use ties. (p. 12) # Use notes and other musical elements sparingly, and include rests. Restraint and silence contribute to the music. == Chapters == * [[/Chapter 1: The Cell, The Row, and Some Scales/]] * Chapter 2: Harmony (I) * Chapter 3: Transformation * Chapter 4: The Small Theme and the Large Theme * Chapter 5: More Scales and the 12-tone Row * Chapter 6: Isomelody and Isorhythm, Combined * Chapter 7: Ostinato * Chapter 8: Accompaniment Procedures * Chapter 9: Harmony (II) * Chapter 10: Counterpoint * Chapter 11: Organum * Chapter 12: Imitation: a Useful Game * Chapter 13: Words and Music * Chapter 14: Picture Music * Chapter 15: Popular Music as a Source * Chapter 16: Minimalism [[Category:Music]] [[Category:Exercises from Composing Music: A New Approach]] [[Category:Lists]] [[Category:Developing]] a490461e3df1079a71ea12c4be9516999a06f4b9 365 363 2018-10-14T04:51:22Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added my rule of thumb for exercise length. wikitext text/x-wiki I used to write music when I was a kid. Now, many years later, I've come back to it, inspired by participating in my church's worship ministry. Based on recommendations from the [https://www.reddit.com/r/composer/ r/composer] subreddit, I've chosen [https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Russo_(musician) William Russo's] ''Composing Music: A New Approach'' (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall, 1983) as a way to wade back in and develop my skills. On this set of pages I'll link to my uploaded exercises and write some observations. There are 191 exercises, so I'm splitting the list into separate pages by chapter. I'm only uploading exercises that involve composition. The ones I skip are simple, rote exercises meant to teach a specific mechanic, such as notating chords based on their symbols. I'm tracking my progress through the exercises on [https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1dF3AU1fM9JQeEPWSEm_SYYnt6PXUdcEF43ciyi4m5VU/edit?usp=sharing this spreadsheet]. == General rules == The book's approach is to give each exercise restrictive rules so you can focus on the specific musical resources the exercise is teaching. There are additional rules that apply to all the exercises (pp. 1-3). Here's my summary of those: # Prepare to concentrate on the exercise. # Compose by singing. This will train your inner ear. # Start and end melody-only exercises on the tonic in the same octave. Start a melody with harmony or accompaniment on any tone, and end it on a tonic below the starting tone. This will shape your melodies and help you stay in one key. # Use intervals of mainly 2nds and 3rds. Singing is the origin of all melody, and this rule will make your melodies easier to sing. # Write for instruments you can play and have access to. This will keep your music playable and give you the excitement of hearing your music performed. # Write for string or wind instruments. These can play simple melodies more expressively than the piano. In most cases you may write harmonies or accompaniment for piano or guitar. # Include tempo, dynamics, and articulation. These complete the music and make it ready to perform. # Give the exercise a descriptive title if it's longer than six measures. This will give the piece life and unify its mood for the performer and the listener. # Rhythm rules: ## Use a 4/4 or 3/4 meter for most exercises. ## Use only what Russo calls the Basic Note Values: half note, quarter, pairs of eighth notes (no eighths or rest following), sets of four sixteenths (no sixteenths or rest following), quarter rests in groups of one or two. This rule will reduce the beginner's risk of trouble. ## Use only two or three rhythms in an exercise. ## On rarer occasions you may use 5/4 or 7/4. Group the beats of 5/4 meter into patterns of 2 + 3 or 3 + 2, and use only one pattern in an exercise, though the rhythms within the pattern may vary. Similarly, for 7/4 choose a pattern of 3 + 4 or 4 + 3. ## Don't use ties. (p. 12) # Use notes and other musical elements sparingly, and include rests. Restraint and silence contribute to the music. To give myself targets for exercise length, as a rule of thumb I'm treating each staff line as four measures. So if Russo provides three lines for an exercise, I write 12 measures for that exercise. == Chapters == * [[/Chapter 1: The Cell, The Row, and Some Scales/]] * Chapter 2: Harmony (I) * Chapter 3: Transformation * Chapter 4: The Small Theme and the Large Theme * Chapter 5: More Scales and the 12-tone Row * Chapter 6: Isomelody and Isorhythm, Combined * Chapter 7: Ostinato * Chapter 8: Accompaniment Procedures * Chapter 9: Harmony (II) * Chapter 10: Counterpoint * Chapter 11: Organum * Chapter 12: Imitation: a Useful Game * Chapter 13: Words and Music * Chapter 14: Picture Music * Chapter 15: Popular Music as a Source * Chapter 16: Minimalism [[Category:Music]] [[Category:Exercises from Composing Music: A New Approach]] [[Category:Lists]] [[Category:Developing]] 6c112d000f39e7370d945eeb7baed2a5c7bcec78 0 106 368 312 2019-02-12T00:21:47Z Andy Culbertson 1 Andy Culbertson moved page [[From Private to Public Coding]] to [[Software Development]]: A more generic title fits the scope of the project better. wikitext text/x-wiki == Introduction == For most of my coding life, I have been the only user of my programs. I wrote them to aid my work or personal life, and only rarely did anyone else even see my code or watch it run. This wasn't on purpose. It just turned out that way. In my current job I do belong to a small development team, but our programs are still only for in-house use, so the only needs we have to consider are our own. This situation is starting to change. My programming projects are becoming more relevant to the outside world, and I want to share some of them as open source. This means I'm needing to reshape some of my programming practices and learn some areas of software development I've had the luxury of ignoring all these years. I haven't completely ignored these areas, though. I pick up on them here and there as I read about how other people code or as I see them in the software I use. Knowing that I'll probably need to know about them someday, I've kept a list. And now the time has come for me to fill in the details. I'm filling in the details here in this guide for two reasons. First, as I learn, writing helps me clarify my thoughts and keep them flowing. And second, posting my writing might help other people. So if you're like me and you've programmed mainly for yourself--what I call private coding--and you're starting to share your work with others--public coding--then maybe what I've learned so far can grease some of your own planning. This project consists of my reading other developers' advice, examining their code, deciding what to adopt and how to adapt it to my needs and preferences, and creating templates, procedures, reference materials, and anything else that might help me code well for a public user base. To give you an idea of my background, I've worked for the past 15 or so years in the publishing industry doing mostly text processing and some web development. The languages I'm most familiar with are Perl, Python, XSLT, and some JavaScript, with a smattering of PHP and VBA. I've spent almost all my time in Windows. I hope to branch out into at least Linux in the future, if only to expand my mind. This guide will be oriented toward Python for now, but I imagine a lot of its suggestions apply to other languages too. At this point it also centers around desktop command-line programs, but I'm hoping to expand it into other interfaces and environments. Since this guide is a place for me to learn, I welcome feedback, and I'm always open to arguments that my choices could be improved or suggestions for things I've missed. This is an early iteration of the guide, so it's incomplete, and a lot of it is only sketched out. == General coding guides == These are resources with advice on many aspects of writing good code. The ones I haven't read are on my to-read list. I'll probably be adding others. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Code_Complete Code Complete - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Art_of_Unix_Programming The Art of Unix Programming - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perl_Best_Practices Perl Best Practices - Wikipedia] Another resource that overlaps with this guide but covers more on the project management end of OSS is [http://producingoss.com/ Producing Open Source Software]. == Code examples == To show how I'm implementing these ideas in my own code, I'll refer to [https://github.com/thinkulum my GitHub repositories] throughout the guide, mainly my templates for [https://github.com/audreyr/cookiecutter cookiecutter], a Python app that creates project skeletons for any language, and my snippets for [https://www.sublimetext.com/ Sublime Text 2], the text editor I use. Snippets are templates Sublime inserts wherever you type the corresponding trigger strings. Here are projects that show up in lists of high quality code, so I'll examine some of them and include any relevant discoveries in the guide. All the projects I'm listing for now are in Python. * [https://launchpad.net/bzr Bazaar] * [https://github.com/boto/boto3 boto3] * [https://github.com/django/django Django] * [https://github.com/pallets/flask Flask] * [https://github.com/gevent/gevent gevent] * [https://www.mercurial-scm.org/downloads Mercurial] * [https://github.com/nltk/nltk NLTK] * [https://github.com/Pylons/pyramid Pyramid] * [https://github.com/reddit/reddit reddit] * [https://github.com/kennethreitz/requests Requests] * [https://github.com/zzzeek/sqlalchemy SQLAlchemy] * [https://github.com/kennethreitz/tablib Tablib] * [https://github.com/tornadoweb/tornado Tornado] * [http://trac.edgewall.org/browser/trunk/trac trac] * [https://github.com/twisted/twisted Twisted] * [https://github.com/rg3/youtube-dl youtube-dl] In addition to these, I keep a mental list of software with features I might want to emulate, even if I don't plan to study their code very thoroughly: * [https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Mozilla/Developer_guide/Source_Code Firefox] - automatic updating; possibly its add-on architecture, if it ever settles down * [https://wordpress.org/download/source/ WordPress] - plugin hooks == Software development methodology == I'll start with some general principles that direct my thinking about software development in general. These are the ideas behind agile development practices. [https://www.agilealliance.org/agile101/ Agile software development] is a paradigm that was created to answer waterfall development, the approach of planning all the features of a piece of software in advance, an effort that often ends up wasted because the customer's needs change in the middle of the project, so the software has to be redesigned. So agile development was intended to prevent overplanning. But using any development methodology will help prevent the opposite problem, which is a complete ''lack'' of structure and discipline. This results in a code organization scheme called a [http://www.laputan.org/mud/ big ball of mud]. I don't think my programs were complete mud, but the fact that I was the only one seeing or using my code let me get by with a lot of slacking. Slacking does keep you from working too hard, but it fails to prevent other kinds of problems. Agile software development seems like a good middle ground. Agile development encompasses a lot of principles and practices, and it has a lot of varieties, but for me at this point, its most important practices are incremental development, test-driven development, and refactoring. === Incremental development === [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iterative_and_incremental_development Incremental development] is the approach of adding a few features per release rather than developing the whole program at once. It lets users begin using the software earlier, and it lets the feature roadmap change without wasting much development effort on the original design. It's different from iterative development, but they normally go together, so I'm using incremental as shorthand for both. If you're a developer working on your own, the habit of small, frequent releases also can add accountability to the development process. It'll at least hold you accountable to work on the project, since other people will notice when the releases stop coming. It might even encourage you to code each feature well. A short release cycle does mean there's less time to get the code right, but there's also less time to procrastinate on getting it to work, and if you implement good programming practices, you'll waste less of that time debugging. Small, frequent releases can also help the developer avoid procrastination, since the tasks for a small release feel more achievable, similar to writing a [http://volokh.com/posts/1182282037.shtml zeroth draft] of a manuscript. There's little concern for polish, so a zeroth draft has fewer requirements to worry about, and therefore it's more likely to get written. A related practice is to deliberately trim your feature list for each release, captured in the [http://wiki.c2.com/?ExtremeProgramming Extreme Programming] practice [http://wiki.c2.com/?YouArentGonnaNeedIt You Aren't Gonna Need It]. One practice that's helping me think in terms of incremental development is using [http://scottchacon.com/2011/08/31/github-flow.html GitHub flow] as my version control workflow. In GitHub flow the master branch is reserved for deployable code, so anything I'm actively developing goes into a topically named branch off of master. Once the code related to that branch is ready for deployment, I merge that branch back into master. This procedure gets me to plan in terms of small clusters of features. I'll talk more about version control in the next main section. === Test-driven development === * [https://martinfowler.com/bliki/TestDrivenDevelopment.html TestDrivenDevelopment - Martin Fowler] * [http://agiledata.org/essays/tdd.html Introduction to Test Driven Development (TDD) - Agile Data] * [https://www.facebook.com/notes/kent-beck/rip-tdd/750840194948847/ RIP TDD - Kent Beck - Facebook] To get myself into the habit of writing tests first, I'm including it as a subtask for each function I note in my task manager (I use [https://nirvanahq.com/ Nirvana], an app designed with [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Getting_Things_Done GTD] in mind). I have a template for these subtasks, which I copy into the description of the tasks. At the moment the template looks like this: <pre> - Document - Test - Code - Commit </pre> Really I'll move back and forth between documenting, testing, and coding, but I'll check them off when I've completed the first instance of each of those subtasks for that function. A practice I'm starting to explore that takes TDD a step further is behavior-driven development. It allows you to derive tests from documentation that's both human readable and executable. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Behavior-driven_development Behavior-driven development - Wikipedia] * [https://github.com/cucumber/cucumber/wiki/Python Python - cucumber Wiki] - A short list of Cucumber alternatives for Python. === Refactoring === * [https://martinfowler.com/books/refactoring.html Refactoring - Martin Fowler] I don't have a specific refactoring procedure in place. I just do it when I notice the need. I'm hoping to study Fowler's book and learn to think in terms of the structures that refactoring creates. That way I can create them as I code and reduce the need to refactor. Some IDEs have tools to aid refactoring. I'm planning to test using the Sublime Text plugin [https://packagecontrol.io/packages/PyRefactor PyRefactor] for refactoring Python. == Version control == * [http://guides.beanstalkapp.com/version-control/intro-to-version-control.html An introduction to version control - Beanstalk Guides] I'm hosting my projects on GitHub (see the Distribution section), which means I'm using Git as my version control system. (Before that I was using Subversion via TortoiseSVN, which I still use for some non-GitHub projects.) I learned how to use Git from ''Git Essentials'' by Ferdinando Santacroce, and I try to follow its advice. For a reference I use ''Git Pocket Guide'' by Richard Silverman. Rather than typing all the Git commands myself, I'm lazy and use the GUI tool [https://www.gitkraken.com/ GitKraken]. As I said above, I use the GitHub flow workflow to organize my commits. GitHub has as [https://guides.github.com/introduction/flow/ guide] for it. == Coding style == * [https://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-0008/ PEP 8 -- Style Guide for Python Code - Python.org] I've picked up my coding style from various sources, including ''Perl Best Practices'', but PEP 8 is a good starting point that's specifically geared toward Python. == Project structure == * [http://docs.python-guide.org/en/latest/writing/structure/ Structuring Your Project - The Hitchhiker's Guide to Python] * [https://learnpythonthehardway.org/book/ex46.html Exercise 46: A Project Skeleton - Learn Python the Hard Way] I make a directory on my local machine named whatever I'm using for the GitHub URL (e.g., math-student-sim), and I create this structure inside it: <pre> docs/ <package>/ tests/ app.py LICENSE.md MANIFEST.in README.md setup.py </pre> My package name is usually the project name without the hyphens (e.g., mathstudentsim). I'll fill in more of the details in later sections. == Distribution == To distribute your code you need somewhere to host it, and I've chosen GitHub, since it's the one I hear the most about. * [http://kbroman.org/github_tutorial/ git/github guide - Karl Broman] == Installation == I haven't completely wrapped my mind around Python code distribution and installation, but for now I'm relying on people downloading the source from GitHub and running the setup script. Here are some more details on some of the issues that came up for me in the project structure guides above. * [https://docs.python.org/3/distutils/setupscript.html Writing the Setup Script - Distributing Python Modules (Legacy version)] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/9949420/how-to-configure-setup-py-to-have-pip-install-from-github-master How to configure setup.py to have pip install from GitHub master? - Stack Overflow] * [https://caremad.io/posts/2013/07/setup-vs-requirement/ setup.py vs requirements.txt - caremad] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/7923509/how-to-include-docs-directory-in-python-distribution How to include docs directory in python distribution - Stack Overflow] == Metadata == Users of your project will need certain information about it, and you'll need to keep this information somewhere. For Python modules this is in the setup script. * [https://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-0345/ PEP 345 -- Metadata for Python Software Packages 1.2 - Python.org] === Version numbers === * [https://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-0396/ PEP 396 -- Module Version Numbers - Python.org] * [http://semver.org/ Semantic Versioning] * [https://git-scm.com/book/en/v2/Git-Basics-Tagging Git Basics - Tagging - Git] * [https://help.github.com/articles/creating-releases/ Creating Releases - GitHub Help] I'm just following the guidelines in those articles. === License === * [http://choosealicense.com/ Choose an open source license] I've picked MIT as my default to give people freedom to use the code however they want and because I don't expect to have patents to license. == Tests == Based on the advice in ''Learn Python the Hard Way'', I've chosen nose as a test management tool, but since the [http://nose.readthedocs.io/en/latest/ future of nose] is uncertain, I'm using [https://github.com/nose-devs/nose2 nose2]. == User interface == === Command line === To make my projects usable quickly, I'm starting most of them with a command line interface. * [https://wiki.python.org/moin/CmdModule CmdModule - The Python Wiki] * [https://docs.python.org/3/library/cmd.html cmd - The Python Standard Library] I'm placing the commands in <code>cli.py</code> within the package. == Documentation == When you're coding for yourself, it's easy to forget about documentation, since you know how your code works and how to use it, and if you forget, you can reread it and figure it out. Deciphering your own code is annoying, but possibly less annoying than writing documentation. Usually when I'm in my lazy, non-documenting mode, I wait to comment pieces of the code during especially painful rereadings. I'd like to be nicer than that to people who aren't me. Documentation comes in several different kinds, based on its location, format, and intended audience. It might help to think of documentation as falling into two basic genres: cookbooks and references. References tell you how the project works, and cookbooks tell you how to navigate through the project to reach particular objectives. Tutorials, for example, are a type of cookbook. Audiences fall into about three main categories: end users, API users who are developers using the code to write plugins or outside apps, and project developers. As an overview, here's my take on the purpose and audience of documentation types you might find in Python projects, though most aren't limited to Python. Afterward I'll list links that discuss each type in more detail. * '''README''' - In a document in the root directory of the project. A cookbook that tells users and developers the basics of working with the project. * '''Docstrings''' - Mostly at the top of a function. A reference that tells API users how to use the function. * '''Command line help''' - In the docstrings of command handling functions and at the top of a script. A reference that tells the user how to use the script and its command. * '''Comments''' - Interspersed among lines of code. A reference that tells project developers what the code does and why. * '''Code self-documentation''' - Elements of coding style aimed at communicating the code's intentions. A reference that tells project developers and API users what the code does. Some developers try to substitute this technique for comments. * '''Project documentation''' - In documents separate from the code. A cookbook and reference that gives users and developers thorough information for working with the project. * '''Literate programming''' - Interspersed among chunks of code. A reference that gives developers detailed explanations of the reasoning behind the code. This type of documentation isn't common, but it could be a good idea for some projects. === General advice === * [http://docs.python-guide.org/en/latest/writing/documentation/ Documentation - The Hitchhiker's Guide to Python] - Covers a lot of these documentation types. * [https://docs.python.org/devguide/documenting.html Documenting Python - Python Developer's Guide - Python.org] - A style guide for the Python source code, which could be adopted for other projects. === README === Here's a recommendation of what to put in a README: * [http://www.writethedocs.org/guide/writing/beginners-guide-to-docs/ A beginner’s guide to writing documentation - Write the Docs] Here are some example READMEs that have helped me plan mine: * [https://gist.github.com/jxson/1784669 jxson/README.md] * [https://gist.github.com/PurpleBooth/109311bb0361f32d87a2 PurpleBooth/README-Template.md] * [https://gist.github.com/zenorocha/4526327 zenorocha/README.md] Here are some other lists of READMEs: * [https://changelog.com/posts/a-beginners-guide-to-creating-a-readme A Beginner's Guide to Creating a README] * [https://github.com/matiassingers/awesome-readme matiassingers/awesome-readme] * [https://github.com/repat/README-template repat/README-template] The initial README I came up with is [https://github.com/thinkulum/math-student-sim/blob/master/README.md here]. === Docstrings === Here are discussions of what to put in a docstring: * [https://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-0257/ PEP 257 -- Docstring Conventions - Python.org] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/3898572/what-is-the-standard-python-docstring-format What is the standard Python docstring format? - Stack Overflow] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Javadoc Javadoc - Wikipedia] - A documentation generator for Java code. The conventions Javadoc understands can be adapted for other languages. I'm evaluating tools for processing Python docstrings that use this format. My snippets for functions and modules will include docstring outlines. Then you need a tool to present the docstrings to the reader. For now I'm going with Sphinx, since Python developers seem to prefer it. Since it formats more than just docstrings, I've put its links in the "Project documentation" section below. === Command line help === Traditional command-line programs are run from the OS command line, and their help statement is called a usage message. On Unix-like OSes they may also have a man (manual) page. I'll talk about man pages in the "Project documentation" section. Python has the <code>cmd</code> module for creating a command-line interpreter within your program, and each of your program's commands can also have a help message, contained in the command function's docstring. My snippets for scripts and command functions will include outlines for usage and help messages. ==== Usage message ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Usage_message Usage message - Wikipedia] * [http://courses.cms.caltech.edu/cs11/material/general/usage.html How to write usage statements - CS 11 - Caltech] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/17314872/shell-scripts-conventions-to-write-usage-text-for-parameters Shell scripts: conventions to write usage text for parameters? - Stack Overflow] * [https://github.com/docopt/docopt docopt (Python implementation)] - A library that checks the user's command line arguments by parsing the script's usage message. Even if you're not using docopt, it gives you a convenient set of conventions for formatting usage messages. * [https://docs.python.org/3/library/argparse.html argparse - Python.org] - Moves in the opposite direction from docopt, generating a usage message from a specification. ==== Command help ==== I haven't found any conventions for <code>cmd</code> help text, and the examples I've seen have been free-form descriptions. Maybe it would make sense to treat each command as a separate program and use usage message conventions for its help. === Comments and self-documentation === Comments and self-documentation are the two sides of the code clarity coin. Code comments are one of the [http://www.hacker-dictionary.com/terms/holy-wars holy wars] of programming--everyone has a strongly held view and debates it vigorously. I basically agree with the views in these articles: * [https://visualstudiomagazine.com/articles/2013/06/01/roc-rocks.aspx Why You Shouldn't Comment (or Document) Code - Visual Studio Magazine] * [https://sourcemaking.com/refactoring/smells/comments Comments - Source Making] * [https://www.pluralsight.com/blog/software-development/code-comments-dos-and-donts Code comments: A quick guide on when (and when not) to use them - Pluralsight] That is, comments are a liability, so for the most part write them as little as possible, and update them when you update the code. Make your code as clear as you can (see the self-documentation section), and comment only to communicate what the code can't on its own, such as its purpose and the reasoning behind your choices in implementing it. If nothing else, comments can be a good indication of places that need refactoring. I don't think it's necessary to stick to one procedure for commenting, but generally when I've commented more, it's because I've paused after a chunk of coding time, such as when I've finished a function. I code in paragraphs, sets of related lines separated by a blank line. In the commenting phase I reread the code I've just written and try to summarize or justify each paragraph, if needed. Stepping back from the code to state things in English sometimes leads to improvements in the code--refactoring or bug fixes. Here are some in-depth discussions on making code self-documenting: * [http://wiki.c2.com/?SelfDocumentingCode Self Documenting Code - WikiWikiWeb] * [http://wiki.c2.com/?SystemMetaphor System Metaphor - WikiWikiWeb] * [https://m.signalvnoise.com/hunting-for-great-names-in-programming-16f624c8fc03 Hunting for great names in programming - Signal v. Noise] Every solution has its own problems. Self-documentation can go wrong too, and in some of the same ways comments can. For example, your function name doesn't have to have anything to do with its contents. Here are a bunch of tricks for wrecking your code's clarity: * [http://mindprod.com/jgloss/unmain.html unmaintainable code - Java Glossary] On the problem that documentation isn't executable, behavior-driven development might give us a partial solution. See the links in the test-driven development section above. === Project documentation === READMEs give the reader a basic intro to your project, but at some point they'll need more extensive information. I'm calling this in-depth treatment the project documentation. ==== Documentation generation ==== Some documentation is freeform writing, but using [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Documentation_generator documentation generators] a lot of it can be collected from specialized comments and formatted automatically. You'd mainly use this to document your API. Sphinx is a popular Python tool for this purpose. It handles both types of documentation. * [http://www.sphinx-doc.org/en/stable/ Sphinx] My default Sphinx setup will be in my cookiecutter templates. ==== Content ==== I didn't find many guides to writing user or developer guides beyond the README, so I may have to write my own at some point, based on an examination of well-documented projects. But here's one guide that covers some of the information developers will need: * [https://www.ctl.io/developers/blog/post/how-to-document-a-project How to Document a Project - CenturyLink Cloud Developer Center] One source of insight for documenters might be the content of man pages. Man (manual) pages are the documentation for Unix tools, and they have a fairly standard format. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Man_page man page - Wikipedia] * [https://liw.fi/manpages/ Writing manual pages - Lars Wirzenius] * [http://www.schweikhardt.net/man_page_howto.html The Linux Man Page How-to - Jens Schweikhardt] === Literate programming === In spite of what I said about comments and self-documentation, sometimes I really want to expound on the meaning of my code, and literate programming is the way to do it. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Literate_programming Literate programming - Wikipedia] * [http://akkartik.name/post/literate-programming Literate programming: Knuth is doing it wrong - Kartik Agaram] Python tools: * [https://sourceforge.net/projects/pywebtool/ pyWeb] - After glancing at a few, I chose pyWeb as probably the closest to what I was looking for. * [http://mpastell.com/pweave/ Pweave] - A feature-rich tool I might try at some point. My first attempt at literate programming is my [https://github.com/thinkulum/math-student-sim Math Student Simulator]. See the README for basic details on writing and processing the source files. == Configuration == When you're coding for yourself, it's easy to keep all the variables inside the code files, since you can just open the files and change the values whenever you want. But when you have outside users, you don't necessarily want them changing the code, and if the code is compiled into binary executables, they can't change it anyway. Plus, separating code and data makes your program easier to think about. So you'll want to put the user-settable data in external files. There are at least two questions to answer: what format to store the settings in and where to store them. === Format === Here are some discussions that cover several formats: * [http://pyvideo.org/pycon-us-2009/pycon-2009--a-configuration-comparison-in-python-.html A Configuration Comparison in Python - PyCon 2009 - PyVideo] (video). * [https://martin-thoma.com/configuration-files-in-python/ Configuration files in Python - Martin Thoma] - Examples of most of the formats I'm listing here. * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/8225954/python-configuration-file-any-file-format-recommendation-ini-format-still-appr Python configuration file: Any file format recommendation? INI format still appropriate? Seems quite old school - Stack Overflow] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/5055042/whats-the-best-practice-using-a-settings-file-in-python What's the best practice using a settings file in Python? - Stack Overflow] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/186916/configuration-file-with-list-of-key-value-pairs-in-python Configuration file with list of key-value pairs in python - Stack Overflow] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/1726802/what-is-the-difference-between-yaml-and-json-when-to-prefer-one-over-the-other What is the difference between YAML and JSON? When to prefer one over the other - Stack Overflow] * [http://www.robg3d.com/2012/06/why-bother-with-python-and-config-files/ Why bother with python and config files? - RobG3d] I've sorted these formats roughly in order of increasing complexity. ==== CSV ==== * [https://docs.python.org/3/library/csv.html csv - The Python Standard Library] Pros: * It's simple. * Some version of it is supported in many languages. * It's fairly easy to import and export. Cons: * It's a little hard to read, especially when the lines get long. * It's limited to simple data. * It doesn't enforce data types. * It doesn't have a standard format. ==== INI ==== * [https://docs.python.org/3/library/configparser.html configparser - The Python Standard Library] * [https://pypi.python.org/pypi/configobj/ ConfigObj - PyPI] - This one has a few more features than configparser. Pros: * It's easy to read. * It's easy to avoid syntax errors (given a particular format). * Some version of it is supported in many languages. * It's easy to import and export. Cons: * It's limited to simple data. * It doesn't enforce data types (unless you use ConfigObj). * It doesn't have a standard format. ==== JSON ==== * [https://docs.python.org/3/library/json.html json - The Python Standard Library] Pros: * It enables multiple data types. * It enables complex data structures. * It's supported in many languages. * It's easy to import and export. Cons: * It's easy to commit syntax errors, especially if you're not familiar with the format. * It can be hard to read, especially if it's not pretty printed or if it uses complex data structures. ==== YAML ==== * [http://pyyaml.org/ PyYAML] Pros: * It enables multiple data types. * It enables complex data structures. * It's supported in many languages. * It's easy to import and export. * It's easy to read if you stick to simple data structures. Cons: * It can be hard to write if you use its more complex features. I'm trying out YAML as my default choice. ==== XML ==== There are a few major Python tools for working with XML: * [http://lxml.de/tutorial.html lxml.etree Tutorial - lxml] * [https://www.crummy.com/software/BeautifulSoup/ Beautiful Soup - Crummy: The Site] - It's mainly meant for HTML, but it parses XML too. * [https://docs.python.org/3/library/xml.etree.elementtree.html xml.etree.ElementTree - The Python Standard Library ] Here's some discussion of the use of XML for configuration: * [https://commons.apache.org/proper/commons-configuration/userguide/howto_hierarchical.html Hierarchical Configurations - Apache Commons Configuration User Guide] Pros: * It enables multiple data types. * It enables complex data structures. * It's supported in many languages. * It's easy to import. Cons: * It doesn't have a standard format for representing configuration. * It can be hard to read. * It can be hard to export if the starting format isn't compatible. * Enforcing data types requires an additional schema. ==== Python ==== You can use regular Python code to define settings, usually by putting them in their own module. I'd personally only use Python for configuration in special cases. Here are some recommendations and warnings: * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/10439486/loading-settings-py-config-file-into-a-dict Loading settings.py config file into a dict - Stack Overflow] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/2259427/load-python-code-at-runtime load python code at runtime - Stack Overflow] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/6198372/most-pythonic-way-to-provide-global-configuration-variables-in-config-py Most Pythonic way to provide global configuration variables in config.py? - Stack Overflow] * [https://pypi.python.org/pypi/pyconfig pyconfig - PyPI] * [https://ralsina.me/posts/python-is-not-a-configuration-file-format.html Python is Not a Configuration File Format - Lateral Opinion] Pros: * It enables multiple data types. * It enables complex data structures. * It enables using conditions to set values. * If your code is already in Python, it doesn't require learning an additional language. * Importing is very easy. Cons: * It mixes code and data, which makes the program harder to think about. * It can create a security risk, since users can add arbitrary code to the configuration file for the program to run. * Exporting can be hard or impossible. * It can be hard to read, depending on the code. * It doesn't have a standard format for representing configuration. * It can be easy to commit syntax errors. ==== Database ==== The formats I've already covered are plain text formats that a human can read and edit. Another option is putting the settings in a binary database and accessing them through a separate UI. The advantages are that you can enforce data types and the user isn't editing the settings file directly, which leaves it less open to syntax errors. For settings to be set by non-technical end users, this is probably the best option. * [https://docs.python.org/3/library/sqlite3.html sqlite3 - The Python Standard Library] Pros: * It's hard for the user to commit syntax errors. * It enables multiple data types. * You can control access to the settings. * It's supported in many languages. * It can be easy to import and export. Cons: * Complex data structures are hard to represent, or they require an additional format. * You have to code a UI for viewing and setting values. === Location === Where should you put your config file? Depending on the circumstances, you might need more than one file, and they might need to go in different locations. Generally speaking, you might separate global and user settings into different files. Global settings might go in the app's root directory or a config subdirectory, and user settings somewhere in a user directory. * [https://pypi.python.org/pypi/appdirs appdirs - PyPI] - A Python module for finding various directories across platforms, such as the user data, a possible location for a config file. == Logging == You need some kind of reporting even when you're coding for yourself, because to debug your program, you have to know what's going on as it runs. But when you're coding for yourself, you can usually afford to be minimal and undisciplined about it. When you might get bug reports from outside users, among other reasons, your program needs to write relevant state and event information to a file they can share. * [https://docs.python.org/3/library/logging.html logging - The Python Standard Library] * [http://python-guide-pt-br.readthedocs.io/en/latest/writing/logging/ Logging - The Hitchhiker's Guide to Python] * [https://www.blog.pythonlibrary.org/2012/08/02/python-101-an-intro-to-logging/ Python 101: An Intro to logging - Mouse vs Python] * [https://fangpenlin.com/posts/2012/08/26/good-logging-practice-in-python/ Good logging practice in Python - Fang's coding note] [More sections to come] <disqus/> [[Category:Programming]] [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Developing]] acad5c993dfa7ca527a47ebb71ced10a06d1c75c 370 368 2019-02-12T00:57:29Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the bibliography. wikitext text/x-wiki == Introduction == For most of my coding life, I have been the only user of my programs. I wrote them to aid my work or personal life, and only rarely did anyone else even see my code or watch it run. This wasn't on purpose. It just turned out that way. In my current job I do belong to a small development team, but our programs are still only for in-house use, so the only needs we have to consider are our own. This situation is starting to change. My programming projects are becoming more relevant to the outside world, and I want to share some of them as open source. This means I'm needing to reshape some of my programming practices and learn some areas of software development I've had the luxury of ignoring all these years. I haven't completely ignored these areas, though. I pick up on them here and there as I read about how other people code or as I see them in the software I use. Knowing that I'll probably need to know about them someday, I've kept a list. And now the time has come for me to fill in the details. I'm filling in the details here in this guide for two reasons. First, as I learn, writing helps me clarify my thoughts and keep them flowing. And second, posting my writing might help other people. So if you're like me and you've programmed mainly for yourself--what I call private coding--and you're starting to share your work with others--public coding--then maybe what I've learned so far can grease some of your own planning. This project consists of my reading other developers' advice, examining their code, deciding what to adopt and how to adapt it to my needs and preferences, and creating templates, procedures, reference materials, and anything else that might help me code well for a public user base. To give you an idea of my background, I've worked for the past 15 or so years in the publishing industry doing mostly text processing and some web development. The languages I'm most familiar with are Perl, Python, XSLT, and some JavaScript, with a smattering of PHP and VBA. I've spent almost all my time in Windows. I hope to branch out into at least Linux in the future, if only to expand my mind. This guide will be oriented toward Python for now, but I imagine a lot of its suggestions apply to other languages too. At this point it also centers around desktop command-line programs, but I'm hoping to expand it into other interfaces and environments. Since this guide is a place for me to learn, I welcome feedback, and I'm always open to arguments that my choices could be improved or suggestions for things I've missed. This is an early iteration of the guide, so it's incomplete, and a lot of it is only sketched out. == General coding guides == These are resources with advice on many aspects of writing good code. The ones I haven't read are on my to-read list. I'll probably be adding others. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Code_Complete Code Complete - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Art_of_Unix_Programming The Art of Unix Programming - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perl_Best_Practices Perl Best Practices - Wikipedia] Another resource that overlaps with this guide but covers more on the project management end of OSS is [http://producingoss.com/ Producing Open Source Software]. == Code examples == To show how I'm implementing these ideas in my own code, I'll refer to [https://github.com/thinkulum my GitHub repositories] throughout the guide, mainly my templates for [https://github.com/audreyr/cookiecutter cookiecutter], a Python app that creates project skeletons for any language, and my snippets for [https://www.sublimetext.com/ Sublime Text 2], the text editor I use. Snippets are templates Sublime inserts wherever you type the corresponding trigger strings. Here are projects that show up in lists of high quality code, so I'll examine some of them and include any relevant discoveries in the guide. All the projects I'm listing for now are in Python. * [https://launchpad.net/bzr Bazaar] * [https://github.com/boto/boto3 boto3] * [https://github.com/django/django Django] * [https://github.com/pallets/flask Flask] * [https://github.com/gevent/gevent gevent] * [https://www.mercurial-scm.org/downloads Mercurial] * [https://github.com/nltk/nltk NLTK] * [https://github.com/Pylons/pyramid Pyramid] * [https://github.com/reddit/reddit reddit] * [https://github.com/kennethreitz/requests Requests] * [https://github.com/zzzeek/sqlalchemy SQLAlchemy] * [https://github.com/kennethreitz/tablib Tablib] * [https://github.com/tornadoweb/tornado Tornado] * [http://trac.edgewall.org/browser/trunk/trac trac] * [https://github.com/twisted/twisted Twisted] * [https://github.com/rg3/youtube-dl youtube-dl] In addition to these, I keep a mental list of software with features I might want to emulate, even if I don't plan to study their code very thoroughly: * [https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Mozilla/Developer_guide/Source_Code Firefox] - automatic updating; possibly its add-on architecture, if it ever settles down * [https://wordpress.org/download/source/ WordPress] - plugin hooks == Software development methodology == I'll start with some general principles that direct my thinking about software development in general. These are the ideas behind agile development practices. [https://www.agilealliance.org/agile101/ Agile software development] is a paradigm that was created to answer waterfall development, the approach of planning all the features of a piece of software in advance, an effort that often ends up wasted because the customer's needs change in the middle of the project, so the software has to be redesigned. So agile development was intended to prevent overplanning. But using any development methodology will help prevent the opposite problem, which is a complete ''lack'' of structure and discipline. This results in a code organization scheme called a [http://www.laputan.org/mud/ big ball of mud]. I don't think my programs were complete mud, but the fact that I was the only one seeing or using my code let me get by with a lot of slacking. Slacking does keep you from working too hard, but it fails to prevent other kinds of problems. Agile software development seems like a good middle ground. Agile development encompasses a lot of principles and practices, and it has a lot of varieties, but for me at this point, its most important practices are incremental development, test-driven development, and refactoring. === Incremental development === [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iterative_and_incremental_development Incremental development] is the approach of adding a few features per release rather than developing the whole program at once. It lets users begin using the software earlier, and it lets the feature roadmap change without wasting much development effort on the original design. It's different from iterative development, but they normally go together, so I'm using incremental as shorthand for both. If you're a developer working on your own, the habit of small, frequent releases also can add accountability to the development process. It'll at least hold you accountable to work on the project, since other people will notice when the releases stop coming. It might even encourage you to code each feature well. A short release cycle does mean there's less time to get the code right, but there's also less time to procrastinate on getting it to work, and if you implement good programming practices, you'll waste less of that time debugging. Small, frequent releases can also help the developer avoid procrastination, since the tasks for a small release feel more achievable, similar to writing a [http://volokh.com/posts/1182282037.shtml zeroth draft] of a manuscript. There's little concern for polish, so a zeroth draft has fewer requirements to worry about, and therefore it's more likely to get written. A related practice is to deliberately trim your feature list for each release, captured in the [http://wiki.c2.com/?ExtremeProgramming Extreme Programming] practice [http://wiki.c2.com/?YouArentGonnaNeedIt You Aren't Gonna Need It]. One practice that's helping me think in terms of incremental development is using [http://scottchacon.com/2011/08/31/github-flow.html GitHub flow] as my version control workflow. In GitHub flow the master branch is reserved for deployable code, so anything I'm actively developing goes into a topically named branch off of master. Once the code related to that branch is ready for deployment, I merge that branch back into master. This procedure gets me to plan in terms of small clusters of features. I'll talk more about version control in the next main section. === Test-driven development === * [https://martinfowler.com/bliki/TestDrivenDevelopment.html TestDrivenDevelopment - Martin Fowler] * [http://agiledata.org/essays/tdd.html Introduction to Test Driven Development (TDD) - Agile Data] * [https://www.facebook.com/notes/kent-beck/rip-tdd/750840194948847/ RIP TDD - Kent Beck - Facebook] To get myself into the habit of writing tests first, I'm including it as a subtask for each function I note in my task manager (I use [https://nirvanahq.com/ Nirvana], an app designed with [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Getting_Things_Done GTD] in mind). I have a template for these subtasks, which I copy into the description of the tasks. At the moment the template looks like this: <pre> - Document - Test - Code - Commit </pre> Really I'll move back and forth between documenting, testing, and coding, but I'll check them off when I've completed the first instance of each of those subtasks for that function. A practice I'm starting to explore that takes TDD a step further is behavior-driven development. It allows you to derive tests from documentation that's both human readable and executable. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Behavior-driven_development Behavior-driven development - Wikipedia] * [https://github.com/cucumber/cucumber/wiki/Python Python - cucumber Wiki] - A short list of Cucumber alternatives for Python. === Refactoring === * [https://martinfowler.com/books/refactoring.html Refactoring - Martin Fowler] I don't have a specific refactoring procedure in place. I just do it when I notice the need. I'm hoping to study Fowler's book and learn to think in terms of the structures that refactoring creates. That way I can create them as I code and reduce the need to refactor. Some IDEs have tools to aid refactoring. I'm planning to test using the Sublime Text plugin [https://packagecontrol.io/packages/PyRefactor PyRefactor] for refactoring Python. == Version control == * [http://guides.beanstalkapp.com/version-control/intro-to-version-control.html An introduction to version control - Beanstalk Guides] I'm hosting my projects on GitHub (see the Distribution section), which means I'm using Git as my version control system. (Before that I was using Subversion via TortoiseSVN, which I still use for some non-GitHub projects.) I learned how to use Git from ''Git Essentials'' by Ferdinando Santacroce, and I try to follow its advice. For a reference I use ''Git Pocket Guide'' by Richard Silverman. Rather than typing all the Git commands myself, I'm lazy and use the GUI tool [https://www.gitkraken.com/ GitKraken]. As I said above, I use the GitHub flow workflow to organize my commits. GitHub has as [https://guides.github.com/introduction/flow/ guide] for it. == Coding style == * [https://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-0008/ PEP 8 -- Style Guide for Python Code - Python.org] I've picked up my coding style from various sources, including ''Perl Best Practices'', but PEP 8 is a good starting point that's specifically geared toward Python. == Project structure == * [http://docs.python-guide.org/en/latest/writing/structure/ Structuring Your Project - The Hitchhiker's Guide to Python] * [https://learnpythonthehardway.org/book/ex46.html Exercise 46: A Project Skeleton - Learn Python the Hard Way] I make a directory on my local machine named whatever I'm using for the GitHub URL (e.g., math-student-sim), and I create this structure inside it: <pre> docs/ <package>/ tests/ app.py LICENSE.md MANIFEST.in README.md setup.py </pre> My package name is usually the project name without the hyphens (e.g., mathstudentsim). I'll fill in more of the details in later sections. == Distribution == To distribute your code you need somewhere to host it, and I've chosen GitHub, since it's the one I hear the most about. * [http://kbroman.org/github_tutorial/ git/github guide - Karl Broman] == Installation == I haven't completely wrapped my mind around Python code distribution and installation, but for now I'm relying on people downloading the source from GitHub and running the setup script. Here are some more details on some of the issues that came up for me in the project structure guides above. * [https://docs.python.org/3/distutils/setupscript.html Writing the Setup Script - Distributing Python Modules (Legacy version)] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/9949420/how-to-configure-setup-py-to-have-pip-install-from-github-master How to configure setup.py to have pip install from GitHub master? - Stack Overflow] * [https://caremad.io/posts/2013/07/setup-vs-requirement/ setup.py vs requirements.txt - caremad] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/7923509/how-to-include-docs-directory-in-python-distribution How to include docs directory in python distribution - Stack Overflow] == Metadata == Users of your project will need certain information about it, and you'll need to keep this information somewhere. For Python modules this is in the setup script. * [https://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-0345/ PEP 345 -- Metadata for Python Software Packages 1.2 - Python.org] === Version numbers === * [https://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-0396/ PEP 396 -- Module Version Numbers - Python.org] * [http://semver.org/ Semantic Versioning] * [https://git-scm.com/book/en/v2/Git-Basics-Tagging Git Basics - Tagging - Git] * [https://help.github.com/articles/creating-releases/ Creating Releases - GitHub Help] I'm just following the guidelines in those articles. === License === * [http://choosealicense.com/ Choose an open source license] I've picked MIT as my default to give people freedom to use the code however they want and because I don't expect to have patents to license. == Tests == Based on the advice in ''Learn Python the Hard Way'', I've chosen nose as a test management tool, but since the [http://nose.readthedocs.io/en/latest/ future of nose] is uncertain, I'm using [https://github.com/nose-devs/nose2 nose2]. == User interface == === Command line === To make my projects usable quickly, I'm starting most of them with a command line interface. * [https://wiki.python.org/moin/CmdModule CmdModule - The Python Wiki] * [https://docs.python.org/3/library/cmd.html cmd - The Python Standard Library] I'm placing the commands in <code>cli.py</code> within the package. == Documentation == When you're coding for yourself, it's easy to forget about documentation, since you know how your code works and how to use it, and if you forget, you can reread it and figure it out. Deciphering your own code is annoying, but possibly less annoying than writing documentation. Usually when I'm in my lazy, non-documenting mode, I wait to comment pieces of the code during especially painful rereadings. I'd like to be nicer than that to people who aren't me. Documentation comes in several different kinds, based on its location, format, and intended audience. It might help to think of documentation as falling into two basic genres: cookbooks and references. References tell you how the project works, and cookbooks tell you how to navigate through the project to reach particular objectives. Tutorials, for example, are a type of cookbook. Audiences fall into about three main categories: end users, API users who are developers using the code to write plugins or outside apps, and project developers. As an overview, here's my take on the purpose and audience of documentation types you might find in Python projects, though most aren't limited to Python. Afterward I'll list links that discuss each type in more detail. * '''README''' - In a document in the root directory of the project. A cookbook that tells users and developers the basics of working with the project. * '''Docstrings''' - Mostly at the top of a function. A reference that tells API users how to use the function. * '''Command line help''' - In the docstrings of command handling functions and at the top of a script. A reference that tells the user how to use the script and its command. * '''Comments''' - Interspersed among lines of code. A reference that tells project developers what the code does and why. * '''Code self-documentation''' - Elements of coding style aimed at communicating the code's intentions. A reference that tells project developers and API users what the code does. Some developers try to substitute this technique for comments. * '''Project documentation''' - In documents separate from the code. A cookbook and reference that gives users and developers thorough information for working with the project. * '''Literate programming''' - Interspersed among chunks of code. A reference that gives developers detailed explanations of the reasoning behind the code. This type of documentation isn't common, but it could be a good idea for some projects. === General advice === * [http://docs.python-guide.org/en/latest/writing/documentation/ Documentation - The Hitchhiker's Guide to Python] - Covers a lot of these documentation types. * [https://docs.python.org/devguide/documenting.html Documenting Python - Python Developer's Guide - Python.org] - A style guide for the Python source code, which could be adopted for other projects. === README === Here's a recommendation of what to put in a README: * [http://www.writethedocs.org/guide/writing/beginners-guide-to-docs/ A beginner’s guide to writing documentation - Write the Docs] Here are some example READMEs that have helped me plan mine: * [https://gist.github.com/jxson/1784669 jxson/README.md] * [https://gist.github.com/PurpleBooth/109311bb0361f32d87a2 PurpleBooth/README-Template.md] * [https://gist.github.com/zenorocha/4526327 zenorocha/README.md] Here are some other lists of READMEs: * [https://changelog.com/posts/a-beginners-guide-to-creating-a-readme A Beginner's Guide to Creating a README] * [https://github.com/matiassingers/awesome-readme matiassingers/awesome-readme] * [https://github.com/repat/README-template repat/README-template] The initial README I came up with is [https://github.com/thinkulum/math-student-sim/blob/master/README.md here]. === Docstrings === Here are discussions of what to put in a docstring: * [https://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-0257/ PEP 257 -- Docstring Conventions - Python.org] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/3898572/what-is-the-standard-python-docstring-format What is the standard Python docstring format? - Stack Overflow] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Javadoc Javadoc - Wikipedia] - A documentation generator for Java code. The conventions Javadoc understands can be adapted for other languages. I'm evaluating tools for processing Python docstrings that use this format. My snippets for functions and modules will include docstring outlines. Then you need a tool to present the docstrings to the reader. For now I'm going with Sphinx, since Python developers seem to prefer it. Since it formats more than just docstrings, I've put its links in the "Project documentation" section below. === Command line help === Traditional command-line programs are run from the OS command line, and their help statement is called a usage message. On Unix-like OSes they may also have a man (manual) page. I'll talk about man pages in the "Project documentation" section. Python has the <code>cmd</code> module for creating a command-line interpreter within your program, and each of your program's commands can also have a help message, contained in the command function's docstring. My snippets for scripts and command functions will include outlines for usage and help messages. ==== Usage message ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Usage_message Usage message - Wikipedia] * [http://courses.cms.caltech.edu/cs11/material/general/usage.html How to write usage statements - CS 11 - Caltech] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/17314872/shell-scripts-conventions-to-write-usage-text-for-parameters Shell scripts: conventions to write usage text for parameters? - Stack Overflow] * [https://github.com/docopt/docopt docopt (Python implementation)] - A library that checks the user's command line arguments by parsing the script's usage message. Even if you're not using docopt, it gives you a convenient set of conventions for formatting usage messages. * [https://docs.python.org/3/library/argparse.html argparse - Python.org] - Moves in the opposite direction from docopt, generating a usage message from a specification. ==== Command help ==== I haven't found any conventions for <code>cmd</code> help text, and the examples I've seen have been free-form descriptions. Maybe it would make sense to treat each command as a separate program and use usage message conventions for its help. === Comments and self-documentation === Comments and self-documentation are the two sides of the code clarity coin. Code comments are one of the [http://www.hacker-dictionary.com/terms/holy-wars holy wars] of programming--everyone has a strongly held view and debates it vigorously. I basically agree with the views in these articles: * [https://visualstudiomagazine.com/articles/2013/06/01/roc-rocks.aspx Why You Shouldn't Comment (or Document) Code - Visual Studio Magazine] * [https://sourcemaking.com/refactoring/smells/comments Comments - Source Making] * [https://www.pluralsight.com/blog/software-development/code-comments-dos-and-donts Code comments: A quick guide on when (and when not) to use them - Pluralsight] That is, comments are a liability, so for the most part write them as little as possible, and update them when you update the code. Make your code as clear as you can (see the self-documentation section), and comment only to communicate what the code can't on its own, such as its purpose and the reasoning behind your choices in implementing it. If nothing else, comments can be a good indication of places that need refactoring. I don't think it's necessary to stick to one procedure for commenting, but generally when I've commented more, it's because I've paused after a chunk of coding time, such as when I've finished a function. I code in paragraphs, sets of related lines separated by a blank line. In the commenting phase I reread the code I've just written and try to summarize or justify each paragraph, if needed. Stepping back from the code to state things in English sometimes leads to improvements in the code--refactoring or bug fixes. Here are some in-depth discussions on making code self-documenting: * [http://wiki.c2.com/?SelfDocumentingCode Self Documenting Code - WikiWikiWeb] * [http://wiki.c2.com/?SystemMetaphor System Metaphor - WikiWikiWeb] * [https://m.signalvnoise.com/hunting-for-great-names-in-programming-16f624c8fc03 Hunting for great names in programming - Signal v. Noise] Every solution has its own problems. Self-documentation can go wrong too, and in some of the same ways comments can. For example, your function name doesn't have to have anything to do with its contents. Here are a bunch of tricks for wrecking your code's clarity: * [http://mindprod.com/jgloss/unmain.html unmaintainable code - Java Glossary] On the problem that documentation isn't executable, behavior-driven development might give us a partial solution. See the links in the test-driven development section above. === Project documentation === READMEs give the reader a basic intro to your project, but at some point they'll need more extensive information. I'm calling this in-depth treatment the project documentation. ==== Documentation generation ==== Some documentation is freeform writing, but using [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Documentation_generator documentation generators] a lot of it can be collected from specialized comments and formatted automatically. You'd mainly use this to document your API. Sphinx is a popular Python tool for this purpose. It handles both types of documentation. * [http://www.sphinx-doc.org/en/stable/ Sphinx] My default Sphinx setup will be in my cookiecutter templates. ==== Content ==== I didn't find many guides to writing user or developer guides beyond the README, so I may have to write my own at some point, based on an examination of well-documented projects. But here's one guide that covers some of the information developers will need: * [https://www.ctl.io/developers/blog/post/how-to-document-a-project How to Document a Project - CenturyLink Cloud Developer Center] One source of insight for documenters might be the content of man pages. Man (manual) pages are the documentation for Unix tools, and they have a fairly standard format. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Man_page man page - Wikipedia] * [https://liw.fi/manpages/ Writing manual pages - Lars Wirzenius] * [http://www.schweikhardt.net/man_page_howto.html The Linux Man Page How-to - Jens Schweikhardt] === Literate programming === In spite of what I said about comments and self-documentation, sometimes I really want to expound on the meaning of my code, and literate programming is the way to do it. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Literate_programming Literate programming - Wikipedia] * [http://akkartik.name/post/literate-programming Literate programming: Knuth is doing it wrong - Kartik Agaram] Python tools: * [https://sourceforge.net/projects/pywebtool/ pyWeb] - After glancing at a few, I chose pyWeb as probably the closest to what I was looking for. * [http://mpastell.com/pweave/ Pweave] - A feature-rich tool I might try at some point. My first attempt at literate programming is my [https://github.com/thinkulum/math-student-sim Math Student Simulator]. See the README for basic details on writing and processing the source files. == Configuration == When you're coding for yourself, it's easy to keep all the variables inside the code files, since you can just open the files and change the values whenever you want. But when you have outside users, you don't necessarily want them changing the code, and if the code is compiled into binary executables, they can't change it anyway. Plus, separating code and data makes your program easier to think about. So you'll want to put the user-settable data in external files. There are at least two questions to answer: what format to store the settings in and where to store them. === Format === Here are some discussions that cover several formats: * [http://pyvideo.org/pycon-us-2009/pycon-2009--a-configuration-comparison-in-python-.html A Configuration Comparison in Python - PyCon 2009 - PyVideo] (video). * [https://martin-thoma.com/configuration-files-in-python/ Configuration files in Python - Martin Thoma] - Examples of most of the formats I'm listing here. * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/8225954/python-configuration-file-any-file-format-recommendation-ini-format-still-appr Python configuration file: Any file format recommendation? INI format still appropriate? Seems quite old school - Stack Overflow] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/5055042/whats-the-best-practice-using-a-settings-file-in-python What's the best practice using a settings file in Python? - Stack Overflow] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/186916/configuration-file-with-list-of-key-value-pairs-in-python Configuration file with list of key-value pairs in python - Stack Overflow] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/1726802/what-is-the-difference-between-yaml-and-json-when-to-prefer-one-over-the-other What is the difference between YAML and JSON? When to prefer one over the other - Stack Overflow] * [http://www.robg3d.com/2012/06/why-bother-with-python-and-config-files/ Why bother with python and config files? - RobG3d] I've sorted these formats roughly in order of increasing complexity. ==== CSV ==== * [https://docs.python.org/3/library/csv.html csv - The Python Standard Library] Pros: * It's simple. * Some version of it is supported in many languages. * It's fairly easy to import and export. Cons: * It's a little hard to read, especially when the lines get long. * It's limited to simple data. * It doesn't enforce data types. * It doesn't have a standard format. ==== INI ==== * [https://docs.python.org/3/library/configparser.html configparser - The Python Standard Library] * [https://pypi.python.org/pypi/configobj/ ConfigObj - PyPI] - This one has a few more features than configparser. Pros: * It's easy to read. * It's easy to avoid syntax errors (given a particular format). * Some version of it is supported in many languages. * It's easy to import and export. Cons: * It's limited to simple data. * It doesn't enforce data types (unless you use ConfigObj). * It doesn't have a standard format. ==== JSON ==== * [https://docs.python.org/3/library/json.html json - The Python Standard Library] Pros: * It enables multiple data types. * It enables complex data structures. * It's supported in many languages. * It's easy to import and export. Cons: * It's easy to commit syntax errors, especially if you're not familiar with the format. * It can be hard to read, especially if it's not pretty printed or if it uses complex data structures. ==== YAML ==== * [http://pyyaml.org/ PyYAML] Pros: * It enables multiple data types. * It enables complex data structures. * It's supported in many languages. * It's easy to import and export. * It's easy to read if you stick to simple data structures. Cons: * It can be hard to write if you use its more complex features. I'm trying out YAML as my default choice. ==== XML ==== There are a few major Python tools for working with XML: * [http://lxml.de/tutorial.html lxml.etree Tutorial - lxml] * [https://www.crummy.com/software/BeautifulSoup/ Beautiful Soup - Crummy: The Site] - It's mainly meant for HTML, but it parses XML too. * [https://docs.python.org/3/library/xml.etree.elementtree.html xml.etree.ElementTree - The Python Standard Library ] Here's some discussion of the use of XML for configuration: * [https://commons.apache.org/proper/commons-configuration/userguide/howto_hierarchical.html Hierarchical Configurations - Apache Commons Configuration User Guide] Pros: * It enables multiple data types. * It enables complex data structures. * It's supported in many languages. * It's easy to import. Cons: * It doesn't have a standard format for representing configuration. * It can be hard to read. * It can be hard to export if the starting format isn't compatible. * Enforcing data types requires an additional schema. ==== Python ==== You can use regular Python code to define settings, usually by putting them in their own module. I'd personally only use Python for configuration in special cases. Here are some recommendations and warnings: * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/10439486/loading-settings-py-config-file-into-a-dict Loading settings.py config file into a dict - Stack Overflow] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/2259427/load-python-code-at-runtime load python code at runtime - Stack Overflow] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/6198372/most-pythonic-way-to-provide-global-configuration-variables-in-config-py Most Pythonic way to provide global configuration variables in config.py? - Stack Overflow] * [https://pypi.python.org/pypi/pyconfig pyconfig - PyPI] * [https://ralsina.me/posts/python-is-not-a-configuration-file-format.html Python is Not a Configuration File Format - Lateral Opinion] Pros: * It enables multiple data types. * It enables complex data structures. * It enables using conditions to set values. * If your code is already in Python, it doesn't require learning an additional language. * Importing is very easy. Cons: * It mixes code and data, which makes the program harder to think about. * It can create a security risk, since users can add arbitrary code to the configuration file for the program to run. * Exporting can be hard or impossible. * It can be hard to read, depending on the code. * It doesn't have a standard format for representing configuration. * It can be easy to commit syntax errors. ==== Database ==== The formats I've already covered are plain text formats that a human can read and edit. Another option is putting the settings in a binary database and accessing them through a separate UI. The advantages are that you can enforce data types and the user isn't editing the settings file directly, which leaves it less open to syntax errors. For settings to be set by non-technical end users, this is probably the best option. * [https://docs.python.org/3/library/sqlite3.html sqlite3 - The Python Standard Library] Pros: * It's hard for the user to commit syntax errors. * It enables multiple data types. * You can control access to the settings. * It's supported in many languages. * It can be easy to import and export. Cons: * Complex data structures are hard to represent, or they require an additional format. * You have to code a UI for viewing and setting values. === Location === Where should you put your config file? Depending on the circumstances, you might need more than one file, and they might need to go in different locations. Generally speaking, you might separate global and user settings into different files. Global settings might go in the app's root directory or a config subdirectory, and user settings somewhere in a user directory. * [https://pypi.python.org/pypi/appdirs appdirs - PyPI] - A Python module for finding various directories across platforms, such as the user data, a possible location for a config file. == Logging == You need some kind of reporting even when you're coding for yourself, because to debug your program, you have to know what's going on as it runs. But when you're coding for yourself, you can usually afford to be minimal and undisciplined about it. When you might get bug reports from outside users, among other reasons, your program needs to write relevant state and event information to a file they can share. * [https://docs.python.org/3/library/logging.html logging - The Python Standard Library] * [http://python-guide-pt-br.readthedocs.io/en/latest/writing/logging/ Logging - The Hitchhiker's Guide to Python] * [https://www.blog.pythonlibrary.org/2012/08/02/python-101-an-intro-to-logging/ Python 101: An Intro to logging - Mouse vs Python] * [https://fangpenlin.com/posts/2012/08/26/good-logging-practice-in-python/ Good logging practice in Python - Fang's coding note] [More sections to come] == Bibliography == Agans, David J. ''Debugging: The Nine Indispensable Rules for Finding Even the Most Elusive Software and Hardware Problems''. New York: Amacom, 2002. Beck, Kent. ''Test-Driven Development: By Example''. The Addison-Wesley Signature Series. Boston: Addison-Wesley, 2003. Bowman, Courtney, Ari Gesher, John K. Grant, Daniel Slate, and Elissa Lerner. ''The Architecture of Privacy: On Engineering Technologies That Can Deliver Trustworthy Safeguards''. First edition. Sebastopol, CA: O’Reilly Media, 2015. Buschmann, Frank, ed. ''Pattern-Oriented Software Architecture: A System of Patterns''. Chichester ; New York: Wiley, 1996. Cooper, Alan. ''About Face: The Essentials of Interaction Design''. 4th edition. Indianapolis, IN: John Wiley and Sons, 2014. Evans, Eric. ''Domain-Driven Design: Tackling Complexity in the Heart of Software''. Boston: Addison-Wesley, 2004. Feathers, Michael C., and Robert C. Martin. ''Working Effectively with Legacy Code''. Robert C. Martin Series. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall Professional Technical Reference, 2005. Fogel, Karl. ''Producing Open Source Software: How to Run a Successful Free Software Project''. Version 2.3106., 2018. https://producingoss.com/. Fowler, Martin. ''Patterns of Enterprise Application Architecture''. The Addison-Wesley Signature Series. Boston: Addison-Wesley, 2003. Fowler, Martin, and Kent Beck. ''Refactoring: Improving the Design of Existing Code''. The Addison-Wesley Object Technology Series. Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley, 1999. Freeman, Steve, and Nat Pryce. ''Growing Object-Oriented Software, Guided by Tests''. The Addison-Wesley Signature Series. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Addison Wesley, 2010. Gamma, Erich, ed. ''Design Patterns: Elements of Reusable Object-Oriented Software''. Addison-Wesley Professional Computing Series. Reading, Mass: Addison-Wesley, 1995. Howard, Michael, David LeBlanc, and John Viega. ''24 Deadly Sins of Software Security: Programming Flaws and How to Fix Them''. New York: McGraw-Hill, 2010. Humble, Jez, and David Farley. ''Continuous Delivery: Reliable Software Releases through Build, Test, and Deployment Automation''. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Addison-Wesley, 2010. Martin, Robert C. ''Clean Architecture: A Craftsman’s Guide to Software Structure and Design''. Boston: Prentice Hall, 2018. Martin, Robert C., ed. ''Clean Code: A Handbook of Agile Software Craftsmanship''. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall, 2009. McConnell, Steve. ''Code Complete''. 2nd ed. Redmond, Wash: Microsoft Press, 2004. ———. ''Rapid Development: Taming Wild Software Schedules''. Redmond, Wash: Microsoft Press, 1996. McDonald, Kent J. ''Beyond Requirements: Analysis with an Agile Mindset''. New York: Addison-Wesley, 2016. Meszaros, Gerard, and Martin Fowler. ''XUnit Test Patterns: Refactoring Test Code''. Upper Saddle River, New Jersey: Addison-Wesley, 2007. Nygard, Michael T. ''Release It! Design and Deploy Production-Ready Software''. Second edition. The Pragmatic Programmers. Raleigh, North Carolina: The Pragmatic Bookshelf, 2018. Patton, Jeff. ''User Story Mapping: Discover the Whole Story, Build the Right Product''. First edition. Beijing ; Sebastopol, CA: O’Reilly, 2014. Raymond, Eric S. ''The Art of UNIX Programming: With Contributions from Thirteen UNIX Pioneers, Including Its Inventor, Ken Thompson''. Nachdr. Addison-Wesley Professional Computing Series. Boston: Addison-Wesley, 2008. Rosenfeld, Louis, Peter Morville, and Jorge Arango. ''Information Architecture: For the Web and Beyond''. Fourth edition. Sebastopol, CA: O’Reilly Media, Inc, 2015. Stellman, Andrew, and Jennifer Greene. ''Learning Agile''. First edition. Beijing: O’Reilly, 2014. <disqus/> [[Category:Programming]] [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Developing]] 74a3f5f01e5016cc217fd5eeae5f67a9ebc39e45 371 370 2019-02-12T01:07:31Z Andy Culbertson 1 Categorized the bibliography. wikitext text/x-wiki == Introduction == For most of my coding life, I have been the only user of my programs. I wrote them to aid my work or personal life, and only rarely did anyone else even see my code or watch it run. This wasn't on purpose. It just turned out that way. In my current job I do belong to a small development team, but our programs are still only for in-house use, so the only needs we have to consider are our own. This situation is starting to change. My programming projects are becoming more relevant to the outside world, and I want to share some of them as open source. This means I'm needing to reshape some of my programming practices and learn some areas of software development I've had the luxury of ignoring all these years. I haven't completely ignored these areas, though. I pick up on them here and there as I read about how other people code or as I see them in the software I use. Knowing that I'll probably need to know about them someday, I've kept a list. And now the time has come for me to fill in the details. I'm filling in the details here in this guide for two reasons. First, as I learn, writing helps me clarify my thoughts and keep them flowing. And second, posting my writing might help other people. So if you're like me and you've programmed mainly for yourself--what I call private coding--and you're starting to share your work with others--public coding--then maybe what I've learned so far can grease some of your own planning. This project consists of my reading other developers' advice, examining their code, deciding what to adopt and how to adapt it to my needs and preferences, and creating templates, procedures, reference materials, and anything else that might help me code well for a public user base. To give you an idea of my background, I've worked for the past 15 or so years in the publishing industry doing mostly text processing and some web development. The languages I'm most familiar with are Perl, Python, XSLT, and some JavaScript, with a smattering of PHP and VBA. I've spent almost all my time in Windows. I hope to branch out into at least Linux in the future, if only to expand my mind. This guide will be oriented toward Python for now, but I imagine a lot of its suggestions apply to other languages too. At this point it also centers around desktop command-line programs, but I'm hoping to expand it into other interfaces and environments. Since this guide is a place for me to learn, I welcome feedback, and I'm always open to arguments that my choices could be improved or suggestions for things I've missed. This is an early iteration of the guide, so it's incomplete, and a lot of it is only sketched out. == General coding guides == These are resources with advice on many aspects of writing good code. The ones I haven't read are on my to-read list. I'll probably be adding others. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Code_Complete Code Complete - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Art_of_Unix_Programming The Art of Unix Programming - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perl_Best_Practices Perl Best Practices - Wikipedia] Another resource that overlaps with this guide but covers more on the project management end of OSS is [http://producingoss.com/ Producing Open Source Software]. == Code examples == To show how I'm implementing these ideas in my own code, I'll refer to [https://github.com/thinkulum my GitHub repositories] throughout the guide, mainly my templates for [https://github.com/audreyr/cookiecutter cookiecutter], a Python app that creates project skeletons for any language, and my snippets for [https://www.sublimetext.com/ Sublime Text 2], the text editor I use. Snippets are templates Sublime inserts wherever you type the corresponding trigger strings. Here are projects that show up in lists of high quality code, so I'll examine some of them and include any relevant discoveries in the guide. All the projects I'm listing for now are in Python. * [https://launchpad.net/bzr Bazaar] * [https://github.com/boto/boto3 boto3] * [https://github.com/django/django Django] * [https://github.com/pallets/flask Flask] * [https://github.com/gevent/gevent gevent] * [https://www.mercurial-scm.org/downloads Mercurial] * [https://github.com/nltk/nltk NLTK] * [https://github.com/Pylons/pyramid Pyramid] * [https://github.com/reddit/reddit reddit] * [https://github.com/kennethreitz/requests Requests] * [https://github.com/zzzeek/sqlalchemy SQLAlchemy] * [https://github.com/kennethreitz/tablib Tablib] * [https://github.com/tornadoweb/tornado Tornado] * [http://trac.edgewall.org/browser/trunk/trac trac] * [https://github.com/twisted/twisted Twisted] * [https://github.com/rg3/youtube-dl youtube-dl] In addition to these, I keep a mental list of software with features I might want to emulate, even if I don't plan to study their code very thoroughly: * [https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Mozilla/Developer_guide/Source_Code Firefox] - automatic updating; possibly its add-on architecture, if it ever settles down * [https://wordpress.org/download/source/ WordPress] - plugin hooks == Software development methodology == I'll start with some general principles that direct my thinking about software development in general. These are the ideas behind agile development practices. [https://www.agilealliance.org/agile101/ Agile software development] is a paradigm that was created to answer waterfall development, the approach of planning all the features of a piece of software in advance, an effort that often ends up wasted because the customer's needs change in the middle of the project, so the software has to be redesigned. So agile development was intended to prevent overplanning. But using any development methodology will help prevent the opposite problem, which is a complete ''lack'' of structure and discipline. This results in a code organization scheme called a [http://www.laputan.org/mud/ big ball of mud]. I don't think my programs were complete mud, but the fact that I was the only one seeing or using my code let me get by with a lot of slacking. Slacking does keep you from working too hard, but it fails to prevent other kinds of problems. Agile software development seems like a good middle ground. Agile development encompasses a lot of principles and practices, and it has a lot of varieties, but for me at this point, its most important practices are incremental development, test-driven development, and refactoring. === Incremental development === [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iterative_and_incremental_development Incremental development] is the approach of adding a few features per release rather than developing the whole program at once. It lets users begin using the software earlier, and it lets the feature roadmap change without wasting much development effort on the original design. It's different from iterative development, but they normally go together, so I'm using incremental as shorthand for both. If you're a developer working on your own, the habit of small, frequent releases also can add accountability to the development process. It'll at least hold you accountable to work on the project, since other people will notice when the releases stop coming. It might even encourage you to code each feature well. A short release cycle does mean there's less time to get the code right, but there's also less time to procrastinate on getting it to work, and if you implement good programming practices, you'll waste less of that time debugging. Small, frequent releases can also help the developer avoid procrastination, since the tasks for a small release feel more achievable, similar to writing a [http://volokh.com/posts/1182282037.shtml zeroth draft] of a manuscript. There's little concern for polish, so a zeroth draft has fewer requirements to worry about, and therefore it's more likely to get written. A related practice is to deliberately trim your feature list for each release, captured in the [http://wiki.c2.com/?ExtremeProgramming Extreme Programming] practice [http://wiki.c2.com/?YouArentGonnaNeedIt You Aren't Gonna Need It]. One practice that's helping me think in terms of incremental development is using [http://scottchacon.com/2011/08/31/github-flow.html GitHub flow] as my version control workflow. In GitHub flow the master branch is reserved for deployable code, so anything I'm actively developing goes into a topically named branch off of master. Once the code related to that branch is ready for deployment, I merge that branch back into master. This procedure gets me to plan in terms of small clusters of features. I'll talk more about version control in the next main section. === Test-driven development === * [https://martinfowler.com/bliki/TestDrivenDevelopment.html TestDrivenDevelopment - Martin Fowler] * [http://agiledata.org/essays/tdd.html Introduction to Test Driven Development (TDD) - Agile Data] * [https://www.facebook.com/notes/kent-beck/rip-tdd/750840194948847/ RIP TDD - Kent Beck - Facebook] To get myself into the habit of writing tests first, I'm including it as a subtask for each function I note in my task manager (I use [https://nirvanahq.com/ Nirvana], an app designed with [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Getting_Things_Done GTD] in mind). I have a template for these subtasks, which I copy into the description of the tasks. At the moment the template looks like this: <pre> - Document - Test - Code - Commit </pre> Really I'll move back and forth between documenting, testing, and coding, but I'll check them off when I've completed the first instance of each of those subtasks for that function. A practice I'm starting to explore that takes TDD a step further is behavior-driven development. It allows you to derive tests from documentation that's both human readable and executable. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Behavior-driven_development Behavior-driven development - Wikipedia] * [https://github.com/cucumber/cucumber/wiki/Python Python - cucumber Wiki] - A short list of Cucumber alternatives for Python. === Refactoring === * [https://martinfowler.com/books/refactoring.html Refactoring - Martin Fowler] I don't have a specific refactoring procedure in place. I just do it when I notice the need. I'm hoping to study Fowler's book and learn to think in terms of the structures that refactoring creates. That way I can create them as I code and reduce the need to refactor. Some IDEs have tools to aid refactoring. I'm planning to test using the Sublime Text plugin [https://packagecontrol.io/packages/PyRefactor PyRefactor] for refactoring Python. == Version control == * [http://guides.beanstalkapp.com/version-control/intro-to-version-control.html An introduction to version control - Beanstalk Guides] I'm hosting my projects on GitHub (see the Distribution section), which means I'm using Git as my version control system. (Before that I was using Subversion via TortoiseSVN, which I still use for some non-GitHub projects.) I learned how to use Git from ''Git Essentials'' by Ferdinando Santacroce, and I try to follow its advice. For a reference I use ''Git Pocket Guide'' by Richard Silverman. Rather than typing all the Git commands myself, I'm lazy and use the GUI tool [https://www.gitkraken.com/ GitKraken]. As I said above, I use the GitHub flow workflow to organize my commits. GitHub has as [https://guides.github.com/introduction/flow/ guide] for it. == Coding style == * [https://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-0008/ PEP 8 -- Style Guide for Python Code - Python.org] I've picked up my coding style from various sources, including ''Perl Best Practices'', but PEP 8 is a good starting point that's specifically geared toward Python. == Project structure == * [http://docs.python-guide.org/en/latest/writing/structure/ Structuring Your Project - The Hitchhiker's Guide to Python] * [https://learnpythonthehardway.org/book/ex46.html Exercise 46: A Project Skeleton - Learn Python the Hard Way] I make a directory on my local machine named whatever I'm using for the GitHub URL (e.g., math-student-sim), and I create this structure inside it: <pre> docs/ <package>/ tests/ app.py LICENSE.md MANIFEST.in README.md setup.py </pre> My package name is usually the project name without the hyphens (e.g., mathstudentsim). I'll fill in more of the details in later sections. == Distribution == To distribute your code you need somewhere to host it, and I've chosen GitHub, since it's the one I hear the most about. * [http://kbroman.org/github_tutorial/ git/github guide - Karl Broman] == Installation == I haven't completely wrapped my mind around Python code distribution and installation, but for now I'm relying on people downloading the source from GitHub and running the setup script. Here are some more details on some of the issues that came up for me in the project structure guides above. * [https://docs.python.org/3/distutils/setupscript.html Writing the Setup Script - Distributing Python Modules (Legacy version)] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/9949420/how-to-configure-setup-py-to-have-pip-install-from-github-master How to configure setup.py to have pip install from GitHub master? - Stack Overflow] * [https://caremad.io/posts/2013/07/setup-vs-requirement/ setup.py vs requirements.txt - caremad] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/7923509/how-to-include-docs-directory-in-python-distribution How to include docs directory in python distribution - Stack Overflow] == Metadata == Users of your project will need certain information about it, and you'll need to keep this information somewhere. For Python modules this is in the setup script. * [https://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-0345/ PEP 345 -- Metadata for Python Software Packages 1.2 - Python.org] === Version numbers === * [https://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-0396/ PEP 396 -- Module Version Numbers - Python.org] * [http://semver.org/ Semantic Versioning] * [https://git-scm.com/book/en/v2/Git-Basics-Tagging Git Basics - Tagging - Git] * [https://help.github.com/articles/creating-releases/ Creating Releases - GitHub Help] I'm just following the guidelines in those articles. === License === * [http://choosealicense.com/ Choose an open source license] I've picked MIT as my default to give people freedom to use the code however they want and because I don't expect to have patents to license. == Tests == Based on the advice in ''Learn Python the Hard Way'', I've chosen nose as a test management tool, but since the [http://nose.readthedocs.io/en/latest/ future of nose] is uncertain, I'm using [https://github.com/nose-devs/nose2 nose2]. == User interface == === Command line === To make my projects usable quickly, I'm starting most of them with a command line interface. * [https://wiki.python.org/moin/CmdModule CmdModule - The Python Wiki] * [https://docs.python.org/3/library/cmd.html cmd - The Python Standard Library] I'm placing the commands in <code>cli.py</code> within the package. == Documentation == When you're coding for yourself, it's easy to forget about documentation, since you know how your code works and how to use it, and if you forget, you can reread it and figure it out. Deciphering your own code is annoying, but possibly less annoying than writing documentation. Usually when I'm in my lazy, non-documenting mode, I wait to comment pieces of the code during especially painful rereadings. I'd like to be nicer than that to people who aren't me. Documentation comes in several different kinds, based on its location, format, and intended audience. It might help to think of documentation as falling into two basic genres: cookbooks and references. References tell you how the project works, and cookbooks tell you how to navigate through the project to reach particular objectives. Tutorials, for example, are a type of cookbook. Audiences fall into about three main categories: end users, API users who are developers using the code to write plugins or outside apps, and project developers. As an overview, here's my take on the purpose and audience of documentation types you might find in Python projects, though most aren't limited to Python. Afterward I'll list links that discuss each type in more detail. * '''README''' - In a document in the root directory of the project. A cookbook that tells users and developers the basics of working with the project. * '''Docstrings''' - Mostly at the top of a function. A reference that tells API users how to use the function. * '''Command line help''' - In the docstrings of command handling functions and at the top of a script. A reference that tells the user how to use the script and its command. * '''Comments''' - Interspersed among lines of code. A reference that tells project developers what the code does and why. * '''Code self-documentation''' - Elements of coding style aimed at communicating the code's intentions. A reference that tells project developers and API users what the code does. Some developers try to substitute this technique for comments. * '''Project documentation''' - In documents separate from the code. A cookbook and reference that gives users and developers thorough information for working with the project. * '''Literate programming''' - Interspersed among chunks of code. A reference that gives developers detailed explanations of the reasoning behind the code. This type of documentation isn't common, but it could be a good idea for some projects. === General advice === * [http://docs.python-guide.org/en/latest/writing/documentation/ Documentation - The Hitchhiker's Guide to Python] - Covers a lot of these documentation types. * [https://docs.python.org/devguide/documenting.html Documenting Python - Python Developer's Guide - Python.org] - A style guide for the Python source code, which could be adopted for other projects. === README === Here's a recommendation of what to put in a README: * [http://www.writethedocs.org/guide/writing/beginners-guide-to-docs/ A beginner’s guide to writing documentation - Write the Docs] Here are some example READMEs that have helped me plan mine: * [https://gist.github.com/jxson/1784669 jxson/README.md] * [https://gist.github.com/PurpleBooth/109311bb0361f32d87a2 PurpleBooth/README-Template.md] * [https://gist.github.com/zenorocha/4526327 zenorocha/README.md] Here are some other lists of READMEs: * [https://changelog.com/posts/a-beginners-guide-to-creating-a-readme A Beginner's Guide to Creating a README] * [https://github.com/matiassingers/awesome-readme matiassingers/awesome-readme] * [https://github.com/repat/README-template repat/README-template] The initial README I came up with is [https://github.com/thinkulum/math-student-sim/blob/master/README.md here]. === Docstrings === Here are discussions of what to put in a docstring: * [https://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-0257/ PEP 257 -- Docstring Conventions - Python.org] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/3898572/what-is-the-standard-python-docstring-format What is the standard Python docstring format? - Stack Overflow] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Javadoc Javadoc - Wikipedia] - A documentation generator for Java code. The conventions Javadoc understands can be adapted for other languages. I'm evaluating tools for processing Python docstrings that use this format. My snippets for functions and modules will include docstring outlines. Then you need a tool to present the docstrings to the reader. For now I'm going with Sphinx, since Python developers seem to prefer it. Since it formats more than just docstrings, I've put its links in the "Project documentation" section below. === Command line help === Traditional command-line programs are run from the OS command line, and their help statement is called a usage message. On Unix-like OSes they may also have a man (manual) page. I'll talk about man pages in the "Project documentation" section. Python has the <code>cmd</code> module for creating a command-line interpreter within your program, and each of your program's commands can also have a help message, contained in the command function's docstring. My snippets for scripts and command functions will include outlines for usage and help messages. ==== Usage message ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Usage_message Usage message - Wikipedia] * [http://courses.cms.caltech.edu/cs11/material/general/usage.html How to write usage statements - CS 11 - Caltech] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/17314872/shell-scripts-conventions-to-write-usage-text-for-parameters Shell scripts: conventions to write usage text for parameters? - Stack Overflow] * [https://github.com/docopt/docopt docopt (Python implementation)] - A library that checks the user's command line arguments by parsing the script's usage message. Even if you're not using docopt, it gives you a convenient set of conventions for formatting usage messages. * [https://docs.python.org/3/library/argparse.html argparse - Python.org] - Moves in the opposite direction from docopt, generating a usage message from a specification. ==== Command help ==== I haven't found any conventions for <code>cmd</code> help text, and the examples I've seen have been free-form descriptions. Maybe it would make sense to treat each command as a separate program and use usage message conventions for its help. === Comments and self-documentation === Comments and self-documentation are the two sides of the code clarity coin. Code comments are one of the [http://www.hacker-dictionary.com/terms/holy-wars holy wars] of programming--everyone has a strongly held view and debates it vigorously. I basically agree with the views in these articles: * [https://visualstudiomagazine.com/articles/2013/06/01/roc-rocks.aspx Why You Shouldn't Comment (or Document) Code - Visual Studio Magazine] * [https://sourcemaking.com/refactoring/smells/comments Comments - Source Making] * [https://www.pluralsight.com/blog/software-development/code-comments-dos-and-donts Code comments: A quick guide on when (and when not) to use them - Pluralsight] That is, comments are a liability, so for the most part write them as little as possible, and update them when you update the code. Make your code as clear as you can (see the self-documentation section), and comment only to communicate what the code can't on its own, such as its purpose and the reasoning behind your choices in implementing it. If nothing else, comments can be a good indication of places that need refactoring. I don't think it's necessary to stick to one procedure for commenting, but generally when I've commented more, it's because I've paused after a chunk of coding time, such as when I've finished a function. I code in paragraphs, sets of related lines separated by a blank line. In the commenting phase I reread the code I've just written and try to summarize or justify each paragraph, if needed. Stepping back from the code to state things in English sometimes leads to improvements in the code--refactoring or bug fixes. Here are some in-depth discussions on making code self-documenting: * [http://wiki.c2.com/?SelfDocumentingCode Self Documenting Code - WikiWikiWeb] * [http://wiki.c2.com/?SystemMetaphor System Metaphor - WikiWikiWeb] * [https://m.signalvnoise.com/hunting-for-great-names-in-programming-16f624c8fc03 Hunting for great names in programming - Signal v. Noise] Every solution has its own problems. Self-documentation can go wrong too, and in some of the same ways comments can. For example, your function name doesn't have to have anything to do with its contents. Here are a bunch of tricks for wrecking your code's clarity: * [http://mindprod.com/jgloss/unmain.html unmaintainable code - Java Glossary] On the problem that documentation isn't executable, behavior-driven development might give us a partial solution. See the links in the test-driven development section above. === Project documentation === READMEs give the reader a basic intro to your project, but at some point they'll need more extensive information. I'm calling this in-depth treatment the project documentation. ==== Documentation generation ==== Some documentation is freeform writing, but using [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Documentation_generator documentation generators] a lot of it can be collected from specialized comments and formatted automatically. You'd mainly use this to document your API. Sphinx is a popular Python tool for this purpose. It handles both types of documentation. * [http://www.sphinx-doc.org/en/stable/ Sphinx] My default Sphinx setup will be in my cookiecutter templates. ==== Content ==== I didn't find many guides to writing user or developer guides beyond the README, so I may have to write my own at some point, based on an examination of well-documented projects. But here's one guide that covers some of the information developers will need: * [https://www.ctl.io/developers/blog/post/how-to-document-a-project How to Document a Project - CenturyLink Cloud Developer Center] One source of insight for documenters might be the content of man pages. Man (manual) pages are the documentation for Unix tools, and they have a fairly standard format. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Man_page man page - Wikipedia] * [https://liw.fi/manpages/ Writing manual pages - Lars Wirzenius] * [http://www.schweikhardt.net/man_page_howto.html The Linux Man Page How-to - Jens Schweikhardt] === Literate programming === In spite of what I said about comments and self-documentation, sometimes I really want to expound on the meaning of my code, and literate programming is the way to do it. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Literate_programming Literate programming - Wikipedia] * [http://akkartik.name/post/literate-programming Literate programming: Knuth is doing it wrong - Kartik Agaram] Python tools: * [https://sourceforge.net/projects/pywebtool/ pyWeb] - After glancing at a few, I chose pyWeb as probably the closest to what I was looking for. * [http://mpastell.com/pweave/ Pweave] - A feature-rich tool I might try at some point. My first attempt at literate programming is my [https://github.com/thinkulum/math-student-sim Math Student Simulator]. See the README for basic details on writing and processing the source files. == Configuration == When you're coding for yourself, it's easy to keep all the variables inside the code files, since you can just open the files and change the values whenever you want. But when you have outside users, you don't necessarily want them changing the code, and if the code is compiled into binary executables, they can't change it anyway. Plus, separating code and data makes your program easier to think about. So you'll want to put the user-settable data in external files. There are at least two questions to answer: what format to store the settings in and where to store them. === Format === Here are some discussions that cover several formats: * [http://pyvideo.org/pycon-us-2009/pycon-2009--a-configuration-comparison-in-python-.html A Configuration Comparison in Python - PyCon 2009 - PyVideo] (video). * [https://martin-thoma.com/configuration-files-in-python/ Configuration files in Python - Martin Thoma] - Examples of most of the formats I'm listing here. * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/8225954/python-configuration-file-any-file-format-recommendation-ini-format-still-appr Python configuration file: Any file format recommendation? INI format still appropriate? Seems quite old school - Stack Overflow] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/5055042/whats-the-best-practice-using-a-settings-file-in-python What's the best practice using a settings file in Python? - Stack Overflow] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/186916/configuration-file-with-list-of-key-value-pairs-in-python Configuration file with list of key-value pairs in python - Stack Overflow] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/1726802/what-is-the-difference-between-yaml-and-json-when-to-prefer-one-over-the-other What is the difference between YAML and JSON? When to prefer one over the other - Stack Overflow] * [http://www.robg3d.com/2012/06/why-bother-with-python-and-config-files/ Why bother with python and config files? - RobG3d] I've sorted these formats roughly in order of increasing complexity. ==== CSV ==== * [https://docs.python.org/3/library/csv.html csv - The Python Standard Library] Pros: * It's simple. * Some version of it is supported in many languages. * It's fairly easy to import and export. Cons: * It's a little hard to read, especially when the lines get long. * It's limited to simple data. * It doesn't enforce data types. * It doesn't have a standard format. ==== INI ==== * [https://docs.python.org/3/library/configparser.html configparser - The Python Standard Library] * [https://pypi.python.org/pypi/configobj/ ConfigObj - PyPI] - This one has a few more features than configparser. Pros: * It's easy to read. * It's easy to avoid syntax errors (given a particular format). * Some version of it is supported in many languages. * It's easy to import and export. Cons: * It's limited to simple data. * It doesn't enforce data types (unless you use ConfigObj). * It doesn't have a standard format. ==== JSON ==== * [https://docs.python.org/3/library/json.html json - The Python Standard Library] Pros: * It enables multiple data types. * It enables complex data structures. * It's supported in many languages. * It's easy to import and export. Cons: * It's easy to commit syntax errors, especially if you're not familiar with the format. * It can be hard to read, especially if it's not pretty printed or if it uses complex data structures. ==== YAML ==== * [http://pyyaml.org/ PyYAML] Pros: * It enables multiple data types. * It enables complex data structures. * It's supported in many languages. * It's easy to import and export. * It's easy to read if you stick to simple data structures. Cons: * It can be hard to write if you use its more complex features. I'm trying out YAML as my default choice. ==== XML ==== There are a few major Python tools for working with XML: * [http://lxml.de/tutorial.html lxml.etree Tutorial - lxml] * [https://www.crummy.com/software/BeautifulSoup/ Beautiful Soup - Crummy: The Site] - It's mainly meant for HTML, but it parses XML too. * [https://docs.python.org/3/library/xml.etree.elementtree.html xml.etree.ElementTree - The Python Standard Library ] Here's some discussion of the use of XML for configuration: * [https://commons.apache.org/proper/commons-configuration/userguide/howto_hierarchical.html Hierarchical Configurations - Apache Commons Configuration User Guide] Pros: * It enables multiple data types. * It enables complex data structures. * It's supported in many languages. * It's easy to import. Cons: * It doesn't have a standard format for representing configuration. * It can be hard to read. * It can be hard to export if the starting format isn't compatible. * Enforcing data types requires an additional schema. ==== Python ==== You can use regular Python code to define settings, usually by putting them in their own module. I'd personally only use Python for configuration in special cases. Here are some recommendations and warnings: * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/10439486/loading-settings-py-config-file-into-a-dict Loading settings.py config file into a dict - Stack Overflow] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/2259427/load-python-code-at-runtime load python code at runtime - Stack Overflow] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/6198372/most-pythonic-way-to-provide-global-configuration-variables-in-config-py Most Pythonic way to provide global configuration variables in config.py? - Stack Overflow] * [https://pypi.python.org/pypi/pyconfig pyconfig - PyPI] * [https://ralsina.me/posts/python-is-not-a-configuration-file-format.html Python is Not a Configuration File Format - Lateral Opinion] Pros: * It enables multiple data types. * It enables complex data structures. * It enables using conditions to set values. * If your code is already in Python, it doesn't require learning an additional language. * Importing is very easy. Cons: * It mixes code and data, which makes the program harder to think about. * It can create a security risk, since users can add arbitrary code to the configuration file for the program to run. * Exporting can be hard or impossible. * It can be hard to read, depending on the code. * It doesn't have a standard format for representing configuration. * It can be easy to commit syntax errors. ==== Database ==== The formats I've already covered are plain text formats that a human can read and edit. Another option is putting the settings in a binary database and accessing them through a separate UI. The advantages are that you can enforce data types and the user isn't editing the settings file directly, which leaves it less open to syntax errors. For settings to be set by non-technical end users, this is probably the best option. * [https://docs.python.org/3/library/sqlite3.html sqlite3 - The Python Standard Library] Pros: * It's hard for the user to commit syntax errors. * It enables multiple data types. * You can control access to the settings. * It's supported in many languages. * It can be easy to import and export. Cons: * Complex data structures are hard to represent, or they require an additional format. * You have to code a UI for viewing and setting values. === Location === Where should you put your config file? Depending on the circumstances, you might need more than one file, and they might need to go in different locations. Generally speaking, you might separate global and user settings into different files. Global settings might go in the app's root directory or a config subdirectory, and user settings somewhere in a user directory. * [https://pypi.python.org/pypi/appdirs appdirs - PyPI] - A Python module for finding various directories across platforms, such as the user data, a possible location for a config file. == Logging == You need some kind of reporting even when you're coding for yourself, because to debug your program, you have to know what's going on as it runs. But when you're coding for yourself, you can usually afford to be minimal and undisciplined about it. When you might get bug reports from outside users, among other reasons, your program needs to write relevant state and event information to a file they can share. * [https://docs.python.org/3/library/logging.html logging - The Python Standard Library] * [http://python-guide-pt-br.readthedocs.io/en/latest/writing/logging/ Logging - The Hitchhiker's Guide to Python] * [https://www.blog.pythonlibrary.org/2012/08/02/python-101-an-intro-to-logging/ Python 101: An Intro to logging - Mouse vs Python] * [https://fangpenlin.com/posts/2012/08/26/good-logging-practice-in-python/ Good logging practice in Python - Fang's coding note] [More sections to come] == Bibliography == === Architecture === Buschmann, Frank, ed. ''Pattern-Oriented Software Architecture: A System of Patterns''. Chichester ; New York: Wiley, 1996. Fowler, Martin. ''Patterns of Enterprise Application Architecture''. The Addison-Wesley Signature Series. Boston: Addison-Wesley, 2003. Martin, Robert C. ''Clean Architecture: A Craftsman’s Guide to Software Structure and Design''. Boston: Prentice Hall, 2018. === Continuous delivery === Humble, Jez, and David Farley. ''Continuous Delivery: Reliable Software Releases through Build, Test, and Deployment Automation''. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Addison-Wesley, 2010. === Debugging === Agans, David J. ''Debugging: The Nine Indispensable Rules for Finding Even the Most Elusive Software and Hardware Problems''. New York: Amacom, 2002. === Design === Evans, Eric. ''Domain-Driven Design: Tackling Complexity in the Heart of Software''. Boston: Addison-Wesley, 2004. Gamma, Erich, ed. ''Design Patterns: Elements of Reusable Object-Oriented Software''. Addison-Wesley Professional Computing Series. Reading, Mass: Addison-Wesley, 1995. Martin, Robert C., ed. ''Clean Code: A Handbook of Agile Software Craftsmanship''. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall, 2009. McConnell, Steve. ''Code Complete''. 2nd ed. Redmond, Wash: Microsoft Press, 2004. Raymond, Eric S. ''The Art of UNIX Programming: With Contributions from Thirteen UNIX Pioneers, Including Its Inventor, Ken Thompson''. Nachdr. Addison-Wesley Professional Computing Series. Boston: Addison-Wesley, 2008. === Privacy === Bowman, Courtney, Ari Gesher, John K. Grant, Daniel Slate, and Elissa Lerner. ''The Architecture of Privacy: On Engineering Technologies That Can Deliver Trustworthy Safeguards''. First edition. Sebastopol, CA: O’Reilly Media, 2015. === Project management === Fogel, Karl. ''Producing Open Source Software: How to Run a Successful Free Software Project''. Version 2.3106., 2018. https://producingoss.com/. McConnell, Steve. ''Rapid Development: Taming Wild Software Schedules''. Redmond, Wash: Microsoft Press, 1996. Stellman, Andrew, and Jennifer Greene. ''Learning Agile''. First edition. Beijing: O’Reilly, 2014. === Refactoring === Fowler, Martin, and Kent Beck. ''Refactoring: Improving the Design of Existing Code''. The Addison-Wesley Object Technology Series. Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley, 1999. === Requirements === McDonald, Kent J. ''Beyond Requirements: Analysis with an Agile Mindset''. New York: Addison-Wesley, 2016. Patton, Jeff. ''User Story Mapping: Discover the Whole Story, Build the Right Product''. First edition. Beijing ; Sebastopol, CA: O’Reilly, 2014. === Security === Howard, Michael, David LeBlanc, and John Viega. ''24 Deadly Sins of Software Security: Programming Flaws and How to Fix Them''. New York: McGraw-Hill, 2010. === Stability === Nygard, Michael T. ''Release It! Design and Deploy Production-Ready Software''. Second edition. The Pragmatic Programmers. Raleigh, North Carolina: The Pragmatic Bookshelf, 2018. === Testing === Beck, Kent. ''Test-Driven Development: By Example''. The Addison-Wesley Signature Series. Boston: Addison-Wesley, 2003. Feathers, Michael C., and Robert C. Martin. ''Working Effectively with Legacy Code''. Robert C. Martin Series. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall Professional Technical Reference, 2005. Freeman, Steve, and Nat Pryce. ''Growing Object-Oriented Software, Guided by Tests''. The Addison-Wesley Signature Series. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Addison Wesley, 2010. Meszaros, Gerard, and Martin Fowler. ''XUnit Test Patterns: Refactoring Test Code''. Upper Saddle River, New Jersey: Addison-Wesley, 2007. === User interface === Cooper, Alan. ''About Face: The Essentials of Interaction Design''. 4th edition. Indianapolis, IN: John Wiley and Sons, 2014. Rosenfeld, Louis, Peter Morville, and Jorge Arango. ''Information Architecture: For the Web and Beyond''. Fourth edition. Sebastopol, CA: O’Reilly Media, Inc, 2015. <disqus/> [[Category:Programming]] [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Developing]] 9a726feaa8e45517bedbe709a713bec49127eb57 372 371 2019-02-22T04:38:41Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the Topics section. wikitext text/x-wiki == Introduction == For most of my coding life, I have been the only user of my programs. I wrote them to aid my work or personal life, and only rarely did anyone else even see my code or watch it run. This wasn't on purpose. It just turned out that way. In my current job I do belong to a small development team, but our programs are still only for in-house use, so the only needs we have to consider are our own. This situation is starting to change. My programming projects are becoming more relevant to the outside world, and I want to share some of them as open source. This means I'm needing to reshape some of my programming practices and learn some areas of software development I've had the luxury of ignoring all these years. I haven't completely ignored these areas, though. I pick up on them here and there as I read about how other people code or as I see them in the software I use. Knowing that I'll probably need to know about them someday, I've kept a list. And now the time has come for me to fill in the details. I'm filling in the details here in this guide for two reasons. First, as I learn, writing helps me clarify my thoughts and keep them flowing. And second, posting my writing might help other people. So if you're like me and you've programmed mainly for yourself--what I call private coding--and you're starting to share your work with others--public coding--then maybe what I've learned so far can grease some of your own planning. This project consists of my reading other developers' advice, examining their code, deciding what to adopt and how to adapt it to my needs and preferences, and creating templates, procedures, reference materials, and anything else that might help me code well for a public user base. To give you an idea of my background, I've worked for the past 15 or so years in the publishing industry doing mostly text processing and some web development. The languages I'm most familiar with are Perl, Python, XSLT, and some JavaScript, with a smattering of PHP and VBA. I've spent almost all my time in Windows. I hope to branch out into at least Linux in the future, if only to expand my mind. This guide will be oriented toward Python for now, but I imagine a lot of its suggestions apply to other languages too. At this point it also centers around desktop command-line programs, but I'm hoping to expand it into other interfaces and environments. Since this guide is a place for me to learn, I welcome feedback, and I'm always open to arguments that my choices could be improved or suggestions for things I've missed. This is an early iteration of the guide, so it's incomplete, and a lot of it is only sketched out. == Topics == * [[/Software Development Methodology/]] ** [[/Iterative and Incremental Development/]] ** [[/Test-First Programming/]] ** [[/Refactoring/]] * [[/Version Control/]] * [[/Code Style/]] * [[/Project Structure/]] * [[/Distribution/]] * [[/Installation/]] * Metadata ** [[/Version Numbers/]] ** [[/License/]] * [[/Testing/]] * User Interface ** [[/Command Line Interface/]] * [[/Documentation/]] ** [[/READMEs/]] ** [[/Docstrings/]] ** [[/Command Line Help/]] ** [[/Comments/]] ** [[/Project Documentation/]] ** [[/Literate Programming/]] * [[/Application Configuration/]] * [[/Logging/]] == General coding guides == These are resources with advice on many aspects of writing good code. The ones I haven't read are on my to-read list. I'll probably be adding others. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Code_Complete Code Complete - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Art_of_Unix_Programming The Art of Unix Programming - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perl_Best_Practices Perl Best Practices - Wikipedia] Another resource that overlaps with this guide but covers more on the project management end of OSS is [http://producingoss.com/ Producing Open Source Software]. == Code examples == To show how I'm implementing these ideas in my own code, I'll refer to [https://github.com/thinkulum my GitHub repositories] throughout the guide, mainly my templates for [https://github.com/audreyr/cookiecutter cookiecutter], a Python app that creates project skeletons for any language, and my snippets for [https://www.sublimetext.com/ Sublime Text 2], the text editor I use. Snippets are templates Sublime inserts wherever you type the corresponding trigger strings. Here are projects that show up in lists of high quality code, so I'll examine some of them and include any relevant discoveries in the guide. All the projects I'm listing for now are in Python. * [https://launchpad.net/bzr Bazaar] * [https://github.com/boto/boto3 boto3] * [https://github.com/django/django Django] * [https://github.com/pallets/flask Flask] * [https://github.com/gevent/gevent gevent] * [https://www.mercurial-scm.org/downloads Mercurial] * [https://github.com/nltk/nltk NLTK] * [https://github.com/Pylons/pyramid Pyramid] * [https://github.com/reddit/reddit reddit] * [https://github.com/kennethreitz/requests Requests] * [https://github.com/zzzeek/sqlalchemy SQLAlchemy] * [https://github.com/kennethreitz/tablib Tablib] * [https://github.com/tornadoweb/tornado Tornado] * [http://trac.edgewall.org/browser/trunk/trac trac] * [https://github.com/twisted/twisted Twisted] * [https://github.com/rg3/youtube-dl youtube-dl] In addition to these, I keep a mental list of software with features I might want to emulate, even if I don't plan to study their code very thoroughly: * [https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Mozilla/Developer_guide/Source_Code Firefox] - automatic updating; possibly its add-on architecture, if it ever settles down * [https://wordpress.org/download/source/ WordPress] - plugin hooks == Software development methodology == I'll start with some general principles that direct my thinking about software development in general. These are the ideas behind agile development practices. [https://www.agilealliance.org/agile101/ Agile software development] is a paradigm that was created to answer waterfall development, the approach of planning all the features of a piece of software in advance, an effort that often ends up wasted because the customer's needs change in the middle of the project, so the software has to be redesigned. So agile development was intended to prevent overplanning. But using any development methodology will help prevent the opposite problem, which is a complete ''lack'' of structure and discipline. This results in a code organization scheme called a [http://www.laputan.org/mud/ big ball of mud]. I don't think my programs were complete mud, but the fact that I was the only one seeing or using my code let me get by with a lot of slacking. Slacking does keep you from working too hard, but it fails to prevent other kinds of problems. Agile software development seems like a good middle ground. Agile development encompasses a lot of principles and practices, and it has a lot of varieties, but for me at this point, its most important practices are incremental development, test-driven development, and refactoring. === Incremental development === [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iterative_and_incremental_development Incremental development] is the approach of adding a few features per release rather than developing the whole program at once. It lets users begin using the software earlier, and it lets the feature roadmap change without wasting much development effort on the original design. It's different from iterative development, but they normally go together, so I'm using incremental as shorthand for both. If you're a developer working on your own, the habit of small, frequent releases also can add accountability to the development process. It'll at least hold you accountable to work on the project, since other people will notice when the releases stop coming. It might even encourage you to code each feature well. A short release cycle does mean there's less time to get the code right, but there's also less time to procrastinate on getting it to work, and if you implement good programming practices, you'll waste less of that time debugging. Small, frequent releases can also help the developer avoid procrastination, since the tasks for a small release feel more achievable, similar to writing a [http://volokh.com/posts/1182282037.shtml zeroth draft] of a manuscript. There's little concern for polish, so a zeroth draft has fewer requirements to worry about, and therefore it's more likely to get written. A related practice is to deliberately trim your feature list for each release, captured in the [http://wiki.c2.com/?ExtremeProgramming Extreme Programming] practice [http://wiki.c2.com/?YouArentGonnaNeedIt You Aren't Gonna Need It]. One practice that's helping me think in terms of incremental development is using [http://scottchacon.com/2011/08/31/github-flow.html GitHub flow] as my version control workflow. In GitHub flow the master branch is reserved for deployable code, so anything I'm actively developing goes into a topically named branch off of master. Once the code related to that branch is ready for deployment, I merge that branch back into master. This procedure gets me to plan in terms of small clusters of features. I'll talk more about version control in the next main section. === Test-driven development === * [https://martinfowler.com/bliki/TestDrivenDevelopment.html TestDrivenDevelopment - Martin Fowler] * [http://agiledata.org/essays/tdd.html Introduction to Test Driven Development (TDD) - Agile Data] * [https://www.facebook.com/notes/kent-beck/rip-tdd/750840194948847/ RIP TDD - Kent Beck - Facebook] To get myself into the habit of writing tests first, I'm including it as a subtask for each function I note in my task manager (I use [https://nirvanahq.com/ Nirvana], an app designed with [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Getting_Things_Done GTD] in mind). I have a template for these subtasks, which I copy into the description of the tasks. At the moment the template looks like this: <pre> - Document - Test - Code - Commit </pre> Really I'll move back and forth between documenting, testing, and coding, but I'll check them off when I've completed the first instance of each of those subtasks for that function. A practice I'm starting to explore that takes TDD a step further is behavior-driven development. It allows you to derive tests from documentation that's both human readable and executable. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Behavior-driven_development Behavior-driven development - Wikipedia] * [https://github.com/cucumber/cucumber/wiki/Python Python - cucumber Wiki] - A short list of Cucumber alternatives for Python. === Refactoring === * [https://martinfowler.com/books/refactoring.html Refactoring - Martin Fowler] I don't have a specific refactoring procedure in place. I just do it when I notice the need. I'm hoping to study Fowler's book and learn to think in terms of the structures that refactoring creates. That way I can create them as I code and reduce the need to refactor. Some IDEs have tools to aid refactoring. I'm planning to test using the Sublime Text plugin [https://packagecontrol.io/packages/PyRefactor PyRefactor] for refactoring Python. == Version control == * [http://guides.beanstalkapp.com/version-control/intro-to-version-control.html An introduction to version control - Beanstalk Guides] I'm hosting my projects on GitHub (see the Distribution section), which means I'm using Git as my version control system. (Before that I was using Subversion via TortoiseSVN, which I still use for some non-GitHub projects.) I learned how to use Git from ''Git Essentials'' by Ferdinando Santacroce, and I try to follow its advice. For a reference I use ''Git Pocket Guide'' by Richard Silverman. Rather than typing all the Git commands myself, I'm lazy and use the GUI tool [https://www.gitkraken.com/ GitKraken]. As I said above, I use the GitHub flow workflow to organize my commits. GitHub has as [https://guides.github.com/introduction/flow/ guide] for it. == Coding style == * [https://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-0008/ PEP 8 -- Style Guide for Python Code - Python.org] I've picked up my coding style from various sources, including ''Perl Best Practices'', but PEP 8 is a good starting point that's specifically geared toward Python. == Project structure == * [http://docs.python-guide.org/en/latest/writing/structure/ Structuring Your Project - The Hitchhiker's Guide to Python] * [https://learnpythonthehardway.org/book/ex46.html Exercise 46: A Project Skeleton - Learn Python the Hard Way] I make a directory on my local machine named whatever I'm using for the GitHub URL (e.g., math-student-sim), and I create this structure inside it: <pre> docs/ <package>/ tests/ app.py LICENSE.md MANIFEST.in README.md setup.py </pre> My package name is usually the project name without the hyphens (e.g., mathstudentsim). I'll fill in more of the details in later sections. == Distribution == To distribute your code you need somewhere to host it, and I've chosen GitHub, since it's the one I hear the most about. * [http://kbroman.org/github_tutorial/ git/github guide - Karl Broman] == Installation == I haven't completely wrapped my mind around Python code distribution and installation, but for now I'm relying on people downloading the source from GitHub and running the setup script. Here are some more details on some of the issues that came up for me in the project structure guides above. * [https://docs.python.org/3/distutils/setupscript.html Writing the Setup Script - Distributing Python Modules (Legacy version)] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/9949420/how-to-configure-setup-py-to-have-pip-install-from-github-master How to configure setup.py to have pip install from GitHub master? - Stack Overflow] * [https://caremad.io/posts/2013/07/setup-vs-requirement/ setup.py vs requirements.txt - caremad] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/7923509/how-to-include-docs-directory-in-python-distribution How to include docs directory in python distribution - Stack Overflow] == Metadata == Users of your project will need certain information about it, and you'll need to keep this information somewhere. For Python modules this is in the setup script. * [https://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-0345/ PEP 345 -- Metadata for Python Software Packages 1.2 - Python.org] === Version numbers === * [https://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-0396/ PEP 396 -- Module Version Numbers - Python.org] * [http://semver.org/ Semantic Versioning] * [https://git-scm.com/book/en/v2/Git-Basics-Tagging Git Basics - Tagging - Git] * [https://help.github.com/articles/creating-releases/ Creating Releases - GitHub Help] I'm just following the guidelines in those articles. === License === * [http://choosealicense.com/ Choose an open source license] I've picked MIT as my default to give people freedom to use the code however they want and because I don't expect to have patents to license. == Tests == Based on the advice in ''Learn Python the Hard Way'', I've chosen nose as a test management tool, but since the [http://nose.readthedocs.io/en/latest/ future of nose] is uncertain, I'm using [https://github.com/nose-devs/nose2 nose2]. == User interface == === Command line === To make my projects usable quickly, I'm starting most of them with a command line interface. * [https://wiki.python.org/moin/CmdModule CmdModule - The Python Wiki] * [https://docs.python.org/3/library/cmd.html cmd - The Python Standard Library] I'm placing the commands in <code>cli.py</code> within the package. == Documentation == When you're coding for yourself, it's easy to forget about documentation, since you know how your code works and how to use it, and if you forget, you can reread it and figure it out. Deciphering your own code is annoying, but possibly less annoying than writing documentation. Usually when I'm in my lazy, non-documenting mode, I wait to comment pieces of the code during especially painful rereadings. I'd like to be nicer than that to people who aren't me. Documentation comes in several different kinds, based on its location, format, and intended audience. It might help to think of documentation as falling into two basic genres: cookbooks and references. References tell you how the project works, and cookbooks tell you how to navigate through the project to reach particular objectives. Tutorials, for example, are a type of cookbook. Audiences fall into about three main categories: end users, API users who are developers using the code to write plugins or outside apps, and project developers. As an overview, here's my take on the purpose and audience of documentation types you might find in Python projects, though most aren't limited to Python. Afterward I'll list links that discuss each type in more detail. * '''README''' - In a document in the root directory of the project. A cookbook that tells users and developers the basics of working with the project. * '''Docstrings''' - Mostly at the top of a function. A reference that tells API users how to use the function. * '''Command line help''' - In the docstrings of command handling functions and at the top of a script. A reference that tells the user how to use the script and its command. * '''Comments''' - Interspersed among lines of code. A reference that tells project developers what the code does and why. * '''Code self-documentation''' - Elements of coding style aimed at communicating the code's intentions. A reference that tells project developers and API users what the code does. Some developers try to substitute this technique for comments. * '''Project documentation''' - In documents separate from the code. A cookbook and reference that gives users and developers thorough information for working with the project. * '''Literate programming''' - Interspersed among chunks of code. A reference that gives developers detailed explanations of the reasoning behind the code. This type of documentation isn't common, but it could be a good idea for some projects. === General advice === * [http://docs.python-guide.org/en/latest/writing/documentation/ Documentation - The Hitchhiker's Guide to Python] - Covers a lot of these documentation types. * [https://docs.python.org/devguide/documenting.html Documenting Python - Python Developer's Guide - Python.org] - A style guide for the Python source code, which could be adopted for other projects. === README === Here's a recommendation of what to put in a README: * [http://www.writethedocs.org/guide/writing/beginners-guide-to-docs/ A beginner’s guide to writing documentation - Write the Docs] Here are some example READMEs that have helped me plan mine: * [https://gist.github.com/jxson/1784669 jxson/README.md] * [https://gist.github.com/PurpleBooth/109311bb0361f32d87a2 PurpleBooth/README-Template.md] * [https://gist.github.com/zenorocha/4526327 zenorocha/README.md] Here are some other lists of READMEs: * [https://changelog.com/posts/a-beginners-guide-to-creating-a-readme A Beginner's Guide to Creating a README] * [https://github.com/matiassingers/awesome-readme matiassingers/awesome-readme] * [https://github.com/repat/README-template repat/README-template] The initial README I came up with is [https://github.com/thinkulum/math-student-sim/blob/master/README.md here]. === Docstrings === Here are discussions of what to put in a docstring: * [https://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-0257/ PEP 257 -- Docstring Conventions - Python.org] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/3898572/what-is-the-standard-python-docstring-format What is the standard Python docstring format? - Stack Overflow] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Javadoc Javadoc - Wikipedia] - A documentation generator for Java code. The conventions Javadoc understands can be adapted for other languages. I'm evaluating tools for processing Python docstrings that use this format. My snippets for functions and modules will include docstring outlines. Then you need a tool to present the docstrings to the reader. For now I'm going with Sphinx, since Python developers seem to prefer it. Since it formats more than just docstrings, I've put its links in the "Project documentation" section below. === Command line help === Traditional command-line programs are run from the OS command line, and their help statement is called a usage message. On Unix-like OSes they may also have a man (manual) page. I'll talk about man pages in the "Project documentation" section. Python has the <code>cmd</code> module for creating a command-line interpreter within your program, and each of your program's commands can also have a help message, contained in the command function's docstring. My snippets for scripts and command functions will include outlines for usage and help messages. ==== Usage message ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Usage_message Usage message - Wikipedia] * [http://courses.cms.caltech.edu/cs11/material/general/usage.html How to write usage statements - CS 11 - Caltech] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/17314872/shell-scripts-conventions-to-write-usage-text-for-parameters Shell scripts: conventions to write usage text for parameters? - Stack Overflow] * [https://github.com/docopt/docopt docopt (Python implementation)] - A library that checks the user's command line arguments by parsing the script's usage message. Even if you're not using docopt, it gives you a convenient set of conventions for formatting usage messages. * [https://docs.python.org/3/library/argparse.html argparse - Python.org] - Moves in the opposite direction from docopt, generating a usage message from a specification. ==== Command help ==== I haven't found any conventions for <code>cmd</code> help text, and the examples I've seen have been free-form descriptions. Maybe it would make sense to treat each command as a separate program and use usage message conventions for its help. === Comments and self-documentation === Comments and self-documentation are the two sides of the code clarity coin. Code comments are one of the [http://www.hacker-dictionary.com/terms/holy-wars holy wars] of programming--everyone has a strongly held view and debates it vigorously. I basically agree with the views in these articles: * [https://visualstudiomagazine.com/articles/2013/06/01/roc-rocks.aspx Why You Shouldn't Comment (or Document) Code - Visual Studio Magazine] * [https://sourcemaking.com/refactoring/smells/comments Comments - Source Making] * [https://www.pluralsight.com/blog/software-development/code-comments-dos-and-donts Code comments: A quick guide on when (and when not) to use them - Pluralsight] That is, comments are a liability, so for the most part write them as little as possible, and update them when you update the code. Make your code as clear as you can (see the self-documentation section), and comment only to communicate what the code can't on its own, such as its purpose and the reasoning behind your choices in implementing it. If nothing else, comments can be a good indication of places that need refactoring. I don't think it's necessary to stick to one procedure for commenting, but generally when I've commented more, it's because I've paused after a chunk of coding time, such as when I've finished a function. I code in paragraphs, sets of related lines separated by a blank line. In the commenting phase I reread the code I've just written and try to summarize or justify each paragraph, if needed. Stepping back from the code to state things in English sometimes leads to improvements in the code--refactoring or bug fixes. Here are some in-depth discussions on making code self-documenting: * [http://wiki.c2.com/?SelfDocumentingCode Self Documenting Code - WikiWikiWeb] * [http://wiki.c2.com/?SystemMetaphor System Metaphor - WikiWikiWeb] * [https://m.signalvnoise.com/hunting-for-great-names-in-programming-16f624c8fc03 Hunting for great names in programming - Signal v. Noise] Every solution has its own problems. Self-documentation can go wrong too, and in some of the same ways comments can. For example, your function name doesn't have to have anything to do with its contents. Here are a bunch of tricks for wrecking your code's clarity: * [http://mindprod.com/jgloss/unmain.html unmaintainable code - Java Glossary] On the problem that documentation isn't executable, behavior-driven development might give us a partial solution. See the links in the test-driven development section above. === Project documentation === READMEs give the reader a basic intro to your project, but at some point they'll need more extensive information. I'm calling this in-depth treatment the project documentation. ==== Documentation generation ==== Some documentation is freeform writing, but using [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Documentation_generator documentation generators] a lot of it can be collected from specialized comments and formatted automatically. You'd mainly use this to document your API. Sphinx is a popular Python tool for this purpose. It handles both types of documentation. * [http://www.sphinx-doc.org/en/stable/ Sphinx] My default Sphinx setup will be in my cookiecutter templates. ==== Content ==== I didn't find many guides to writing user or developer guides beyond the README, so I may have to write my own at some point, based on an examination of well-documented projects. But here's one guide that covers some of the information developers will need: * [https://www.ctl.io/developers/blog/post/how-to-document-a-project How to Document a Project - CenturyLink Cloud Developer Center] One source of insight for documenters might be the content of man pages. Man (manual) pages are the documentation for Unix tools, and they have a fairly standard format. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Man_page man page - Wikipedia] * [https://liw.fi/manpages/ Writing manual pages - Lars Wirzenius] * [http://www.schweikhardt.net/man_page_howto.html The Linux Man Page How-to - Jens Schweikhardt] === Literate programming === In spite of what I said about comments and self-documentation, sometimes I really want to expound on the meaning of my code, and literate programming is the way to do it. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Literate_programming Literate programming - Wikipedia] * [http://akkartik.name/post/literate-programming Literate programming: Knuth is doing it wrong - Kartik Agaram] Python tools: * [https://sourceforge.net/projects/pywebtool/ pyWeb] - After glancing at a few, I chose pyWeb as probably the closest to what I was looking for. * [http://mpastell.com/pweave/ Pweave] - A feature-rich tool I might try at some point. My first attempt at literate programming is my [https://github.com/thinkulum/math-student-sim Math Student Simulator]. See the README for basic details on writing and processing the source files. == Configuration == When you're coding for yourself, it's easy to keep all the variables inside the code files, since you can just open the files and change the values whenever you want. But when you have outside users, you don't necessarily want them changing the code, and if the code is compiled into binary executables, they can't change it anyway. Plus, separating code and data makes your program easier to think about. So you'll want to put the user-settable data in external files. There are at least two questions to answer: what format to store the settings in and where to store them. === Format === Here are some discussions that cover several formats: * [http://pyvideo.org/pycon-us-2009/pycon-2009--a-configuration-comparison-in-python-.html A Configuration Comparison in Python - PyCon 2009 - PyVideo] (video). * [https://martin-thoma.com/configuration-files-in-python/ Configuration files in Python - Martin Thoma] - Examples of most of the formats I'm listing here. * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/8225954/python-configuration-file-any-file-format-recommendation-ini-format-still-appr Python configuration file: Any file format recommendation? INI format still appropriate? Seems quite old school - Stack Overflow] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/5055042/whats-the-best-practice-using-a-settings-file-in-python What's the best practice using a settings file in Python? - Stack Overflow] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/186916/configuration-file-with-list-of-key-value-pairs-in-python Configuration file with list of key-value pairs in python - Stack Overflow] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/1726802/what-is-the-difference-between-yaml-and-json-when-to-prefer-one-over-the-other What is the difference between YAML and JSON? When to prefer one over the other - Stack Overflow] * [http://www.robg3d.com/2012/06/why-bother-with-python-and-config-files/ Why bother with python and config files? - RobG3d] I've sorted these formats roughly in order of increasing complexity. ==== CSV ==== * [https://docs.python.org/3/library/csv.html csv - The Python Standard Library] Pros: * It's simple. * Some version of it is supported in many languages. * It's fairly easy to import and export. Cons: * It's a little hard to read, especially when the lines get long. * It's limited to simple data. * It doesn't enforce data types. * It doesn't have a standard format. ==== INI ==== * [https://docs.python.org/3/library/configparser.html configparser - The Python Standard Library] * [https://pypi.python.org/pypi/configobj/ ConfigObj - PyPI] - This one has a few more features than configparser. Pros: * It's easy to read. * It's easy to avoid syntax errors (given a particular format). * Some version of it is supported in many languages. * It's easy to import and export. Cons: * It's limited to simple data. * It doesn't enforce data types (unless you use ConfigObj). * It doesn't have a standard format. ==== JSON ==== * [https://docs.python.org/3/library/json.html json - The Python Standard Library] Pros: * It enables multiple data types. * It enables complex data structures. * It's supported in many languages. * It's easy to import and export. Cons: * It's easy to commit syntax errors, especially if you're not familiar with the format. * It can be hard to read, especially if it's not pretty printed or if it uses complex data structures. ==== YAML ==== * [http://pyyaml.org/ PyYAML] Pros: * It enables multiple data types. * It enables complex data structures. * It's supported in many languages. * It's easy to import and export. * It's easy to read if you stick to simple data structures. Cons: * It can be hard to write if you use its more complex features. I'm trying out YAML as my default choice. ==== XML ==== There are a few major Python tools for working with XML: * [http://lxml.de/tutorial.html lxml.etree Tutorial - lxml] * [https://www.crummy.com/software/BeautifulSoup/ Beautiful Soup - Crummy: The Site] - It's mainly meant for HTML, but it parses XML too. * [https://docs.python.org/3/library/xml.etree.elementtree.html xml.etree.ElementTree - The Python Standard Library ] Here's some discussion of the use of XML for configuration: * [https://commons.apache.org/proper/commons-configuration/userguide/howto_hierarchical.html Hierarchical Configurations - Apache Commons Configuration User Guide] Pros: * It enables multiple data types. * It enables complex data structures. * It's supported in many languages. * It's easy to import. Cons: * It doesn't have a standard format for representing configuration. * It can be hard to read. * It can be hard to export if the starting format isn't compatible. * Enforcing data types requires an additional schema. ==== Python ==== You can use regular Python code to define settings, usually by putting them in their own module. I'd personally only use Python for configuration in special cases. Here are some recommendations and warnings: * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/10439486/loading-settings-py-config-file-into-a-dict Loading settings.py config file into a dict - Stack Overflow] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/2259427/load-python-code-at-runtime load python code at runtime - Stack Overflow] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/6198372/most-pythonic-way-to-provide-global-configuration-variables-in-config-py Most Pythonic way to provide global configuration variables in config.py? - Stack Overflow] * [https://pypi.python.org/pypi/pyconfig pyconfig - PyPI] * [https://ralsina.me/posts/python-is-not-a-configuration-file-format.html Python is Not a Configuration File Format - Lateral Opinion] Pros: * It enables multiple data types. * It enables complex data structures. * It enables using conditions to set values. * If your code is already in Python, it doesn't require learning an additional language. * Importing is very easy. Cons: * It mixes code and data, which makes the program harder to think about. * It can create a security risk, since users can add arbitrary code to the configuration file for the program to run. * Exporting can be hard or impossible. * It can be hard to read, depending on the code. * It doesn't have a standard format for representing configuration. * It can be easy to commit syntax errors. ==== Database ==== The formats I've already covered are plain text formats that a human can read and edit. Another option is putting the settings in a binary database and accessing them through a separate UI. The advantages are that you can enforce data types and the user isn't editing the settings file directly, which leaves it less open to syntax errors. For settings to be set by non-technical end users, this is probably the best option. * [https://docs.python.org/3/library/sqlite3.html sqlite3 - The Python Standard Library] Pros: * It's hard for the user to commit syntax errors. * It enables multiple data types. * You can control access to the settings. * It's supported in many languages. * It can be easy to import and export. Cons: * Complex data structures are hard to represent, or they require an additional format. * You have to code a UI for viewing and setting values. === Location === Where should you put your config file? Depending on the circumstances, you might need more than one file, and they might need to go in different locations. Generally speaking, you might separate global and user settings into different files. Global settings might go in the app's root directory or a config subdirectory, and user settings somewhere in a user directory. * [https://pypi.python.org/pypi/appdirs appdirs - PyPI] - A Python module for finding various directories across platforms, such as the user data, a possible location for a config file. == Logging == You need some kind of reporting even when you're coding for yourself, because to debug your program, you have to know what's going on as it runs. But when you're coding for yourself, you can usually afford to be minimal and undisciplined about it. When you might get bug reports from outside users, among other reasons, your program needs to write relevant state and event information to a file they can share. * [https://docs.python.org/3/library/logging.html logging - The Python Standard Library] * [http://python-guide-pt-br.readthedocs.io/en/latest/writing/logging/ Logging - The Hitchhiker's Guide to Python] * [https://www.blog.pythonlibrary.org/2012/08/02/python-101-an-intro-to-logging/ Python 101: An Intro to logging - Mouse vs Python] * [https://fangpenlin.com/posts/2012/08/26/good-logging-practice-in-python/ Good logging practice in Python - Fang's coding note] [More sections to come] == Bibliography == === Architecture === Buschmann, Frank, ed. ''Pattern-Oriented Software Architecture: A System of Patterns''. Chichester ; New York: Wiley, 1996. Fowler, Martin. ''Patterns of Enterprise Application Architecture''. The Addison-Wesley Signature Series. Boston: Addison-Wesley, 2003. Martin, Robert C. ''Clean Architecture: A Craftsman’s Guide to Software Structure and Design''. Boston: Prentice Hall, 2018. === Continuous delivery === Humble, Jez, and David Farley. ''Continuous Delivery: Reliable Software Releases through Build, Test, and Deployment Automation''. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Addison-Wesley, 2010. === Debugging === Agans, David J. ''Debugging: The Nine Indispensable Rules for Finding Even the Most Elusive Software and Hardware Problems''. New York: Amacom, 2002. === Design === Evans, Eric. ''Domain-Driven Design: Tackling Complexity in the Heart of Software''. Boston: Addison-Wesley, 2004. Gamma, Erich, ed. ''Design Patterns: Elements of Reusable Object-Oriented Software''. Addison-Wesley Professional Computing Series. Reading, Mass: Addison-Wesley, 1995. Martin, Robert C., ed. ''Clean Code: A Handbook of Agile Software Craftsmanship''. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall, 2009. McConnell, Steve. ''Code Complete''. 2nd ed. Redmond, Wash: Microsoft Press, 2004. Raymond, Eric S. ''The Art of UNIX Programming: With Contributions from Thirteen UNIX Pioneers, Including Its Inventor, Ken Thompson''. Nachdr. Addison-Wesley Professional Computing Series. Boston: Addison-Wesley, 2008. === Privacy === Bowman, Courtney, Ari Gesher, John K. Grant, Daniel Slate, and Elissa Lerner. ''The Architecture of Privacy: On Engineering Technologies That Can Deliver Trustworthy Safeguards''. First edition. Sebastopol, CA: O’Reilly Media, 2015. === Project management === Fogel, Karl. ''Producing Open Source Software: How to Run a Successful Free Software Project''. Version 2.3106., 2018. https://producingoss.com/. McConnell, Steve. ''Rapid Development: Taming Wild Software Schedules''. Redmond, Wash: Microsoft Press, 1996. Stellman, Andrew, and Jennifer Greene. ''Learning Agile''. First edition. Beijing: O’Reilly, 2014. === Refactoring === Fowler, Martin, and Kent Beck. ''Refactoring: Improving the Design of Existing Code''. The Addison-Wesley Object Technology Series. Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley, 1999. === Requirements === McDonald, Kent J. ''Beyond Requirements: Analysis with an Agile Mindset''. New York: Addison-Wesley, 2016. Patton, Jeff. ''User Story Mapping: Discover the Whole Story, Build the Right Product''. First edition. Beijing ; Sebastopol, CA: O’Reilly, 2014. === Security === Howard, Michael, David LeBlanc, and John Viega. ''24 Deadly Sins of Software Security: Programming Flaws and How to Fix Them''. New York: McGraw-Hill, 2010. === Stability === Nygard, Michael T. ''Release It! Design and Deploy Production-Ready Software''. Second edition. The Pragmatic Programmers. Raleigh, North Carolina: The Pragmatic Bookshelf, 2018. === Testing === Beck, Kent. ''Test-Driven Development: By Example''. The Addison-Wesley Signature Series. Boston: Addison-Wesley, 2003. Feathers, Michael C., and Robert C. Martin. ''Working Effectively with Legacy Code''. Robert C. Martin Series. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall Professional Technical Reference, 2005. Freeman, Steve, and Nat Pryce. ''Growing Object-Oriented Software, Guided by Tests''. The Addison-Wesley Signature Series. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Addison Wesley, 2010. Meszaros, Gerard, and Martin Fowler. ''XUnit Test Patterns: Refactoring Test Code''. Upper Saddle River, New Jersey: Addison-Wesley, 2007. === User interface === Cooper, Alan. ''About Face: The Essentials of Interaction Design''. 4th edition. Indianapolis, IN: John Wiley and Sons, 2014. Rosenfeld, Louis, Peter Morville, and Jorge Arango. ''Information Architecture: For the Web and Beyond''. Fourth edition. Sebastopol, CA: O’Reilly Media, Inc, 2015. <disqus/> [[Category:Programming]] [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Developing]] 16b343675766a5dda156cb8e79cfe584e572e271 377 372 2019-02-22T05:21:56Z Andy Culbertson 1 Linked the metadata topic. wikitext text/x-wiki == Introduction == For most of my coding life, I have been the only user of my programs. I wrote them to aid my work or personal life, and only rarely did anyone else even see my code or watch it run. This wasn't on purpose. It just turned out that way. In my current job I do belong to a small development team, but our programs are still only for in-house use, so the only needs we have to consider are our own. This situation is starting to change. My programming projects are becoming more relevant to the outside world, and I want to share some of them as open source. This means I'm needing to reshape some of my programming practices and learn some areas of software development I've had the luxury of ignoring all these years. I haven't completely ignored these areas, though. I pick up on them here and there as I read about how other people code or as I see them in the software I use. Knowing that I'll probably need to know about them someday, I've kept a list. And now the time has come for me to fill in the details. I'm filling in the details here in this guide for two reasons. First, as I learn, writing helps me clarify my thoughts and keep them flowing. And second, posting my writing might help other people. So if you're like me and you've programmed mainly for yourself--what I call private coding--and you're starting to share your work with others--public coding--then maybe what I've learned so far can grease some of your own planning. This project consists of my reading other developers' advice, examining their code, deciding what to adopt and how to adapt it to my needs and preferences, and creating templates, procedures, reference materials, and anything else that might help me code well for a public user base. To give you an idea of my background, I've worked for the past 15 or so years in the publishing industry doing mostly text processing and some web development. The languages I'm most familiar with are Perl, Python, XSLT, and some JavaScript, with a smattering of PHP and VBA. I've spent almost all my time in Windows. I hope to branch out into at least Linux in the future, if only to expand my mind. This guide will be oriented toward Python for now, but I imagine a lot of its suggestions apply to other languages too. At this point it also centers around desktop command-line programs, but I'm hoping to expand it into other interfaces and environments. Since this guide is a place for me to learn, I welcome feedback, and I'm always open to arguments that my choices could be improved or suggestions for things I've missed. This is an early iteration of the guide, so it's incomplete, and a lot of it is only sketched out. == Topics == * [[/Software Development Methodology/]] ** [[/Iterative and Incremental Development/]] ** [[/Test-First Programming/]] ** [[/Refactoring/]] * [[/Version Control/]] * [[/Code Style/]] * [[/Project Structure/]] * [[/Distribution/]] * [[/Installation/]] * [[/Metadata/]] ** [[/Version Numbers/]] ** [[/License/]] * [[/Testing/]] * User Interface ** [[/Command Line Interface/]] * [[/Documentation/]] ** [[/READMEs/]] ** [[/Docstrings/]] ** [[/Command Line Help/]] ** [[/Comments/]] ** [[/Project Documentation/]] ** [[/Literate Programming/]] * [[/Application Configuration/]] * [[/Logging/]] == General coding guides == These are resources with advice on many aspects of writing good code. The ones I haven't read are on my to-read list. I'll probably be adding others. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Code_Complete Code Complete - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Art_of_Unix_Programming The Art of Unix Programming - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perl_Best_Practices Perl Best Practices - Wikipedia] Another resource that overlaps with this guide but covers more on the project management end of OSS is [http://producingoss.com/ Producing Open Source Software]. == Code examples == To show how I'm implementing these ideas in my own code, I'll refer to [https://github.com/thinkulum my GitHub repositories] throughout the guide, mainly my templates for [https://github.com/audreyr/cookiecutter cookiecutter], a Python app that creates project skeletons for any language, and my snippets for [https://www.sublimetext.com/ Sublime Text 2], the text editor I use. Snippets are templates Sublime inserts wherever you type the corresponding trigger strings. Here are projects that show up in lists of high quality code, so I'll examine some of them and include any relevant discoveries in the guide. All the projects I'm listing for now are in Python. * [https://launchpad.net/bzr Bazaar] * [https://github.com/boto/boto3 boto3] * [https://github.com/django/django Django] * [https://github.com/pallets/flask Flask] * [https://github.com/gevent/gevent gevent] * [https://www.mercurial-scm.org/downloads Mercurial] * [https://github.com/nltk/nltk NLTK] * [https://github.com/Pylons/pyramid Pyramid] * [https://github.com/reddit/reddit reddit] * [https://github.com/kennethreitz/requests Requests] * [https://github.com/zzzeek/sqlalchemy SQLAlchemy] * [https://github.com/kennethreitz/tablib Tablib] * [https://github.com/tornadoweb/tornado Tornado] * [http://trac.edgewall.org/browser/trunk/trac trac] * [https://github.com/twisted/twisted Twisted] * [https://github.com/rg3/youtube-dl youtube-dl] In addition to these, I keep a mental list of software with features I might want to emulate, even if I don't plan to study their code very thoroughly: * [https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Mozilla/Developer_guide/Source_Code Firefox] - automatic updating; possibly its add-on architecture, if it ever settles down * [https://wordpress.org/download/source/ WordPress] - plugin hooks == Software development methodology == I'll start with some general principles that direct my thinking about software development in general. These are the ideas behind agile development practices. [https://www.agilealliance.org/agile101/ Agile software development] is a paradigm that was created to answer waterfall development, the approach of planning all the features of a piece of software in advance, an effort that often ends up wasted because the customer's needs change in the middle of the project, so the software has to be redesigned. So agile development was intended to prevent overplanning. But using any development methodology will help prevent the opposite problem, which is a complete ''lack'' of structure and discipline. This results in a code organization scheme called a [http://www.laputan.org/mud/ big ball of mud]. I don't think my programs were complete mud, but the fact that I was the only one seeing or using my code let me get by with a lot of slacking. Slacking does keep you from working too hard, but it fails to prevent other kinds of problems. Agile software development seems like a good middle ground. Agile development encompasses a lot of principles and practices, and it has a lot of varieties, but for me at this point, its most important practices are incremental development, test-driven development, and refactoring. === Incremental development === [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iterative_and_incremental_development Incremental development] is the approach of adding a few features per release rather than developing the whole program at once. It lets users begin using the software earlier, and it lets the feature roadmap change without wasting much development effort on the original design. It's different from iterative development, but they normally go together, so I'm using incremental as shorthand for both. If you're a developer working on your own, the habit of small, frequent releases also can add accountability to the development process. It'll at least hold you accountable to work on the project, since other people will notice when the releases stop coming. It might even encourage you to code each feature well. A short release cycle does mean there's less time to get the code right, but there's also less time to procrastinate on getting it to work, and if you implement good programming practices, you'll waste less of that time debugging. Small, frequent releases can also help the developer avoid procrastination, since the tasks for a small release feel more achievable, similar to writing a [http://volokh.com/posts/1182282037.shtml zeroth draft] of a manuscript. There's little concern for polish, so a zeroth draft has fewer requirements to worry about, and therefore it's more likely to get written. A related practice is to deliberately trim your feature list for each release, captured in the [http://wiki.c2.com/?ExtremeProgramming Extreme Programming] practice [http://wiki.c2.com/?YouArentGonnaNeedIt You Aren't Gonna Need It]. One practice that's helping me think in terms of incremental development is using [http://scottchacon.com/2011/08/31/github-flow.html GitHub flow] as my version control workflow. In GitHub flow the master branch is reserved for deployable code, so anything I'm actively developing goes into a topically named branch off of master. Once the code related to that branch is ready for deployment, I merge that branch back into master. This procedure gets me to plan in terms of small clusters of features. I'll talk more about version control in the next main section. === Test-driven development === * [https://martinfowler.com/bliki/TestDrivenDevelopment.html TestDrivenDevelopment - Martin Fowler] * [http://agiledata.org/essays/tdd.html Introduction to Test Driven Development (TDD) - Agile Data] * [https://www.facebook.com/notes/kent-beck/rip-tdd/750840194948847/ RIP TDD - Kent Beck - Facebook] To get myself into the habit of writing tests first, I'm including it as a subtask for each function I note in my task manager (I use [https://nirvanahq.com/ Nirvana], an app designed with [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Getting_Things_Done GTD] in mind). I have a template for these subtasks, which I copy into the description of the tasks. At the moment the template looks like this: <pre> - Document - Test - Code - Commit </pre> Really I'll move back and forth between documenting, testing, and coding, but I'll check them off when I've completed the first instance of each of those subtasks for that function. A practice I'm starting to explore that takes TDD a step further is behavior-driven development. It allows you to derive tests from documentation that's both human readable and executable. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Behavior-driven_development Behavior-driven development - Wikipedia] * [https://github.com/cucumber/cucumber/wiki/Python Python - cucumber Wiki] - A short list of Cucumber alternatives for Python. === Refactoring === * [https://martinfowler.com/books/refactoring.html Refactoring - Martin Fowler] I don't have a specific refactoring procedure in place. I just do it when I notice the need. I'm hoping to study Fowler's book and learn to think in terms of the structures that refactoring creates. That way I can create them as I code and reduce the need to refactor. Some IDEs have tools to aid refactoring. I'm planning to test using the Sublime Text plugin [https://packagecontrol.io/packages/PyRefactor PyRefactor] for refactoring Python. == Version control == * [http://guides.beanstalkapp.com/version-control/intro-to-version-control.html An introduction to version control - Beanstalk Guides] I'm hosting my projects on GitHub (see the Distribution section), which means I'm using Git as my version control system. (Before that I was using Subversion via TortoiseSVN, which I still use for some non-GitHub projects.) I learned how to use Git from ''Git Essentials'' by Ferdinando Santacroce, and I try to follow its advice. For a reference I use ''Git Pocket Guide'' by Richard Silverman. Rather than typing all the Git commands myself, I'm lazy and use the GUI tool [https://www.gitkraken.com/ GitKraken]. As I said above, I use the GitHub flow workflow to organize my commits. GitHub has as [https://guides.github.com/introduction/flow/ guide] for it. == Coding style == * [https://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-0008/ PEP 8 -- Style Guide for Python Code - Python.org] I've picked up my coding style from various sources, including ''Perl Best Practices'', but PEP 8 is a good starting point that's specifically geared toward Python. == Project structure == * [http://docs.python-guide.org/en/latest/writing/structure/ Structuring Your Project - The Hitchhiker's Guide to Python] * [https://learnpythonthehardway.org/book/ex46.html Exercise 46: A Project Skeleton - Learn Python the Hard Way] I make a directory on my local machine named whatever I'm using for the GitHub URL (e.g., math-student-sim), and I create this structure inside it: <pre> docs/ <package>/ tests/ app.py LICENSE.md MANIFEST.in README.md setup.py </pre> My package name is usually the project name without the hyphens (e.g., mathstudentsim). I'll fill in more of the details in later sections. == Distribution == To distribute your code you need somewhere to host it, and I've chosen GitHub, since it's the one I hear the most about. * [http://kbroman.org/github_tutorial/ git/github guide - Karl Broman] == Installation == I haven't completely wrapped my mind around Python code distribution and installation, but for now I'm relying on people downloading the source from GitHub and running the setup script. Here are some more details on some of the issues that came up for me in the project structure guides above. * [https://docs.python.org/3/distutils/setupscript.html Writing the Setup Script - Distributing Python Modules (Legacy version)] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/9949420/how-to-configure-setup-py-to-have-pip-install-from-github-master How to configure setup.py to have pip install from GitHub master? - Stack Overflow] * [https://caremad.io/posts/2013/07/setup-vs-requirement/ setup.py vs requirements.txt - caremad] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/7923509/how-to-include-docs-directory-in-python-distribution How to include docs directory in python distribution - Stack Overflow] == Metadata == Users of your project will need certain information about it, and you'll need to keep this information somewhere. For Python modules this is in the setup script. * [https://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-0345/ PEP 345 -- Metadata for Python Software Packages 1.2 - Python.org] === Version numbers === * [https://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-0396/ PEP 396 -- Module Version Numbers - Python.org] * [http://semver.org/ Semantic Versioning] * [https://git-scm.com/book/en/v2/Git-Basics-Tagging Git Basics - Tagging - Git] * [https://help.github.com/articles/creating-releases/ Creating Releases - GitHub Help] I'm just following the guidelines in those articles. === License === * [http://choosealicense.com/ Choose an open source license] I've picked MIT as my default to give people freedom to use the code however they want and because I don't expect to have patents to license. == Tests == Based on the advice in ''Learn Python the Hard Way'', I've chosen nose as a test management tool, but since the [http://nose.readthedocs.io/en/latest/ future of nose] is uncertain, I'm using [https://github.com/nose-devs/nose2 nose2]. == User interface == === Command line === To make my projects usable quickly, I'm starting most of them with a command line interface. * [https://wiki.python.org/moin/CmdModule CmdModule - The Python Wiki] * [https://docs.python.org/3/library/cmd.html cmd - The Python Standard Library] I'm placing the commands in <code>cli.py</code> within the package. == Documentation == When you're coding for yourself, it's easy to forget about documentation, since you know how your code works and how to use it, and if you forget, you can reread it and figure it out. Deciphering your own code is annoying, but possibly less annoying than writing documentation. Usually when I'm in my lazy, non-documenting mode, I wait to comment pieces of the code during especially painful rereadings. I'd like to be nicer than that to people who aren't me. Documentation comes in several different kinds, based on its location, format, and intended audience. It might help to think of documentation as falling into two basic genres: cookbooks and references. References tell you how the project works, and cookbooks tell you how to navigate through the project to reach particular objectives. Tutorials, for example, are a type of cookbook. Audiences fall into about three main categories: end users, API users who are developers using the code to write plugins or outside apps, and project developers. As an overview, here's my take on the purpose and audience of documentation types you might find in Python projects, though most aren't limited to Python. Afterward I'll list links that discuss each type in more detail. * '''README''' - In a document in the root directory of the project. A cookbook that tells users and developers the basics of working with the project. * '''Docstrings''' - Mostly at the top of a function. A reference that tells API users how to use the function. * '''Command line help''' - In the docstrings of command handling functions and at the top of a script. A reference that tells the user how to use the script and its command. * '''Comments''' - Interspersed among lines of code. A reference that tells project developers what the code does and why. * '''Code self-documentation''' - Elements of coding style aimed at communicating the code's intentions. A reference that tells project developers and API users what the code does. Some developers try to substitute this technique for comments. * '''Project documentation''' - In documents separate from the code. A cookbook and reference that gives users and developers thorough information for working with the project. * '''Literate programming''' - Interspersed among chunks of code. A reference that gives developers detailed explanations of the reasoning behind the code. This type of documentation isn't common, but it could be a good idea for some projects. === General advice === * [http://docs.python-guide.org/en/latest/writing/documentation/ Documentation - The Hitchhiker's Guide to Python] - Covers a lot of these documentation types. * [https://docs.python.org/devguide/documenting.html Documenting Python - Python Developer's Guide - Python.org] - A style guide for the Python source code, which could be adopted for other projects. === README === Here's a recommendation of what to put in a README: * [http://www.writethedocs.org/guide/writing/beginners-guide-to-docs/ A beginner’s guide to writing documentation - Write the Docs] Here are some example READMEs that have helped me plan mine: * [https://gist.github.com/jxson/1784669 jxson/README.md] * [https://gist.github.com/PurpleBooth/109311bb0361f32d87a2 PurpleBooth/README-Template.md] * [https://gist.github.com/zenorocha/4526327 zenorocha/README.md] Here are some other lists of READMEs: * [https://changelog.com/posts/a-beginners-guide-to-creating-a-readme A Beginner's Guide to Creating a README] * [https://github.com/matiassingers/awesome-readme matiassingers/awesome-readme] * [https://github.com/repat/README-template repat/README-template] The initial README I came up with is [https://github.com/thinkulum/math-student-sim/blob/master/README.md here]. === Docstrings === Here are discussions of what to put in a docstring: * [https://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-0257/ PEP 257 -- Docstring Conventions - Python.org] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/3898572/what-is-the-standard-python-docstring-format What is the standard Python docstring format? - Stack Overflow] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Javadoc Javadoc - Wikipedia] - A documentation generator for Java code. The conventions Javadoc understands can be adapted for other languages. I'm evaluating tools for processing Python docstrings that use this format. My snippets for functions and modules will include docstring outlines. Then you need a tool to present the docstrings to the reader. For now I'm going with Sphinx, since Python developers seem to prefer it. Since it formats more than just docstrings, I've put its links in the "Project documentation" section below. === Command line help === Traditional command-line programs are run from the OS command line, and their help statement is called a usage message. On Unix-like OSes they may also have a man (manual) page. I'll talk about man pages in the "Project documentation" section. Python has the <code>cmd</code> module for creating a command-line interpreter within your program, and each of your program's commands can also have a help message, contained in the command function's docstring. My snippets for scripts and command functions will include outlines for usage and help messages. ==== Usage message ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Usage_message Usage message - Wikipedia] * [http://courses.cms.caltech.edu/cs11/material/general/usage.html How to write usage statements - CS 11 - Caltech] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/17314872/shell-scripts-conventions-to-write-usage-text-for-parameters Shell scripts: conventions to write usage text for parameters? - Stack Overflow] * [https://github.com/docopt/docopt docopt (Python implementation)] - A library that checks the user's command line arguments by parsing the script's usage message. Even if you're not using docopt, it gives you a convenient set of conventions for formatting usage messages. * [https://docs.python.org/3/library/argparse.html argparse - Python.org] - Moves in the opposite direction from docopt, generating a usage message from a specification. ==== Command help ==== I haven't found any conventions for <code>cmd</code> help text, and the examples I've seen have been free-form descriptions. Maybe it would make sense to treat each command as a separate program and use usage message conventions for its help. === Comments and self-documentation === Comments and self-documentation are the two sides of the code clarity coin. Code comments are one of the [http://www.hacker-dictionary.com/terms/holy-wars holy wars] of programming--everyone has a strongly held view and debates it vigorously. I basically agree with the views in these articles: * [https://visualstudiomagazine.com/articles/2013/06/01/roc-rocks.aspx Why You Shouldn't Comment (or Document) Code - Visual Studio Magazine] * [https://sourcemaking.com/refactoring/smells/comments Comments - Source Making] * [https://www.pluralsight.com/blog/software-development/code-comments-dos-and-donts Code comments: A quick guide on when (and when not) to use them - Pluralsight] That is, comments are a liability, so for the most part write them as little as possible, and update them when you update the code. Make your code as clear as you can (see the self-documentation section), and comment only to communicate what the code can't on its own, such as its purpose and the reasoning behind your choices in implementing it. If nothing else, comments can be a good indication of places that need refactoring. I don't think it's necessary to stick to one procedure for commenting, but generally when I've commented more, it's because I've paused after a chunk of coding time, such as when I've finished a function. I code in paragraphs, sets of related lines separated by a blank line. In the commenting phase I reread the code I've just written and try to summarize or justify each paragraph, if needed. Stepping back from the code to state things in English sometimes leads to improvements in the code--refactoring or bug fixes. Here are some in-depth discussions on making code self-documenting: * [http://wiki.c2.com/?SelfDocumentingCode Self Documenting Code - WikiWikiWeb] * [http://wiki.c2.com/?SystemMetaphor System Metaphor - WikiWikiWeb] * [https://m.signalvnoise.com/hunting-for-great-names-in-programming-16f624c8fc03 Hunting for great names in programming - Signal v. Noise] Every solution has its own problems. Self-documentation can go wrong too, and in some of the same ways comments can. For example, your function name doesn't have to have anything to do with its contents. Here are a bunch of tricks for wrecking your code's clarity: * [http://mindprod.com/jgloss/unmain.html unmaintainable code - Java Glossary] On the problem that documentation isn't executable, behavior-driven development might give us a partial solution. See the links in the test-driven development section above. === Project documentation === READMEs give the reader a basic intro to your project, but at some point they'll need more extensive information. I'm calling this in-depth treatment the project documentation. ==== Documentation generation ==== Some documentation is freeform writing, but using [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Documentation_generator documentation generators] a lot of it can be collected from specialized comments and formatted automatically. You'd mainly use this to document your API. Sphinx is a popular Python tool for this purpose. It handles both types of documentation. * [http://www.sphinx-doc.org/en/stable/ Sphinx] My default Sphinx setup will be in my cookiecutter templates. ==== Content ==== I didn't find many guides to writing user or developer guides beyond the README, so I may have to write my own at some point, based on an examination of well-documented projects. But here's one guide that covers some of the information developers will need: * [https://www.ctl.io/developers/blog/post/how-to-document-a-project How to Document a Project - CenturyLink Cloud Developer Center] One source of insight for documenters might be the content of man pages. Man (manual) pages are the documentation for Unix tools, and they have a fairly standard format. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Man_page man page - Wikipedia] * [https://liw.fi/manpages/ Writing manual pages - Lars Wirzenius] * [http://www.schweikhardt.net/man_page_howto.html The Linux Man Page How-to - Jens Schweikhardt] === Literate programming === In spite of what I said about comments and self-documentation, sometimes I really want to expound on the meaning of my code, and literate programming is the way to do it. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Literate_programming Literate programming - Wikipedia] * [http://akkartik.name/post/literate-programming Literate programming: Knuth is doing it wrong - Kartik Agaram] Python tools: * [https://sourceforge.net/projects/pywebtool/ pyWeb] - After glancing at a few, I chose pyWeb as probably the closest to what I was looking for. * [http://mpastell.com/pweave/ Pweave] - A feature-rich tool I might try at some point. My first attempt at literate programming is my [https://github.com/thinkulum/math-student-sim Math Student Simulator]. See the README for basic details on writing and processing the source files. == Configuration == When you're coding for yourself, it's easy to keep all the variables inside the code files, since you can just open the files and change the values whenever you want. But when you have outside users, you don't necessarily want them changing the code, and if the code is compiled into binary executables, they can't change it anyway. Plus, separating code and data makes your program easier to think about. So you'll want to put the user-settable data in external files. There are at least two questions to answer: what format to store the settings in and where to store them. === Format === Here are some discussions that cover several formats: * [http://pyvideo.org/pycon-us-2009/pycon-2009--a-configuration-comparison-in-python-.html A Configuration Comparison in Python - PyCon 2009 - PyVideo] (video). * [https://martin-thoma.com/configuration-files-in-python/ Configuration files in Python - Martin Thoma] - Examples of most of the formats I'm listing here. * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/8225954/python-configuration-file-any-file-format-recommendation-ini-format-still-appr Python configuration file: Any file format recommendation? INI format still appropriate? Seems quite old school - Stack Overflow] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/5055042/whats-the-best-practice-using-a-settings-file-in-python What's the best practice using a settings file in Python? - Stack Overflow] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/186916/configuration-file-with-list-of-key-value-pairs-in-python Configuration file with list of key-value pairs in python - Stack Overflow] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/1726802/what-is-the-difference-between-yaml-and-json-when-to-prefer-one-over-the-other What is the difference between YAML and JSON? When to prefer one over the other - Stack Overflow] * [http://www.robg3d.com/2012/06/why-bother-with-python-and-config-files/ Why bother with python and config files? - RobG3d] I've sorted these formats roughly in order of increasing complexity. ==== CSV ==== * [https://docs.python.org/3/library/csv.html csv - The Python Standard Library] Pros: * It's simple. * Some version of it is supported in many languages. * It's fairly easy to import and export. Cons: * It's a little hard to read, especially when the lines get long. * It's limited to simple data. * It doesn't enforce data types. * It doesn't have a standard format. ==== INI ==== * [https://docs.python.org/3/library/configparser.html configparser - The Python Standard Library] * [https://pypi.python.org/pypi/configobj/ ConfigObj - PyPI] - This one has a few more features than configparser. Pros: * It's easy to read. * It's easy to avoid syntax errors (given a particular format). * Some version of it is supported in many languages. * It's easy to import and export. Cons: * It's limited to simple data. * It doesn't enforce data types (unless you use ConfigObj). * It doesn't have a standard format. ==== JSON ==== * [https://docs.python.org/3/library/json.html json - The Python Standard Library] Pros: * It enables multiple data types. * It enables complex data structures. * It's supported in many languages. * It's easy to import and export. Cons: * It's easy to commit syntax errors, especially if you're not familiar with the format. * It can be hard to read, especially if it's not pretty printed or if it uses complex data structures. ==== YAML ==== * [http://pyyaml.org/ PyYAML] Pros: * It enables multiple data types. * It enables complex data structures. * It's supported in many languages. * It's easy to import and export. * It's easy to read if you stick to simple data structures. Cons: * It can be hard to write if you use its more complex features. I'm trying out YAML as my default choice. ==== XML ==== There are a few major Python tools for working with XML: * [http://lxml.de/tutorial.html lxml.etree Tutorial - lxml] * [https://www.crummy.com/software/BeautifulSoup/ Beautiful Soup - Crummy: The Site] - It's mainly meant for HTML, but it parses XML too. * [https://docs.python.org/3/library/xml.etree.elementtree.html xml.etree.ElementTree - The Python Standard Library ] Here's some discussion of the use of XML for configuration: * [https://commons.apache.org/proper/commons-configuration/userguide/howto_hierarchical.html Hierarchical Configurations - Apache Commons Configuration User Guide] Pros: * It enables multiple data types. * It enables complex data structures. * It's supported in many languages. * It's easy to import. Cons: * It doesn't have a standard format for representing configuration. * It can be hard to read. * It can be hard to export if the starting format isn't compatible. * Enforcing data types requires an additional schema. ==== Python ==== You can use regular Python code to define settings, usually by putting them in their own module. I'd personally only use Python for configuration in special cases. Here are some recommendations and warnings: * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/10439486/loading-settings-py-config-file-into-a-dict Loading settings.py config file into a dict - Stack Overflow] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/2259427/load-python-code-at-runtime load python code at runtime - Stack Overflow] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/6198372/most-pythonic-way-to-provide-global-configuration-variables-in-config-py Most Pythonic way to provide global configuration variables in config.py? - Stack Overflow] * [https://pypi.python.org/pypi/pyconfig pyconfig - PyPI] * [https://ralsina.me/posts/python-is-not-a-configuration-file-format.html Python is Not a Configuration File Format - Lateral Opinion] Pros: * It enables multiple data types. * It enables complex data structures. * It enables using conditions to set values. * If your code is already in Python, it doesn't require learning an additional language. * Importing is very easy. Cons: * It mixes code and data, which makes the program harder to think about. * It can create a security risk, since users can add arbitrary code to the configuration file for the program to run. * Exporting can be hard or impossible. * It can be hard to read, depending on the code. * It doesn't have a standard format for representing configuration. * It can be easy to commit syntax errors. ==== Database ==== The formats I've already covered are plain text formats that a human can read and edit. Another option is putting the settings in a binary database and accessing them through a separate UI. The advantages are that you can enforce data types and the user isn't editing the settings file directly, which leaves it less open to syntax errors. For settings to be set by non-technical end users, this is probably the best option. * [https://docs.python.org/3/library/sqlite3.html sqlite3 - The Python Standard Library] Pros: * It's hard for the user to commit syntax errors. * It enables multiple data types. * You can control access to the settings. * It's supported in many languages. * It can be easy to import and export. Cons: * Complex data structures are hard to represent, or they require an additional format. * You have to code a UI for viewing and setting values. === Location === Where should you put your config file? Depending on the circumstances, you might need more than one file, and they might need to go in different locations. Generally speaking, you might separate global and user settings into different files. Global settings might go in the app's root directory or a config subdirectory, and user settings somewhere in a user directory. * [https://pypi.python.org/pypi/appdirs appdirs - PyPI] - A Python module for finding various directories across platforms, such as the user data, a possible location for a config file. == Logging == You need some kind of reporting even when you're coding for yourself, because to debug your program, you have to know what's going on as it runs. But when you're coding for yourself, you can usually afford to be minimal and undisciplined about it. When you might get bug reports from outside users, among other reasons, your program needs to write relevant state and event information to a file they can share. * [https://docs.python.org/3/library/logging.html logging - The Python Standard Library] * [http://python-guide-pt-br.readthedocs.io/en/latest/writing/logging/ Logging - The Hitchhiker's Guide to Python] * [https://www.blog.pythonlibrary.org/2012/08/02/python-101-an-intro-to-logging/ Python 101: An Intro to logging - Mouse vs Python] * [https://fangpenlin.com/posts/2012/08/26/good-logging-practice-in-python/ Good logging practice in Python - Fang's coding note] [More sections to come] == Bibliography == === Architecture === Buschmann, Frank, ed. ''Pattern-Oriented Software Architecture: A System of Patterns''. Chichester ; New York: Wiley, 1996. Fowler, Martin. ''Patterns of Enterprise Application Architecture''. The Addison-Wesley Signature Series. Boston: Addison-Wesley, 2003. Martin, Robert C. ''Clean Architecture: A Craftsman’s Guide to Software Structure and Design''. Boston: Prentice Hall, 2018. === Continuous delivery === Humble, Jez, and David Farley. ''Continuous Delivery: Reliable Software Releases through Build, Test, and Deployment Automation''. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Addison-Wesley, 2010. === Debugging === Agans, David J. ''Debugging: The Nine Indispensable Rules for Finding Even the Most Elusive Software and Hardware Problems''. New York: Amacom, 2002. === Design === Evans, Eric. ''Domain-Driven Design: Tackling Complexity in the Heart of Software''. Boston: Addison-Wesley, 2004. Gamma, Erich, ed. ''Design Patterns: Elements of Reusable Object-Oriented Software''. Addison-Wesley Professional Computing Series. Reading, Mass: Addison-Wesley, 1995. Martin, Robert C., ed. ''Clean Code: A Handbook of Agile Software Craftsmanship''. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall, 2009. McConnell, Steve. ''Code Complete''. 2nd ed. Redmond, Wash: Microsoft Press, 2004. Raymond, Eric S. ''The Art of UNIX Programming: With Contributions from Thirteen UNIX Pioneers, Including Its Inventor, Ken Thompson''. Nachdr. Addison-Wesley Professional Computing Series. Boston: Addison-Wesley, 2008. === Privacy === Bowman, Courtney, Ari Gesher, John K. Grant, Daniel Slate, and Elissa Lerner. ''The Architecture of Privacy: On Engineering Technologies That Can Deliver Trustworthy Safeguards''. First edition. Sebastopol, CA: O’Reilly Media, 2015. === Project management === Fogel, Karl. ''Producing Open Source Software: How to Run a Successful Free Software Project''. Version 2.3106., 2018. https://producingoss.com/. McConnell, Steve. ''Rapid Development: Taming Wild Software Schedules''. Redmond, Wash: Microsoft Press, 1996. Stellman, Andrew, and Jennifer Greene. ''Learning Agile''. First edition. Beijing: O’Reilly, 2014. === Refactoring === Fowler, Martin, and Kent Beck. ''Refactoring: Improving the Design of Existing Code''. The Addison-Wesley Object Technology Series. Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley, 1999. === Requirements === McDonald, Kent J. ''Beyond Requirements: Analysis with an Agile Mindset''. New York: Addison-Wesley, 2016. Patton, Jeff. ''User Story Mapping: Discover the Whole Story, Build the Right Product''. First edition. Beijing ; Sebastopol, CA: O’Reilly, 2014. === Security === Howard, Michael, David LeBlanc, and John Viega. ''24 Deadly Sins of Software Security: Programming Flaws and How to Fix Them''. New York: McGraw-Hill, 2010. === Stability === Nygard, Michael T. ''Release It! Design and Deploy Production-Ready Software''. Second edition. The Pragmatic Programmers. Raleigh, North Carolina: The Pragmatic Bookshelf, 2018. === Testing === Beck, Kent. ''Test-Driven Development: By Example''. The Addison-Wesley Signature Series. Boston: Addison-Wesley, 2003. Feathers, Michael C., and Robert C. Martin. ''Working Effectively with Legacy Code''. Robert C. Martin Series. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall Professional Technical Reference, 2005. Freeman, Steve, and Nat Pryce. ''Growing Object-Oriented Software, Guided by Tests''. The Addison-Wesley Signature Series. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Addison Wesley, 2010. Meszaros, Gerard, and Martin Fowler. ''XUnit Test Patterns: Refactoring Test Code''. Upper Saddle River, New Jersey: Addison-Wesley, 2007. === User interface === Cooper, Alan. ''About Face: The Essentials of Interaction Design''. 4th edition. Indianapolis, IN: John Wiley and Sons, 2014. Rosenfeld, Louis, Peter Morville, and Jorge Arango. ''Information Architecture: For the Web and Beyond''. Fourth edition. Sebastopol, CA: O’Reilly Media, Inc, 2015. <disqus/> [[Category:Programming]] [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Developing]] 1c778da34c9ade9c68c30edb109b59b18ae96f00 397 377 2019-02-22T05:50:50Z Andy Culbertson 1 Moved topic sections into separate articles linked from the Topics section. wikitext text/x-wiki == Introduction == For most of my coding life, I have been the only user of my programs. I wrote them to aid my work or personal life, and only rarely did anyone else even see my code or watch it run. This wasn't on purpose. It just turned out that way. In my current job I do belong to a small development team, but our programs are still only for in-house use, so the only needs we have to consider are our own. This situation is starting to change. My programming projects are becoming more relevant to the outside world, and I want to share some of them as open source. This means I'm needing to reshape some of my programming practices and learn some areas of software development I've had the luxury of ignoring all these years. I haven't completely ignored these areas, though. I pick up on them here and there as I read about how other people code or as I see them in the software I use. Knowing that I'll probably need to know about them someday, I've kept a list. And now the time has come for me to fill in the details. I'm filling in the details here in this guide for two reasons. First, as I learn, writing helps me clarify my thoughts and keep them flowing. And second, posting my writing might help other people. So if you're like me and you've programmed mainly for yourself--what I call private coding--and you're starting to share your work with others--public coding--then maybe what I've learned so far can grease some of your own planning. This project consists of my reading other developers' advice, examining their code, deciding what to adopt and how to adapt it to my needs and preferences, and creating templates, procedures, reference materials, and anything else that might help me code well for a public user base. To give you an idea of my background, I've worked for the past 15 or so years in the publishing industry doing mostly text processing and some web development. The languages I'm most familiar with are Perl, Python, XSLT, and some JavaScript, with a smattering of PHP and VBA. I've spent almost all my time in Windows. I hope to branch out into at least Linux in the future, if only to expand my mind. This guide will be oriented toward Python for now, but I imagine a lot of its suggestions apply to other languages too. At this point it also centers around desktop command-line programs, but I'm hoping to expand it into other interfaces and environments. Since this guide is a place for me to learn, I welcome feedback, and I'm always open to arguments that my choices could be improved or suggestions for things I've missed. This is an early iteration of the guide, so it's incomplete, and a lot of it is only sketched out. == Topics == * [[/Software Development Methodology/]] ** [[/Iterative and Incremental Development/]] ** [[/Test-First Programming/]] ** [[/Refactoring/]] * [[/Version Control/]] * [[/Code Style/]] * [[/Project Structure/]] * [[/Distribution/]] * [[/Installation/]] * [[/Metadata/]] ** [[/Version Numbers/]] ** [[/License/]] * [[/Testing/]] * User Interface ** [[/Command Line Interface/]] * [[/Documentation/]] ** [[/READMEs/]] ** [[/Docstrings/]] ** [[/Command Line Help/]] ** [[/Comments/]] ** [[/Project Documentation/]] ** [[/Literate Programming/]] * [[/Application Configuration/]] * [[/Logging/]] == General coding guides == These are resources with advice on many aspects of writing good code. The ones I haven't read are on my to-read list. I'll probably be adding others. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Code_Complete Code Complete - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Art_of_Unix_Programming The Art of Unix Programming - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perl_Best_Practices Perl Best Practices - Wikipedia] Another resource that overlaps with this guide but covers more on the project management end of OSS is [http://producingoss.com/ Producing Open Source Software]. == Code examples == To show how I'm implementing these ideas in my own code, I'll refer to [https://github.com/thinkulum my GitHub repositories] throughout the guide, mainly my templates for [https://github.com/audreyr/cookiecutter cookiecutter], a Python app that creates project skeletons for any language, and my snippets for [https://www.sublimetext.com/ Sublime Text 2], the text editor I use. Snippets are templates Sublime inserts wherever you type the corresponding trigger strings. Here are projects that show up in lists of high quality code, so I'll examine some of them and include any relevant discoveries in the guide. All the projects I'm listing for now are in Python. * [https://launchpad.net/bzr Bazaar] * [https://github.com/boto/boto3 boto3] * [https://github.com/django/django Django] * [https://github.com/pallets/flask Flask] * [https://github.com/gevent/gevent gevent] * [https://www.mercurial-scm.org/downloads Mercurial] * [https://github.com/nltk/nltk NLTK] * [https://github.com/Pylons/pyramid Pyramid] * [https://github.com/reddit/reddit reddit] * [https://github.com/kennethreitz/requests Requests] * [https://github.com/zzzeek/sqlalchemy SQLAlchemy] * [https://github.com/kennethreitz/tablib Tablib] * [https://github.com/tornadoweb/tornado Tornado] * [http://trac.edgewall.org/browser/trunk/trac trac] * [https://github.com/twisted/twisted Twisted] * [https://github.com/rg3/youtube-dl youtube-dl] In addition to these, I keep a mental list of software with features I might want to emulate, even if I don't plan to study their code very thoroughly: * [https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Mozilla/Developer_guide/Source_Code Firefox] - automatic updating; possibly its add-on architecture, if it ever settles down * [https://wordpress.org/download/source/ WordPress] - plugin hooks == Bibliography == === Architecture === Buschmann, Frank, ed. ''Pattern-Oriented Software Architecture: A System of Patterns''. Chichester ; New York: Wiley, 1996. Fowler, Martin. ''Patterns of Enterprise Application Architecture''. The Addison-Wesley Signature Series. Boston: Addison-Wesley, 2003. Martin, Robert C. ''Clean Architecture: A Craftsman’s Guide to Software Structure and Design''. Boston: Prentice Hall, 2018. === Continuous delivery === Humble, Jez, and David Farley. ''Continuous Delivery: Reliable Software Releases through Build, Test, and Deployment Automation''. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Addison-Wesley, 2010. === Debugging === Agans, David J. ''Debugging: The Nine Indispensable Rules for Finding Even the Most Elusive Software and Hardware Problems''. New York: Amacom, 2002. === Design === Evans, Eric. ''Domain-Driven Design: Tackling Complexity in the Heart of Software''. Boston: Addison-Wesley, 2004. Gamma, Erich, ed. ''Design Patterns: Elements of Reusable Object-Oriented Software''. Addison-Wesley Professional Computing Series. Reading, Mass: Addison-Wesley, 1995. Martin, Robert C., ed. ''Clean Code: A Handbook of Agile Software Craftsmanship''. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall, 2009. McConnell, Steve. ''Code Complete''. 2nd ed. Redmond, Wash: Microsoft Press, 2004. Raymond, Eric S. ''The Art of UNIX Programming: With Contributions from Thirteen UNIX Pioneers, Including Its Inventor, Ken Thompson''. Nachdr. Addison-Wesley Professional Computing Series. Boston: Addison-Wesley, 2008. === Privacy === Bowman, Courtney, Ari Gesher, John K. Grant, Daniel Slate, and Elissa Lerner. ''The Architecture of Privacy: On Engineering Technologies That Can Deliver Trustworthy Safeguards''. First edition. Sebastopol, CA: O’Reilly Media, 2015. === Project management === Fogel, Karl. ''Producing Open Source Software: How to Run a Successful Free Software Project''. Version 2.3106., 2018. https://producingoss.com/. McConnell, Steve. ''Rapid Development: Taming Wild Software Schedules''. Redmond, Wash: Microsoft Press, 1996. Stellman, Andrew, and Jennifer Greene. ''Learning Agile''. First edition. Beijing: O’Reilly, 2014. === Refactoring === Fowler, Martin, and Kent Beck. ''Refactoring: Improving the Design of Existing Code''. The Addison-Wesley Object Technology Series. Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley, 1999. === Requirements === McDonald, Kent J. ''Beyond Requirements: Analysis with an Agile Mindset''. New York: Addison-Wesley, 2016. Patton, Jeff. ''User Story Mapping: Discover the Whole Story, Build the Right Product''. First edition. Beijing ; Sebastopol, CA: O’Reilly, 2014. === Security === Howard, Michael, David LeBlanc, and John Viega. ''24 Deadly Sins of Software Security: Programming Flaws and How to Fix Them''. New York: McGraw-Hill, 2010. === Stability === Nygard, Michael T. ''Release It! Design and Deploy Production-Ready Software''. Second edition. The Pragmatic Programmers. Raleigh, North Carolina: The Pragmatic Bookshelf, 2018. === Testing === Beck, Kent. ''Test-Driven Development: By Example''. The Addison-Wesley Signature Series. Boston: Addison-Wesley, 2003. Feathers, Michael C., and Robert C. Martin. ''Working Effectively with Legacy Code''. Robert C. Martin Series. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall Professional Technical Reference, 2005. Freeman, Steve, and Nat Pryce. ''Growing Object-Oriented Software, Guided by Tests''. The Addison-Wesley Signature Series. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Addison Wesley, 2010. Meszaros, Gerard, and Martin Fowler. ''XUnit Test Patterns: Refactoring Test Code''. Upper Saddle River, New Jersey: Addison-Wesley, 2007. === User interface === Cooper, Alan. ''About Face: The Essentials of Interaction Design''. 4th edition. Indianapolis, IN: John Wiley and Sons, 2014. Rosenfeld, Louis, Peter Morville, and Jorge Arango. ''Information Architecture: For the Web and Beyond''. Fourth edition. Sebastopol, CA: O’Reilly Media, Inc, 2015. <disqus/> [[Category:Programming]] [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Developing]] 64d00331c0d7e60de53c7714a223e917e89cc1fa 398 397 2019-02-23T21:59:20Z Andy Culbertson 1 Removed the "General coding guides" section. wikitext text/x-wiki == Introduction == For most of my coding life, I have been the only user of my programs. I wrote them to aid my work or personal life, and only rarely did anyone else even see my code or watch it run. This wasn't on purpose. It just turned out that way. In my current job I do belong to a small development team, but our programs are still only for in-house use, so the only needs we have to consider are our own. This situation is starting to change. My programming projects are becoming more relevant to the outside world, and I want to share some of them as open source. This means I'm needing to reshape some of my programming practices and learn some areas of software development I've had the luxury of ignoring all these years. I haven't completely ignored these areas, though. I pick up on them here and there as I read about how other people code or as I see them in the software I use. Knowing that I'll probably need to know about them someday, I've kept a list. And now the time has come for me to fill in the details. I'm filling in the details here in this guide for two reasons. First, as I learn, writing helps me clarify my thoughts and keep them flowing. And second, posting my writing might help other people. So if you're like me and you've programmed mainly for yourself--what I call private coding--and you're starting to share your work with others--public coding--then maybe what I've learned so far can grease some of your own planning. This project consists of my reading other developers' advice, examining their code, deciding what to adopt and how to adapt it to my needs and preferences, and creating templates, procedures, reference materials, and anything else that might help me code well for a public user base. To give you an idea of my background, I've worked for the past 15 or so years in the publishing industry doing mostly text processing and some web development. The languages I'm most familiar with are Perl, Python, XSLT, and some JavaScript, with a smattering of PHP and VBA. I've spent almost all my time in Windows. I hope to branch out into at least Linux in the future, if only to expand my mind. This guide will be oriented toward Python for now, but I imagine a lot of its suggestions apply to other languages too. At this point it also centers around desktop command-line programs, but I'm hoping to expand it into other interfaces and environments. Since this guide is a place for me to learn, I welcome feedback, and I'm always open to arguments that my choices could be improved or suggestions for things I've missed. This is an early iteration of the guide, so it's incomplete, and a lot of it is only sketched out. == Topics == * [[/Software Development Methodology/]] ** [[/Iterative and Incremental Development/]] ** [[/Test-First Programming/]] ** [[/Refactoring/]] * [[/Version Control/]] * [[/Code Style/]] * [[/Project Structure/]] * [[/Distribution/]] * [[/Installation/]] * [[/Metadata/]] ** [[/Version Numbers/]] ** [[/License/]] * [[/Testing/]] * User Interface ** [[/Command Line Interface/]] * [[/Documentation/]] ** [[/READMEs/]] ** [[/Docstrings/]] ** [[/Command Line Help/]] ** [[/Comments/]] ** [[/Project Documentation/]] ** [[/Literate Programming/]] * [[/Application Configuration/]] * [[/Logging/]] == Code examples == To show how I'm implementing these ideas in my own code, I'll refer to [https://github.com/thinkulum my GitHub repositories] throughout the guide, mainly my templates for [https://github.com/audreyr/cookiecutter cookiecutter], a Python app that creates project skeletons for any language, and my snippets for [https://www.sublimetext.com/ Sublime Text 2], the text editor I use. Snippets are templates Sublime inserts wherever you type the corresponding trigger strings. Here are projects that show up in lists of high quality code, so I'll examine some of them and include any relevant discoveries in the guide. All the projects I'm listing for now are in Python. * [https://launchpad.net/bzr Bazaar] * [https://github.com/boto/boto3 boto3] * [https://github.com/django/django Django] * [https://github.com/pallets/flask Flask] * [https://github.com/gevent/gevent gevent] * [https://www.mercurial-scm.org/downloads Mercurial] * [https://github.com/nltk/nltk NLTK] * [https://github.com/Pylons/pyramid Pyramid] * [https://github.com/reddit/reddit reddit] * [https://github.com/kennethreitz/requests Requests] * [https://github.com/zzzeek/sqlalchemy SQLAlchemy] * [https://github.com/kennethreitz/tablib Tablib] * [https://github.com/tornadoweb/tornado Tornado] * [http://trac.edgewall.org/browser/trunk/trac trac] * [https://github.com/twisted/twisted Twisted] * [https://github.com/rg3/youtube-dl youtube-dl] In addition to these, I keep a mental list of software with features I might want to emulate, even if I don't plan to study their code very thoroughly: * [https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Mozilla/Developer_guide/Source_Code Firefox] - automatic updating; possibly its add-on architecture, if it ever settles down * [https://wordpress.org/download/source/ WordPress] - plugin hooks == Bibliography == === Architecture === Buschmann, Frank, ed. ''Pattern-Oriented Software Architecture: A System of Patterns''. Chichester ; New York: Wiley, 1996. Fowler, Martin. ''Patterns of Enterprise Application Architecture''. The Addison-Wesley Signature Series. Boston: Addison-Wesley, 2003. Martin, Robert C. ''Clean Architecture: A Craftsman’s Guide to Software Structure and Design''. Boston: Prentice Hall, 2018. === Continuous delivery === Humble, Jez, and David Farley. ''Continuous Delivery: Reliable Software Releases through Build, Test, and Deployment Automation''. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Addison-Wesley, 2010. === Debugging === Agans, David J. ''Debugging: The Nine Indispensable Rules for Finding Even the Most Elusive Software and Hardware Problems''. New York: Amacom, 2002. === Design === Evans, Eric. ''Domain-Driven Design: Tackling Complexity in the Heart of Software''. Boston: Addison-Wesley, 2004. Gamma, Erich, ed. ''Design Patterns: Elements of Reusable Object-Oriented Software''. Addison-Wesley Professional Computing Series. Reading, Mass: Addison-Wesley, 1995. Martin, Robert C., ed. ''Clean Code: A Handbook of Agile Software Craftsmanship''. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall, 2009. McConnell, Steve. ''Code Complete''. 2nd ed. Redmond, Wash: Microsoft Press, 2004. Raymond, Eric S. ''The Art of UNIX Programming: With Contributions from Thirteen UNIX Pioneers, Including Its Inventor, Ken Thompson''. Nachdr. Addison-Wesley Professional Computing Series. Boston: Addison-Wesley, 2008. === Privacy === Bowman, Courtney, Ari Gesher, John K. Grant, Daniel Slate, and Elissa Lerner. ''The Architecture of Privacy: On Engineering Technologies That Can Deliver Trustworthy Safeguards''. First edition. Sebastopol, CA: O’Reilly Media, 2015. === Project management === Fogel, Karl. ''Producing Open Source Software: How to Run a Successful Free Software Project''. Version 2.3106., 2018. https://producingoss.com/. McConnell, Steve. ''Rapid Development: Taming Wild Software Schedules''. Redmond, Wash: Microsoft Press, 1996. Stellman, Andrew, and Jennifer Greene. ''Learning Agile''. First edition. Beijing: O’Reilly, 2014. === Refactoring === Fowler, Martin, and Kent Beck. ''Refactoring: Improving the Design of Existing Code''. The Addison-Wesley Object Technology Series. Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley, 1999. === Requirements === McDonald, Kent J. ''Beyond Requirements: Analysis with an Agile Mindset''. New York: Addison-Wesley, 2016. Patton, Jeff. ''User Story Mapping: Discover the Whole Story, Build the Right Product''. First edition. Beijing ; Sebastopol, CA: O’Reilly, 2014. === Security === Howard, Michael, David LeBlanc, and John Viega. ''24 Deadly Sins of Software Security: Programming Flaws and How to Fix Them''. New York: McGraw-Hill, 2010. === Stability === Nygard, Michael T. ''Release It! Design and Deploy Production-Ready Software''. Second edition. The Pragmatic Programmers. Raleigh, North Carolina: The Pragmatic Bookshelf, 2018. === Testing === Beck, Kent. ''Test-Driven Development: By Example''. The Addison-Wesley Signature Series. Boston: Addison-Wesley, 2003. Feathers, Michael C., and Robert C. Martin. ''Working Effectively with Legacy Code''. Robert C. Martin Series. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall Professional Technical Reference, 2005. Freeman, Steve, and Nat Pryce. ''Growing Object-Oriented Software, Guided by Tests''. The Addison-Wesley Signature Series. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Addison Wesley, 2010. Meszaros, Gerard, and Martin Fowler. ''XUnit Test Patterns: Refactoring Test Code''. Upper Saddle River, New Jersey: Addison-Wesley, 2007. === User interface === Cooper, Alan. ''About Face: The Essentials of Interaction Design''. 4th edition. Indianapolis, IN: John Wiley and Sons, 2014. Rosenfeld, Louis, Peter Morville, and Jorge Arango. ''Information Architecture: For the Web and Beyond''. Fourth edition. Sebastopol, CA: O’Reilly Media, Inc, 2015. <disqus/> [[Category:Programming]] [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Developing]] 8956e2ad03788ce738e81f3eb80e61a2166c5e58 399 398 2019-02-23T22:00:59Z Andy Culbertson 1 a wikitext text/x-wiki == Introduction == === Purpose === This project is a growing set of notes on various aspects of software development. Its purpose is to define a set of standard operating procedures for my programming projects. === Background === For most of my coding life, I have been the only user of my programs. I wrote them to aid my work or personal life, and only rarely did anyone else even see my code or watch it run. This wasn't on purpose. It just turned out that way. In my current job I do belong to a small development team, but our programs are still only for in-house use, so the only needs we have to consider are our own. This situation is starting to change. My programming projects are becoming more relevant to the outside world, and I want to share some of them as open source. This means I'm needing to reshape some of my programming practices and learn some areas of software development I've had the luxury of ignoring all these years. I haven't completely ignored these areas, though. I pick up on them here and there as I read about how other people code or as I see them in the software I use. Knowing that I'll probably need to know about them someday, I've kept a list. And now the time has come for me to fill in the details. I'm filling in the details here in this project for two reasons. First, as I learn, writing helps me clarify my thoughts and keep them flowing. And second, posting my writing might help other people. So if you're like me and you've programmed mainly for yourself--what I call private coding--and you're starting to share your work with others--public coding--then maybe what I've learned so far can grease some of your own planning. === Method === This project consists of my reading other developers' advice, examining their code, deciding what to adopt and how to adapt it to my needs and preferences, and creating templates, procedures, reference materials, and anything else that might help me code well for a public user base. === Limitations === To give you an idea of my background, I've worked for the past 15 or so years in the publishing industry doing mostly text processing and some web development. The languages I'm most familiar with are Perl, Python, XSLT, and some JavaScript, with a smattering of PHP and VBA. I've spent almost all my time in Windows. I hope to branch out into at least Linux in the future, if only to expand my mind. This project will be oriented toward Python for now, but I imagine a lot of its suggestions apply to other languages too. At this point it also centers around desktop command-line programs, but I'm hoping to expand it into other interfaces and environments. === Feedback === Since this project is a place for me to learn, I welcome feedback, and I'm always open to arguments that my choices could be improved or suggestions for things I've missed. == Topics == * [[/Software Development Methodology/]] ** [[/Iterative and Incremental Development/]] ** [[/Test-First Programming/]] ** [[/Refactoring/]] * [[/Version Control/]] * [[/Code Style/]] * [[/Project Structure/]] * [[/Distribution/]] * [[/Installation/]] * [[/Metadata/]] ** [[/Version Numbers/]] ** [[/License/]] * [[/Testing/]] * User Interface ** [[/Command Line Interface/]] * [[/Documentation/]] ** [[/READMEs/]] ** [[/Docstrings/]] ** [[/Command Line Help/]] ** [[/Comments/]] ** [[/Project Documentation/]] ** [[/Literate Programming/]] * [[/Application Configuration/]] * [[/Logging/]] == Code examples == To show how I'm implementing these ideas in my own code, I'll refer to [https://github.com/thinkulum my GitHub repositories] throughout the project, mainly my templates for [https://github.com/audreyr/cookiecutter cookiecutter], a Python app that creates project skeletons for any language, and my snippets for [https://www.sublimetext.com/ Sublime Text 2], the text editor I use. Snippets are templates Sublime inserts wherever you type the corresponding trigger strings. Here are projects that show up in lists of high quality code, so I'll examine some of them and include any relevant discoveries in the project. All the projects I'm listing for now are in Python. * [https://launchpad.net/bzr Bazaar] * [https://github.com/boto/boto3 boto3] * [https://github.com/django/django Django] * [https://github.com/pallets/flask Flask] * [https://github.com/gevent/gevent gevent] * [https://www.mercurial-scm.org/downloads Mercurial] * [https://github.com/nltk/nltk NLTK] * [https://github.com/Pylons/pyramid Pyramid] * [https://github.com/reddit/reddit reddit] * [https://github.com/kennethreitz/requests Requests] * [https://github.com/zzzeek/sqlalchemy SQLAlchemy] * [https://github.com/kennethreitz/tablib Tablib] * [https://github.com/tornadoweb/tornado Tornado] * [http://trac.edgewall.org/browser/trunk/trac trac] * [https://github.com/twisted/twisted Twisted] * [https://github.com/rg3/youtube-dl youtube-dl] In addition to these, I keep a mental list of software with features I might want to emulate, even if I don't plan to study their code very thoroughly: * [https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Mozilla/Developer_guide/Source_Code Firefox] - automatic updating; possibly its add-on architecture, if it ever settles down * [https://wordpress.org/download/source/ WordPress] - plugin hooks == Bibliography == === Architecture === Buschmann, Frank, ed. ''Pattern-Oriented Software Architecture: A System of Patterns''. Chichester ; New York: Wiley, 1996. Fowler, Martin. ''Patterns of Enterprise Application Architecture''. The Addison-Wesley Signature Series. Boston: Addison-Wesley, 2003. Martin, Robert C. ''Clean Architecture: A Craftsman’s Guide to Software Structure and Design''. Boston: Prentice Hall, 2018. === Continuous delivery === Humble, Jez, and David Farley. ''Continuous Delivery: Reliable Software Releases through Build, Test, and Deployment Automation''. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Addison-Wesley, 2010. === Debugging === Agans, David J. ''Debugging: The Nine Indispensable Rules for Finding Even the Most Elusive Software and Hardware Problems''. New York: Amacom, 2002. === Design === Evans, Eric. ''Domain-Driven Design: Tackling Complexity in the Heart of Software''. Boston: Addison-Wesley, 2004. Gamma, Erich, ed. ''Design Patterns: Elements of Reusable Object-Oriented Software''. Addison-Wesley Professional Computing Series. Reading, Mass: Addison-Wesley, 1995. Martin, Robert C., ed. ''Clean Code: A Handbook of Agile Software Craftsmanship''. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall, 2009. McConnell, Steve. ''Code Complete''. 2nd ed. Redmond, Wash: Microsoft Press, 2004. Raymond, Eric S. ''The Art of UNIX Programming: With Contributions from Thirteen UNIX Pioneers, Including Its Inventor, Ken Thompson''. Nachdr. Addison-Wesley Professional Computing Series. Boston: Addison-Wesley, 2008. === Privacy === Bowman, Courtney, Ari Gesher, John K. Grant, Daniel Slate, and Elissa Lerner. ''The Architecture of Privacy: On Engineering Technologies That Can Deliver Trustworthy Safeguards''. First edition. Sebastopol, CA: O’Reilly Media, 2015. === Project management === Fogel, Karl. ''Producing Open Source Software: How to Run a Successful Free Software Project''. Version 2.3106., 2018. https://producingoss.com/. McConnell, Steve. ''Rapid Development: Taming Wild Software Schedules''. Redmond, Wash: Microsoft Press, 1996. Stellman, Andrew, and Jennifer Greene. ''Learning Agile''. First edition. Beijing: O’Reilly, 2014. === Refactoring === Fowler, Martin, and Kent Beck. ''Refactoring: Improving the Design of Existing Code''. The Addison-Wesley Object Technology Series. Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley, 1999. === Requirements === McDonald, Kent J. ''Beyond Requirements: Analysis with an Agile Mindset''. New York: Addison-Wesley, 2016. Patton, Jeff. ''User Story Mapping: Discover the Whole Story, Build the Right Product''. First edition. Beijing ; Sebastopol, CA: O’Reilly, 2014. === Security === Howard, Michael, David LeBlanc, and John Viega. ''24 Deadly Sins of Software Security: Programming Flaws and How to Fix Them''. New York: McGraw-Hill, 2010. === Stability === Nygard, Michael T. ''Release It! Design and Deploy Production-Ready Software''. Second edition. The Pragmatic Programmers. Raleigh, North Carolina: The Pragmatic Bookshelf, 2018. === Testing === Beck, Kent. ''Test-Driven Development: By Example''. The Addison-Wesley Signature Series. Boston: Addison-Wesley, 2003. Feathers, Michael C., and Robert C. Martin. ''Working Effectively with Legacy Code''. Robert C. Martin Series. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall Professional Technical Reference, 2005. Freeman, Steve, and Nat Pryce. ''Growing Object-Oriented Software, Guided by Tests''. The Addison-Wesley Signature Series. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Addison Wesley, 2010. Meszaros, Gerard, and Martin Fowler. ''XUnit Test Patterns: Refactoring Test Code''. Upper Saddle River, New Jersey: Addison-Wesley, 2007. === User interface === Cooper, Alan. ''About Face: The Essentials of Interaction Design''. 4th edition. Indianapolis, IN: John Wiley and Sons, 2014. Rosenfeld, Louis, Peter Morville, and Jorge Arango. ''Information Architecture: For the Web and Beyond''. Fourth edition. Sebastopol, CA: O’Reilly Media, Inc, 2015. <disqus/> [[Category:Programming]] [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Developing]] 6debb60503cb68b3b3f02a00c772a997ec85e588 400 399 2019-02-23T22:03:52Z Andy Culbertson 1 Undo revision 399 by [[Special:Contributions/Andy Culbertson|Andy Culbertson]] ([[User talk:Andy Culbertson|talk]]) wikitext text/x-wiki == Introduction == For most of my coding life, I have been the only user of my programs. I wrote them to aid my work or personal life, and only rarely did anyone else even see my code or watch it run. This wasn't on purpose. It just turned out that way. In my current job I do belong to a small development team, but our programs are still only for in-house use, so the only needs we have to consider are our own. This situation is starting to change. My programming projects are becoming more relevant to the outside world, and I want to share some of them as open source. This means I'm needing to reshape some of my programming practices and learn some areas of software development I've had the luxury of ignoring all these years. I haven't completely ignored these areas, though. I pick up on them here and there as I read about how other people code or as I see them in the software I use. Knowing that I'll probably need to know about them someday, I've kept a list. And now the time has come for me to fill in the details. I'm filling in the details here in this guide for two reasons. First, as I learn, writing helps me clarify my thoughts and keep them flowing. And second, posting my writing might help other people. So if you're like me and you've programmed mainly for yourself--what I call private coding--and you're starting to share your work with others--public coding--then maybe what I've learned so far can grease some of your own planning. This project consists of my reading other developers' advice, examining their code, deciding what to adopt and how to adapt it to my needs and preferences, and creating templates, procedures, reference materials, and anything else that might help me code well for a public user base. To give you an idea of my background, I've worked for the past 15 or so years in the publishing industry doing mostly text processing and some web development. The languages I'm most familiar with are Perl, Python, XSLT, and some JavaScript, with a smattering of PHP and VBA. I've spent almost all my time in Windows. I hope to branch out into at least Linux in the future, if only to expand my mind. This guide will be oriented toward Python for now, but I imagine a lot of its suggestions apply to other languages too. At this point it also centers around desktop command-line programs, but I'm hoping to expand it into other interfaces and environments. Since this guide is a place for me to learn, I welcome feedback, and I'm always open to arguments that my choices could be improved or suggestions for things I've missed. This is an early iteration of the guide, so it's incomplete, and a lot of it is only sketched out. == Topics == * [[/Software Development Methodology/]] ** [[/Iterative and Incremental Development/]] ** [[/Test-First Programming/]] ** [[/Refactoring/]] * [[/Version Control/]] * [[/Code Style/]] * [[/Project Structure/]] * [[/Distribution/]] * [[/Installation/]] * [[/Metadata/]] ** [[/Version Numbers/]] ** [[/License/]] * [[/Testing/]] * User Interface ** [[/Command Line Interface/]] * [[/Documentation/]] ** [[/READMEs/]] ** [[/Docstrings/]] ** [[/Command Line Help/]] ** [[/Comments/]] ** [[/Project Documentation/]] ** [[/Literate Programming/]] * [[/Application Configuration/]] * [[/Logging/]] == Code examples == To show how I'm implementing these ideas in my own code, I'll refer to [https://github.com/thinkulum my GitHub repositories] throughout the guide, mainly my templates for [https://github.com/audreyr/cookiecutter cookiecutter], a Python app that creates project skeletons for any language, and my snippets for [https://www.sublimetext.com/ Sublime Text 2], the text editor I use. Snippets are templates Sublime inserts wherever you type the corresponding trigger strings. Here are projects that show up in lists of high quality code, so I'll examine some of them and include any relevant discoveries in the guide. All the projects I'm listing for now are in Python. * [https://launchpad.net/bzr Bazaar] * [https://github.com/boto/boto3 boto3] * [https://github.com/django/django Django] * [https://github.com/pallets/flask Flask] * [https://github.com/gevent/gevent gevent] * [https://www.mercurial-scm.org/downloads Mercurial] * [https://github.com/nltk/nltk NLTK] * [https://github.com/Pylons/pyramid Pyramid] * [https://github.com/reddit/reddit reddit] * [https://github.com/kennethreitz/requests Requests] * [https://github.com/zzzeek/sqlalchemy SQLAlchemy] * [https://github.com/kennethreitz/tablib Tablib] * [https://github.com/tornadoweb/tornado Tornado] * [http://trac.edgewall.org/browser/trunk/trac trac] * [https://github.com/twisted/twisted Twisted] * [https://github.com/rg3/youtube-dl youtube-dl] In addition to these, I keep a mental list of software with features I might want to emulate, even if I don't plan to study their code very thoroughly: * [https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Mozilla/Developer_guide/Source_Code Firefox] - automatic updating; possibly its add-on architecture, if it ever settles down * [https://wordpress.org/download/source/ WordPress] - plugin hooks == Bibliography == === Architecture === Buschmann, Frank, ed. ''Pattern-Oriented Software Architecture: A System of Patterns''. Chichester ; New York: Wiley, 1996. Fowler, Martin. ''Patterns of Enterprise Application Architecture''. The Addison-Wesley Signature Series. Boston: Addison-Wesley, 2003. Martin, Robert C. ''Clean Architecture: A Craftsman’s Guide to Software Structure and Design''. Boston: Prentice Hall, 2018. === Continuous delivery === Humble, Jez, and David Farley. ''Continuous Delivery: Reliable Software Releases through Build, Test, and Deployment Automation''. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Addison-Wesley, 2010. === Debugging === Agans, David J. ''Debugging: The Nine Indispensable Rules for Finding Even the Most Elusive Software and Hardware Problems''. New York: Amacom, 2002. === Design === Evans, Eric. ''Domain-Driven Design: Tackling Complexity in the Heart of Software''. Boston: Addison-Wesley, 2004. Gamma, Erich, ed. ''Design Patterns: Elements of Reusable Object-Oriented Software''. Addison-Wesley Professional Computing Series. Reading, Mass: Addison-Wesley, 1995. Martin, Robert C., ed. ''Clean Code: A Handbook of Agile Software Craftsmanship''. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall, 2009. McConnell, Steve. ''Code Complete''. 2nd ed. Redmond, Wash: Microsoft Press, 2004. Raymond, Eric S. ''The Art of UNIX Programming: With Contributions from Thirteen UNIX Pioneers, Including Its Inventor, Ken Thompson''. Nachdr. Addison-Wesley Professional Computing Series. Boston: Addison-Wesley, 2008. === Privacy === Bowman, Courtney, Ari Gesher, John K. Grant, Daniel Slate, and Elissa Lerner. ''The Architecture of Privacy: On Engineering Technologies That Can Deliver Trustworthy Safeguards''. First edition. Sebastopol, CA: O’Reilly Media, 2015. === Project management === Fogel, Karl. ''Producing Open Source Software: How to Run a Successful Free Software Project''. Version 2.3106., 2018. https://producingoss.com/. McConnell, Steve. ''Rapid Development: Taming Wild Software Schedules''. Redmond, Wash: Microsoft Press, 1996. Stellman, Andrew, and Jennifer Greene. ''Learning Agile''. First edition. Beijing: O’Reilly, 2014. === Refactoring === Fowler, Martin, and Kent Beck. ''Refactoring: Improving the Design of Existing Code''. The Addison-Wesley Object Technology Series. Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley, 1999. === Requirements === McDonald, Kent J. ''Beyond Requirements: Analysis with an Agile Mindset''. New York: Addison-Wesley, 2016. Patton, Jeff. ''User Story Mapping: Discover the Whole Story, Build the Right Product''. First edition. Beijing ; Sebastopol, CA: O’Reilly, 2014. === Security === Howard, Michael, David LeBlanc, and John Viega. ''24 Deadly Sins of Software Security: Programming Flaws and How to Fix Them''. New York: McGraw-Hill, 2010. === Stability === Nygard, Michael T. ''Release It! Design and Deploy Production-Ready Software''. Second edition. The Pragmatic Programmers. Raleigh, North Carolina: The Pragmatic Bookshelf, 2018. === Testing === Beck, Kent. ''Test-Driven Development: By Example''. The Addison-Wesley Signature Series. Boston: Addison-Wesley, 2003. Feathers, Michael C., and Robert C. Martin. ''Working Effectively with Legacy Code''. Robert C. Martin Series. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall Professional Technical Reference, 2005. Freeman, Steve, and Nat Pryce. ''Growing Object-Oriented Software, Guided by Tests''. The Addison-Wesley Signature Series. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Addison Wesley, 2010. Meszaros, Gerard, and Martin Fowler. ''XUnit Test Patterns: Refactoring Test Code''. Upper Saddle River, New Jersey: Addison-Wesley, 2007. === User interface === Cooper, Alan. ''About Face: The Essentials of Interaction Design''. 4th edition. Indianapolis, IN: John Wiley and Sons, 2014. Rosenfeld, Louis, Peter Morville, and Jorge Arango. ''Information Architecture: For the Web and Beyond''. Fourth edition. Sebastopol, CA: O’Reilly Media, Inc, 2015. <disqus/> [[Category:Programming]] [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Developing]] 8956e2ad03788ce738e81f3eb80e61a2166c5e58 0 131 369 2019-02-12T00:21:47Z Andy Culbertson 1 Andy Culbertson moved page [[From Private to Public Coding]] to [[Software Development]]: A more generic title fits the scope of the project better. wikitext text/x-wiki #REDIRECT [[Software Development]] 8bbacbfe2b57fa8fd956e7c542dccb281413398b 0 132 373 2019-02-22T04:56:55Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the article. wikitext text/x-wiki I'll start with some general principles that direct my thinking about software development in general. These are the ideas behind agile development practices. [https://www.agilealliance.org/agile101/ Agile software development] is a paradigm that was created to answer waterfall development, the approach of planning all the features of a piece of software in advance, an effort that often ends up wasted because the customer's needs change in the middle of the project, so the software has to be redesigned. So agile development was intended to prevent overplanning. But using any development methodology will help prevent the opposite problem, which is a complete ''lack'' of structure and discipline. This results in a code organization scheme called a [http://www.laputan.org/mud/ big ball of mud]. I don't think my programs were complete mud, but the fact that I was the only one seeing or using my code let me get by with a lot of slacking. Slacking does keep you from working too hard, but it fails to prevent other kinds of problems. Agile software development seems like a good middle ground. Agile development encompasses a lot of principles and practices, and it has a lot of varieties, but for me at this point, its most important practices are incremental development, test-driven development, and refactoring. * [[../Iterative and Incremental Development/]] * [[../Test-First Programming/]] * [[../Refactoring/]] [[Category:Programming]] [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Developing]] 2287879250a8ec1fc53d8871810f0da07925890a 0 133 374 2019-02-22T04:58:50Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the article. wikitext text/x-wiki [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iterative_and_incremental_development Incremental development] is the approach of adding a few features per release rather than developing the whole program at once. It lets users begin using the software earlier, and it lets the feature roadmap change without wasting much development effort on the original design. It's different from iterative development, but they normally go together, so I'm using incremental as shorthand for both. If you're a developer working on your own, the habit of small, frequent releases also can add accountability to the development process. It'll at least hold you accountable to work on the project, since other people will notice when the releases stop coming. It might even encourage you to code each feature well. A short release cycle does mean there's less time to get the code right, but there's also less time to procrastinate on getting it to work, and if you implement good programming practices, you'll waste less of that time debugging. Small, frequent releases can also help the developer avoid procrastination, since the tasks for a small release feel more achievable, similar to writing a [http://volokh.com/posts/1182282037.shtml zeroth draft] of a manuscript. There's little concern for polish, so a zeroth draft has fewer requirements to worry about, and therefore it's more likely to get written. A related practice is to deliberately trim your feature list for each release, captured in the [http://wiki.c2.com/?ExtremeProgramming Extreme Programming] practice [http://wiki.c2.com/?YouArentGonnaNeedIt You Aren't Gonna Need It]. One practice that's helping me think in terms of incremental development is using [http://scottchacon.com/2011/08/31/github-flow.html GitHub flow] as my version control workflow. In GitHub flow the master branch is reserved for deployable code, so anything I'm actively developing goes into a topically named branch off of master. Once the code related to that branch is ready for deployment, I merge that branch back into master. This procedure gets me to plan in terms of small clusters of features. I'll talk more about version control in the next main section. [[Category:Programming]] [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Developing]] 2059743ac071bfd5dc5d232170fcfc5f8670d847 0 134 375 2019-02-22T05:00:28Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the article. wikitext text/x-wiki * [https://martinfowler.com/bliki/TestDrivenDevelopment.html TestDrivenDevelopment - Martin Fowler] * [http://agiledata.org/essays/tdd.html Introduction to Test Driven Development (TDD) - Agile Data] * [https://www.facebook.com/notes/kent-beck/rip-tdd/750840194948847/ RIP TDD - Kent Beck - Facebook] To get myself into the habit of writing tests first, I'm including it as a subtask for each function I note in my task manager (I use [https://nirvanahq.com/ Nirvana], an app designed with [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Getting_Things_Done GTD] in mind). I have a template for these subtasks, which I copy into the description of the tasks. At the moment the template looks like this: <pre> - Document - Test - Code - Commit </pre> Really I'll move back and forth between documenting, testing, and coding, but I'll check them off when I've completed the first instance of each of those subtasks for that function. A practice I'm starting to explore that takes TDD a step further is behavior-driven development. It allows you to derive tests from documentation that's both human readable and executable. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Behavior-driven_development Behavior-driven development - Wikipedia] * [https://github.com/cucumber/cucumber/wiki/Python Python - cucumber Wiki] - A short list of Cucumber alternatives for Python. [[Category:Programming]] [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Developing]] 0395f4095d5eddfc290b5b00a3deb4d8e26dcad0 0 135 376 2019-02-22T05:02:36Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the article. wikitext text/x-wiki * [https://martinfowler.com/books/refactoring.html Refactoring - Martin Fowler] I don't have a specific refactoring procedure in place. I just do it when I notice the need. I'm hoping to study Fowler's book and learn to think in terms of the structures that refactoring creates. That way I can create them as I code and reduce the need to refactor. Some IDEs have tools to aid refactoring. I'm planning to test using the Sublime Text plugin [https://packagecontrol.io/packages/PyRefactor PyRefactor] for refactoring Python. [[Category:Programming]] [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Developing]] dc8e4f6d608da1c4b893ecced456c3f089544922 0 136 378 2019-02-22T05:47:36Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the article. wikitext text/x-wiki * [http://guides.beanstalkapp.com/version-control/intro-to-version-control.html An introduction to version control - Beanstalk Guides] I'm hosting my projects on GitHub (see the Distribution section), which means I'm using Git as my version control system. (Before that I was using Subversion via TortoiseSVN, which I still use for some non-GitHub projects.) I learned how to use Git from ''Git Essentials'' by Ferdinando Santacroce, and I try to follow its advice. For a reference I use ''Git Pocket Guide'' by Richard Silverman. Rather than typing all the Git commands myself, I'm lazy and use the GUI tool [https://www.gitkraken.com/ GitKraken]. As I said above, I use the GitHub flow workflow to organize my commits. GitHub has as [https://guides.github.com/introduction/flow/ guide] for it. [[Category:Programming]] [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Developing]] d58eb01ede6990e80dd24a8b8d1f31dbbf5cc18f 0 137 379 2019-02-22T05:47:39Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the article. wikitext text/x-wiki * [https://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-0008/ PEP 8 -- Style Guide for Python Code - Python.org] I've picked up my coding style from various sources, including ''Perl Best Practices'', but PEP 8 is a good starting point that's specifically geared toward Python. [[Category:Programming]] [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Developing]] 5b82f3bd1c262f03a4ea3c0de0a3b687ae3767da 0 138 380 2019-02-22T05:47:41Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the article. wikitext text/x-wiki * [http://docs.python-guide.org/en/latest/writing/structure/ Structuring Your Project - The Hitchhiker's Guide to Python] * [https://learnpythonthehardway.org/book/ex46.html Exercise 46: A Project Skeleton - Learn Python the Hard Way] I make a directory on my local machine named whatever I'm using for the GitHub URL (e.g., math-student-sim), and I create this structure inside it: <pre> docs/ <package>/ tests/ app.py LICENSE.md MANIFEST.in README.md setup.py </pre> My package name is usually the project name without the hyphens (e.g., mathstudentsim). I'll fill in more of the details in later sections. [[Category:Programming]] [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Developing]] 9c68c66a0ad902ee41b3e2ab7e9e09150ef5a85e 0 139 381 2019-02-22T05:47:43Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the article. wikitext text/x-wiki To distribute your code you need somewhere to host it, and I've chosen GitHub, since it's the one I hear the most about. * [http://kbroman.org/github_tutorial/ git/github guide - Karl Broman] [[Category:Programming]] [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Developing]] 9e551696db20a6a227cdaf183719339b1d77797d 0 140 382 2019-02-22T05:47:45Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the article. wikitext text/x-wiki I haven't completely wrapped my mind around Python code distribution and installation, but for now I'm relying on people downloading the source from GitHub and running the setup script. Here are some more details on some of the issues that came up for me in the project structure guides above. * [https://docs.python.org/3/distutils/setupscript.html Writing the Setup Script - Distributing Python Modules (Legacy version)] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/9949420/how-to-configure-setup-py-to-have-pip-install-from-github-master How to configure setup.py to have pip install from GitHub master? - Stack Overflow] * [https://caremad.io/posts/2013/07/setup-vs-requirement/ setup.py vs requirements.txt - caremad] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/7923509/how-to-include-docs-directory-in-python-distribution How to include docs directory in python distribution - Stack Overflow] [[Category:Programming]] [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Developing]] 2f1613354ab44b3b8cf4ba7b59dfa08699a86af3 0 141 383 2019-02-22T05:47:47Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the article. wikitext text/x-wiki Users of your project will need certain information about it, and you'll need to keep this information somewhere. For Python modules this is in the setup script. * [https://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-0345/ PEP 345 -- Metadata for Python Software Packages 1.2 - Python.org] * [[../Version Numbers/]] * [[../License/]] [[Category:Programming]] [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Developing]] dc8d4286755d70969a2be0f63e49d4ba3f9a8c5c 0 142 384 2019-02-22T05:47:49Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the article. wikitext text/x-wiki * [https://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-0396/ PEP 396 -- Module Version Numbers - Python.org] * [http://semver.org/ Semantic Versioning] * [https://git-scm.com/book/en/v2/Git-Basics-Tagging Git Basics - Tagging - Git] * [https://help.github.com/articles/creating-releases/ Creating Releases - GitHub Help] I'm just following the guidelines in those articles. [[Category:Programming]] [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Developing]] 3bfbdf2c330d31c8760e7559a8cd58e4ac10190a 0 143 385 2019-02-22T05:47:51Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the article. wikitext text/x-wiki * [http://choosealicense.com/ Choose an open source license] I've picked MIT as my default to give people freedom to use the code however they want and because I don't expect to have patents to license. [[Category:Programming]] [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Developing]] 6f7390c5d3fffe62b3a952af2b92d737bd8db1bb 0 144 386 2019-02-22T05:47:53Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the article. wikitext text/x-wiki Based on the advice in ''Learn Python the Hard Way'', I've chosen nose as a test management tool, but since the [http://nose.readthedocs.io/en/latest/ future of nose] is uncertain, I'm using [https://github.com/nose-devs/nose2 nose2]. [[Category:Programming]] [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Developing]] 6ffae6155979d6c811844917870410be1a38f6fc 0 145 387 2019-02-22T05:47:54Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the article. wikitext text/x-wiki To make my projects usable quickly, I'm starting most of them with a command line interface. * [https://wiki.python.org/moin/CmdModule CmdModule - The Python Wiki] * [https://docs.python.org/3/library/cmd.html cmd - The Python Standard Library] I'm placing the commands in <code>cli.py</code> within the package. [[Category:Programming]] [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Developing]] 7f32d8a6d59cc6553773e83cdd10ac8a57b6b053 0 146 388 2019-02-22T05:47:57Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the article. wikitext text/x-wiki When you're coding for yourself, it's easy to forget about documentation, since you know how your code works and how to use it, and if you forget, you can reread it and figure it out. Deciphering your own code is annoying, but possibly less annoying than writing documentation. Usually when I'm in my lazy, non-documenting mode, I wait to comment pieces of the code during especially painful rereadings. I'd like to be nicer than that to people who aren't me. Documentation comes in several different kinds, based on its location, format, and intended audience. It might help to think of documentation as falling into two basic genres: cookbooks and references. References tell you how the project works, and cookbooks tell you how to navigate through the project to reach particular objectives. Tutorials, for example, are a type of cookbook. Audiences fall into about three main categories: end users, API users who are developers using the code to write plugins or outside apps, and project developers. As an overview, here's my take on the purpose and audience of documentation types you might find in Python projects, though most aren't limited to Python. Afterward I'll list links that discuss each type in more detail. * '''[[../READMEs/]]''' - In a document in the root directory of the project. A cookbook that tells users and developers the basics of working with the project. * '''[[../Docstrings/]]''' - Mostly at the top of a function. A reference that tells API users how to use the function. * '''[[../Command Line Help/]]''' - In the docstrings of command handling functions and at the top of a script. A reference that tells the user how to use the script and its command. * '''[[../Comments/]]''' - Interspersed among lines of code. A reference that tells project developers what the code does and why. * '''Code self-documentation''' (see [[../Comments/]]) - Elements of coding style aimed at communicating the code's intentions. A reference that tells project developers and API users what the code does. Some developers try to substitute this technique for comments. * '''[[../Project Documentation/]]''' - In documents separate from the code. A cookbook and reference that gives users and developers thorough information for working with the project. * '''[[../Literate Programming/]]''' - Interspersed among chunks of code. A reference that gives developers detailed explanations of the reasoning behind the code. This type of documentation isn't common, but it could be a good idea for some projects. == General advice == * [http://docs.python-guide.org/en/latest/writing/documentation/ Documentation - The Hitchhiker's Guide to Python] - Covers a lot of these documentation types. * [https://docs.python.org/devguide/documenting.html Documenting Python - Python Developer's Guide - Python.org] - A style guide for the Python source code, which could be adopted for other projects. [[Category:Programming]] [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Developing]] 1188714b206698722e141a5b3a1c8c9a1c525c89 0 147 389 2019-02-22T05:47:59Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the article. wikitext text/x-wiki Here's a recommendation of what to put in a README: * [http://www.writethedocs.org/guide/writing/beginners-guide-to-docs/ A beginner’s guide to writing documentation - Write the Docs] Here are some example READMEs that have helped me plan mine: * [https://gist.github.com/jxson/1784669 jxson/README.md] * [https://gist.github.com/PurpleBooth/109311bb0361f32d87a2 PurpleBooth/README-Template.md] * [https://gist.github.com/zenorocha/4526327 zenorocha/README.md] Here are some other lists of READMEs: * [https://changelog.com/posts/a-beginners-guide-to-creating-a-readme A Beginner's Guide to Creating a README] * [https://github.com/matiassingers/awesome-readme matiassingers/awesome-readme] * [https://github.com/repat/README-template repat/README-template] The initial README I came up with is [https://github.com/thinkulum/math-student-sim/blob/master/README.md here]. [[Category:Programming]] [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Developing]] cb64fb74ac6bd7f7271acc9bcbe26b0eacae09ce 0 148 390 2019-02-22T05:48:01Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the article. wikitext text/x-wiki Here are discussions of what to put in a docstring: * [https://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-0257/ PEP 257 -- Docstring Conventions - Python.org] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/3898572/what-is-the-standard-python-docstring-format What is the standard Python docstring format? - Stack Overflow] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Javadoc Javadoc - Wikipedia] - A documentation generator for Java code. The conventions Javadoc understands can be adapted for other languages. I'm evaluating tools for processing Python docstrings that use this format. My snippets for functions and modules will include docstring outlines. Then you need a tool to present the docstrings to the reader. For now I'm going with Sphinx, since Python developers seem to prefer it. Since it formats more than just docstrings, I've put its links in the "Project documentation" section below. [[Category:Programming]] [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Developing]] 2f1adfb8eb9bcdf59e59b2465c3625c5b2b493e5 0 149 391 2019-02-22T05:48:02Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the article. wikitext text/x-wiki Traditional command-line programs are run from the OS command line, and their help statement is called a usage message. On Unix-like OSes they may also have a man (manual) page. I'll talk about man pages in the "Project documentation" section. Python has the <code>cmd</code> module for creating a command-line interpreter within your program, and each of your program's commands can also have a help message, contained in the command function's docstring. My snippets for scripts and command functions will include outlines for usage and help messages. == Usage message == * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Usage_message Usage message - Wikipedia] * [http://courses.cms.caltech.edu/cs11/material/general/usage.html How to write usage statements - CS 11 - Caltech] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/17314872/shell-scripts-conventions-to-write-usage-text-for-parameters Shell scripts: conventions to write usage text for parameters? - Stack Overflow] * [https://github.com/docopt/docopt docopt (Python implementation)] - A library that checks the user's command line arguments by parsing the script's usage message. Even if you're not using docopt, it gives you a convenient set of conventions for formatting usage messages. * [https://docs.python.org/3/library/argparse.html argparse - Python.org] - Moves in the opposite direction from docopt, generating a usage message from a specification. == Command help == I haven't found any conventions for <code>cmd</code> help text, and the examples I've seen have been free-form descriptions. Maybe it would make sense to treat each command as a separate program and use usage message conventions for its help. [[Category:Programming]] [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Developing]] 81dce05b9db816b4d855726429edffc1c79dfa7a 0 150 392 2019-02-22T05:48:04Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the article. wikitext text/x-wiki Comments and self-documentation are the two sides of the code clarity coin. Code comments are one of the [http://www.hacker-dictionary.com/terms/holy-wars holy wars] of programming--everyone has a strongly held view and debates it vigorously. I basically agree with the views in these articles: * [https://visualstudiomagazine.com/articles/2013/06/01/roc-rocks.aspx Why You Shouldn't Comment (or Document) Code - Visual Studio Magazine] * [https://sourcemaking.com/refactoring/smells/comments Comments - Source Making] * [https://www.pluralsight.com/blog/software-development/code-comments-dos-and-donts Code comments: A quick guide on when (and when not) to use them - Pluralsight] That is, comments are a liability, so for the most part write them as little as possible, and update them when you update the code. Make your code as clear as you can (see the self-documentation section), and comment only to communicate what the code can't on its own, such as its purpose and the reasoning behind your choices in implementing it. If nothing else, comments can be a good indication of places that need refactoring. I don't think it's necessary to stick to one procedure for commenting, but generally when I've commented more, it's because I've paused after a chunk of coding time, such as when I've finished a function. I code in paragraphs, sets of related lines separated by a blank line. In the commenting phase I reread the code I've just written and try to summarize or justify each paragraph, if needed. Stepping back from the code to state things in English sometimes leads to improvements in the code--refactoring or bug fixes. Here are some in-depth discussions on making code self-documenting: * [http://wiki.c2.com/?SelfDocumentingCode Self Documenting Code - WikiWikiWeb] * [http://wiki.c2.com/?SystemMetaphor System Metaphor - WikiWikiWeb] * [https://m.signalvnoise.com/hunting-for-great-names-in-programming-16f624c8fc03 Hunting for great names in programming - Signal v. Noise] Every solution has its own problems. Self-documentation can go wrong too, and in some of the same ways comments can. For example, your function name doesn't have to have anything to do with its contents. Here are a bunch of tricks for wrecking your code's clarity: * [http://mindprod.com/jgloss/unmain.html unmaintainable code - Java Glossary] On the problem that documentation isn't executable, behavior-driven development might give us a partial solution. See the links in the test-driven development section above. [[Category:Programming]] [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Developing]] be0c4f07daf5f29040b66eb106e646c24108486a 0 151 393 2019-02-22T05:48:06Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the article. wikitext text/x-wiki READMEs give the reader a basic intro to your project, but at some point they'll need more extensive information. I'm calling this in-depth treatment the project documentation. == Documentation generation == Some documentation is freeform writing, but using [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Documentation_generator documentation generators] a lot of it can be collected from specialized comments and formatted automatically. You'd mainly use this to document your API. Sphinx is a popular Python tool for this purpose. It handles both types of documentation. * [http://www.sphinx-doc.org/en/stable/ Sphinx] My default Sphinx setup will be in my cookiecutter templates. == Content == I didn't find many guides to writing user or developer guides beyond the README, so I may have to write my own at some point, based on an examination of well-documented projects. But here's one guide that covers some of the information developers will need: * [https://www.ctl.io/developers/blog/post/how-to-document-a-project How to Document a Project - CenturyLink Cloud Developer Center] One source of insight for documenters might be the content of man pages. Man (manual) pages are the documentation for Unix tools, and they have a fairly standard format. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Man_page man page - Wikipedia] * [https://liw.fi/manpages/ Writing manual pages - Lars Wirzenius] * [http://www.schweikhardt.net/man_page_howto.html The Linux Man Page How-to - Jens Schweikhardt] [[Category:Programming]] [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Developing]] c01bbf2b9d59609fecfd069804029c0b9d423f8f 0 152 394 2019-02-22T05:48:07Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the article. wikitext text/x-wiki In spite of what I said about comments and self-documentation, sometimes I really want to expound on the meaning of my code, and literate programming is the way to do it. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Literate_programming Literate programming - Wikipedia] * [http://akkartik.name/post/literate-programming Literate programming: Knuth is doing it wrong - Kartik Agaram] Python tools: * [https://sourceforge.net/projects/pywebtool/ pyWeb] - After glancing at a few, I chose pyWeb as probably the closest to what I was looking for. * [http://mpastell.com/pweave/ Pweave] - A feature-rich tool I might try at some point. My first attempt at literate programming is my [https://github.com/thinkulum/math-student-sim Math Student Simulator]. See the README for basic details on writing and processing the source files. [[Category:Programming]] [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Developing]] 8b2de0078a5d8c2b7d97149a3490021b96450b80 0 153 395 2019-02-22T05:48:09Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the article. wikitext text/x-wiki When you're coding for yourself, it's easy to keep all the variables inside the code files, since you can just open the files and change the values whenever you want. But when you have outside users, you don't necessarily want them changing the code, and if the code is compiled into binary executables, they can't change it anyway. Plus, separating code and data makes your program easier to think about. So you'll want to put the user-settable data in external files. There are at least two questions to answer: what format to store the settings in and where to store them. == Format == Here are some discussions that cover several formats: * [http://pyvideo.org/pycon-us-2009/pycon-2009--a-configuration-comparison-in-python-.html A Configuration Comparison in Python - PyCon 2009 - PyVideo] (video). * [https://martin-thoma.com/configuration-files-in-python/ Configuration files in Python - Martin Thoma] - Examples of most of the formats I'm listing here. * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/8225954/python-configuration-file-any-file-format-recommendation-ini-format-still-appr Python configuration file: Any file format recommendation? INI format still appropriate? Seems quite old school - Stack Overflow] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/5055042/whats-the-best-practice-using-a-settings-file-in-python What's the best practice using a settings file in Python? - Stack Overflow] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/186916/configuration-file-with-list-of-key-value-pairs-in-python Configuration file with list of key-value pairs in python - Stack Overflow] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/1726802/what-is-the-difference-between-yaml-and-json-when-to-prefer-one-over-the-other What is the difference between YAML and JSON? When to prefer one over the other - Stack Overflow] * [http://www.robg3d.com/2012/06/why-bother-with-python-and-config-files/ Why bother with python and config files? - RobG3d] I've sorted these formats roughly in order of increasing complexity. === CSV === * [https://docs.python.org/3/library/csv.html csv - The Python Standard Library] Pros: * It's simple. * Some version of it is supported in many languages. * It's fairly easy to import and export. Cons: * It's a little hard to read, especially when the lines get long. * It's limited to simple data. * It doesn't enforce data types. * It doesn't have a standard format. === INI === * [https://docs.python.org/3/library/configparser.html configparser - The Python Standard Library] * [https://pypi.python.org/pypi/configobj/ ConfigObj - PyPI] - This one has a few more features than configparser. Pros: * It's easy to read. * It's easy to avoid syntax errors (given a particular format). * Some version of it is supported in many languages. * It's easy to import and export. Cons: * It's limited to simple data. * It doesn't enforce data types (unless you use ConfigObj). * It doesn't have a standard format. === JSON === * [https://docs.python.org/3/library/json.html json - The Python Standard Library] Pros: * It enables multiple data types. * It enables complex data structures. * It's supported in many languages. * It's easy to import and export. Cons: * It's easy to commit syntax errors, especially if you're not familiar with the format. * It can be hard to read, especially if it's not pretty printed or if it uses complex data structures. === YAML === * [http://pyyaml.org/ PyYAML] Pros: * It enables multiple data types. * It enables complex data structures. * It's supported in many languages. * It's easy to import and export. * It's easy to read if you stick to simple data structures. Cons: * It can be hard to write if you use its more complex features. I'm trying out YAML as my default choice. === XML === There are a few major Python tools for working with XML: * [http://lxml.de/tutorial.html lxml.etree Tutorial - lxml] * [https://www.crummy.com/software/BeautifulSoup/ Beautiful Soup - Crummy: The Site] - It's mainly meant for HTML, but it parses XML too. * [https://docs.python.org/3/library/xml.etree.elementtree.html xml.etree.ElementTree - The Python Standard Library ] Here's some discussion of the use of XML for configuration: * [https://commons.apache.org/proper/commons-configuration/userguide/howto_hierarchical.html Hierarchical Configurations - Apache Commons Configuration User Guide] Pros: * It enables multiple data types. * It enables complex data structures. * It's supported in many languages. * It's easy to import. Cons: * It doesn't have a standard format for representing configuration. * It can be hard to read. * It can be hard to export if the starting format isn't compatible. * Enforcing data types requires an additional schema. === Python === You can use regular Python code to define settings, usually by putting them in their own module. I'd personally only use Python for configuration in special cases. Here are some recommendations and warnings: * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/10439486/loading-settings-py-config-file-into-a-dict Loading settings.py config file into a dict - Stack Overflow] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/2259427/load-python-code-at-runtime load python code at runtime - Stack Overflow] * [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/6198372/most-pythonic-way-to-provide-global-configuration-variables-in-config-py Most Pythonic way to provide global configuration variables in config.py? - Stack Overflow] * [https://pypi.python.org/pypi/pyconfig pyconfig - PyPI] * [https://ralsina.me/posts/python-is-not-a-configuration-file-format.html Python is Not a Configuration File Format - Lateral Opinion] Pros: * It enables multiple data types. * It enables complex data structures. * It enables using conditions to set values. * If your code is already in Python, it doesn't require learning an additional language. * Importing is very easy. Cons: * It mixes code and data, which makes the program harder to think about. * It can create a security risk, since users can add arbitrary code to the configuration file for the program to run. * Exporting can be hard or impossible. * It can be hard to read, depending on the code. * It doesn't have a standard format for representing configuration. * It can be easy to commit syntax errors. === Database === The formats I've already covered are plain text formats that a human can read and edit. Another option is putting the settings in a binary database and accessing them through a separate UI. The advantages are that you can enforce data types and the user isn't editing the settings file directly, which leaves it less open to syntax errors. For settings to be set by non-technical end users, this is probably the best option. * [https://docs.python.org/3/library/sqlite3.html sqlite3 - The Python Standard Library] Pros: * It's hard for the user to commit syntax errors. * It enables multiple data types. * You can control access to the settings. * It's supported in many languages. * It can be easy to import and export. Cons: * Complex data structures are hard to represent, or they require an additional format. * You have to code a UI for viewing and setting values. == Location == Where should you put your config file? Depending on the circumstances, you might need more than one file, and they might need to go in different locations. Generally speaking, you might separate global and user settings into different files. Global settings might go in the app's root directory or a config subdirectory, and user settings somewhere in a user directory. * [https://pypi.python.org/pypi/appdirs appdirs - PyPI] - A Python module for finding various directories across platforms, such as the user data, a possible location for a config file. [[Category:Programming]] [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Developing]] f4265d34c0944222e131609224c1f14420271094 0 154 396 2019-02-22T05:48:10Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the article. wikitext text/x-wiki You need some kind of reporting even when you're coding for yourself, because to debug your program, you have to know what's going on as it runs. But when you're coding for yourself, you can usually afford to be minimal and undisciplined about it. When you might get bug reports from outside users, among other reasons, your program needs to write relevant state and event information to a file they can share. * [https://docs.python.org/3/library/logging.html logging - The Python Standard Library] * [http://python-guide-pt-br.readthedocs.io/en/latest/writing/logging/ Logging - The Hitchhiker's Guide to Python] * [https://www.blog.pythonlibrary.org/2012/08/02/python-101-an-intro-to-logging/ Python 101: An Intro to logging - Mouse vs Python] * [https://fangpenlin.com/posts/2012/08/26/good-logging-practice-in-python/ Good logging practice in Python - Fang's coding note] [[Category:Programming]] [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Developing]] e688ed2271279a9de8313a0449add403191e2759 0 106 401 400 2019-02-23T22:05:37Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added subheadings to the introduction. Added a purpose section. Updated some language to match the current project state. wikitext text/x-wiki == Introduction == === Purpose === This project is a growing set of notes on various aspects of software development. Its purpose is to define a set of standard operating procedures for my programming projects. === Background === For most of my coding life, I have been the only user of my programs. I wrote them to aid my work or personal life, and only rarely did anyone else even see my code or watch it run. This wasn't on purpose. It just turned out that way. In my current job I do belong to a small development team, but our programs are still only for in-house use, so the only needs we have to consider are our own. This situation is starting to change. My programming projects are becoming more relevant to the outside world, and I want to share some of them as open source. This means I'm needing to reshape some of my programming practices and learn some areas of software development I've had the luxury of ignoring all these years. I haven't completely ignored these areas, though. I pick up on them here and there as I read about how other people code or as I see them in the software I use. Knowing that I'll probably need to know about them someday, I've kept a list. And now the time has come for me to fill in the details. I'm filling in the details here in this project for two reasons. First, as I learn, writing helps me clarify my thoughts and keep them flowing. And second, posting my writing might help other people. So if you're like me and you've programmed mainly for yourself--what I call private coding--and you're starting to share your work with others--public coding--then maybe what I've learned so far can grease some of your own planning. === Method === This project consists of my reading other developers' advice, examining their code, deciding what to adopt and how to adapt it to my needs and preferences, and creating templates, procedures, reference materials, and anything else that might help me code well for a public user base. === Limitations === To give you an idea of my background, I've worked for the past 15 or so years in the publishing industry doing mostly text processing and some web development. The languages I'm most familiar with are Perl, Python, XSLT, and some JavaScript, with a smattering of PHP and VBA. I've spent almost all my time in Windows. I hope to branch out into at least Linux in the future, if only to expand my mind. This project will be oriented toward Python for now, but I imagine a lot of its suggestions apply to other languages too. At this point it also centers around desktop command-line programs, but I'm hoping to expand it into other interfaces and environments. === Feedback === Since this project is a place for me to learn, I welcome feedback, and I'm always open to arguments that my choices could be improved or suggestions for things I've missed. == Topics == * [[/Software Development Methodology/]] ** [[/Iterative and Incremental Development/]] ** [[/Test-First Programming/]] ** [[/Refactoring/]] * [[/Version Control/]] * [[/Code Style/]] * [[/Project Structure/]] * [[/Distribution/]] * [[/Installation/]] * [[/Metadata/]] ** [[/Version Numbers/]] ** [[/License/]] * [[/Testing/]] * User Interface ** [[/Command Line Interface/]] * [[/Documentation/]] ** [[/READMEs/]] ** [[/Docstrings/]] ** [[/Command Line Help/]] ** [[/Comments/]] ** [[/Project Documentation/]] ** [[/Literate Programming/]] * [[/Application Configuration/]] * [[/Logging/]] == Code examples == To show how I'm implementing these ideas in my own code, I'll refer to [https://github.com/thinkulum my GitHub repositories] throughout the project, mainly my templates for [https://github.com/audreyr/cookiecutter cookiecutter], a Python app that creates project skeletons for any language, and my snippets for [https://www.sublimetext.com/ Sublime Text 2], the text editor I use. Snippets are templates Sublime inserts wherever you type the corresponding trigger strings. Here are projects that show up in lists of high quality code, so I'll examine some of them and include any relevant discoveries in the project. All the projects I'm listing for now are in Python. * [https://launchpad.net/bzr Bazaar] * [https://github.com/boto/boto3 boto3] * [https://github.com/django/django Django] * [https://github.com/pallets/flask Flask] * [https://github.com/gevent/gevent gevent] * [https://www.mercurial-scm.org/downloads Mercurial] * [https://github.com/nltk/nltk NLTK] * [https://github.com/Pylons/pyramid Pyramid] * [https://github.com/reddit/reddit reddit] * [https://github.com/kennethreitz/requests Requests] * [https://github.com/zzzeek/sqlalchemy SQLAlchemy] * [https://github.com/kennethreitz/tablib Tablib] * [https://github.com/tornadoweb/tornado Tornado] * [http://trac.edgewall.org/browser/trunk/trac trac] * [https://github.com/twisted/twisted Twisted] * [https://github.com/rg3/youtube-dl youtube-dl] In addition to these, I keep a mental list of software with features I might want to emulate, even if I don't plan to study their code very thoroughly: * [https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Mozilla/Developer_guide/Source_Code Firefox] - automatic updating; possibly its add-on architecture, if it ever settles down * [https://wordpress.org/download/source/ WordPress] - plugin hooks == Bibliography == === Architecture === Buschmann, Frank, ed. ''Pattern-Oriented Software Architecture: A System of Patterns''. Chichester ; New York: Wiley, 1996. Fowler, Martin. ''Patterns of Enterprise Application Architecture''. The Addison-Wesley Signature Series. Boston: Addison-Wesley, 2003. Martin, Robert C. ''Clean Architecture: A Craftsman’s Guide to Software Structure and Design''. Boston: Prentice Hall, 2018. === Continuous delivery === Humble, Jez, and David Farley. ''Continuous Delivery: Reliable Software Releases through Build, Test, and Deployment Automation''. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Addison-Wesley, 2010. === Debugging === Agans, David J. ''Debugging: The Nine Indispensable Rules for Finding Even the Most Elusive Software and Hardware Problems''. New York: Amacom, 2002. === Design === Evans, Eric. ''Domain-Driven Design: Tackling Complexity in the Heart of Software''. Boston: Addison-Wesley, 2004. Gamma, Erich, ed. ''Design Patterns: Elements of Reusable Object-Oriented Software''. Addison-Wesley Professional Computing Series. Reading, Mass: Addison-Wesley, 1995. Martin, Robert C., ed. ''Clean Code: A Handbook of Agile Software Craftsmanship''. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall, 2009. McConnell, Steve. ''Code Complete''. 2nd ed. Redmond, Wash: Microsoft Press, 2004. Raymond, Eric S. ''The Art of UNIX Programming: With Contributions from Thirteen UNIX Pioneers, Including Its Inventor, Ken Thompson''. Nachdr. Addison-Wesley Professional Computing Series. Boston: Addison-Wesley, 2008. === Privacy === Bowman, Courtney, Ari Gesher, John K. Grant, Daniel Slate, and Elissa Lerner. ''The Architecture of Privacy: On Engineering Technologies That Can Deliver Trustworthy Safeguards''. First edition. Sebastopol, CA: O’Reilly Media, 2015. === Project management === Fogel, Karl. ''Producing Open Source Software: How to Run a Successful Free Software Project''. Version 2.3106., 2018. https://producingoss.com/. McConnell, Steve. ''Rapid Development: Taming Wild Software Schedules''. Redmond, Wash: Microsoft Press, 1996. Stellman, Andrew, and Jennifer Greene. ''Learning Agile''. First edition. Beijing: O’Reilly, 2014. === Refactoring === Fowler, Martin, and Kent Beck. ''Refactoring: Improving the Design of Existing Code''. The Addison-Wesley Object Technology Series. Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley, 1999. === Requirements === McDonald, Kent J. ''Beyond Requirements: Analysis with an Agile Mindset''. New York: Addison-Wesley, 2016. Patton, Jeff. ''User Story Mapping: Discover the Whole Story, Build the Right Product''. First edition. Beijing ; Sebastopol, CA: O’Reilly, 2014. === Security === Howard, Michael, David LeBlanc, and John Viega. ''24 Deadly Sins of Software Security: Programming Flaws and How to Fix Them''. New York: McGraw-Hill, 2010. === Stability === Nygard, Michael T. ''Release It! Design and Deploy Production-Ready Software''. Second edition. The Pragmatic Programmers. Raleigh, North Carolina: The Pragmatic Bookshelf, 2018. === Testing === Beck, Kent. ''Test-Driven Development: By Example''. The Addison-Wesley Signature Series. Boston: Addison-Wesley, 2003. Feathers, Michael C., and Robert C. Martin. ''Working Effectively with Legacy Code''. Robert C. Martin Series. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall Professional Technical Reference, 2005. Freeman, Steve, and Nat Pryce. ''Growing Object-Oriented Software, Guided by Tests''. The Addison-Wesley Signature Series. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Addison Wesley, 2010. Meszaros, Gerard, and Martin Fowler. ''XUnit Test Patterns: Refactoring Test Code''. Upper Saddle River, New Jersey: Addison-Wesley, 2007. === User interface === Cooper, Alan. ''About Face: The Essentials of Interaction Design''. 4th edition. Indianapolis, IN: John Wiley and Sons, 2014. Rosenfeld, Louis, Peter Morville, and Jorge Arango. ''Information Architecture: For the Web and Beyond''. Fourth edition. Sebastopol, CA: O’Reilly Media, Inc, 2015. <disqus/> [[Category:Programming]] [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Developing]] 6debb60503cb68b3b3f02a00c772a997ec85e588 402 401 2019-02-23T22:38:27Z Andy Culbertson 1 Replaced the original outline of topics with one based on SWEBOK. wikitext text/x-wiki == Introduction == === Purpose === This project is a growing set of notes on various aspects of software development. Its purpose is to define a set of standard operating procedures for my programming projects. === Background === For most of my coding life, I have been the only user of my programs. I wrote them to aid my work or personal life, and only rarely did anyone else even see my code or watch it run. This wasn't on purpose. It just turned out that way. In my current job I do belong to a small development team, but our programs are still only for in-house use, so the only needs we have to consider are our own. This situation is starting to change. My programming projects are becoming more relevant to the outside world, and I want to share some of them as open source. This means I'm needing to reshape some of my programming practices and learn some areas of software development I've had the luxury of ignoring all these years. I haven't completely ignored these areas, though. I pick up on them here and there as I read about how other people code or as I see them in the software I use. Knowing that I'll probably need to know about them someday, I've kept a list. And now the time has come for me to fill in the details. I'm filling in the details here in this project for two reasons. First, as I learn, writing helps me clarify my thoughts and keep them flowing. And second, posting my writing might help other people. So if you're like me and you've programmed mainly for yourself--what I call private coding--and you're starting to share your work with others--public coding--then maybe what I've learned so far can grease some of your own planning. === Method === This project consists of my reading other developers' advice, examining their code, deciding what to adopt and how to adapt it to my needs and preferences, and creating templates, procedures, reference materials, and anything else that might help me code well for a public user base. === Limitations === To give you an idea of my background, I've worked for the past 15 or so years in the publishing industry doing mostly text processing and some web development. The languages I'm most familiar with are Perl, Python, XSLT, and some JavaScript, with a smattering of PHP and VBA. I've spent almost all my time in Windows. I hope to branch out into at least Linux in the future, if only to expand my mind. This project will be oriented toward Python for now, but I imagine a lot of its suggestions apply to other languages too. At this point it also centers around desktop command-line programs, but I'm hoping to expand it into other interfaces and environments. === Feedback === Since this project is a place for me to learn, I welcome feedback, and I'm always open to arguments that my choices could be improved or suggestions for things I've missed. == Topics == As a way to organize my notes and make sure I don't miss anything important, I'll use the structure of IEEE's ''Guide to the Software Engineering Body of Knowledge'' (SWEBOK). It's a standard that overviews the entire field and forms the basis for creating things like curricula and certifications. You can download it for free [https://www.computer.org/web/swebok/index as a PDF] or read it online [https://www.iso.org/obp/ui/#iso:std:iso-iec:tr:19759:ed-2:v2:en as HTML]. The items under the first level link to my notes on those topics. * Software requirements * Software design * Software construction ** [[/Code Style/]] ** [[/Project Structure/]] ** [[/Installation/]] ** [[/Metadata/]] ** [[/Command Line Interface/]] ** [[/Documentation/]] *** [[/Comments/]] *** [[/Literate Programming/]] *** [[/Docstrings/]] *** [[/Project Documentation/]] *** [[/READMEs/]] *** [[/Command Line Help/]] ** [[/Application Configuration/]] ** [[/Logging/]] ** [[/Test-First Programming/]] * Software testing ** [[/Testing/]] * Software maintenance ** [[/Refactoring/]] * Software configuration management ** [[/Version Control/]] ** [[/Version Numbers/]] ** [[/Distribution/]] * Software engineering management * Software engineering process ** [[/Software Development Methodology/]] *** [[/Iterative and Incremental Development/]] * Software engineering models and methods * Software quality * Software engineering professional practice ** [[/License/]] * Software engineering economics * Computing foundations * Mathematical foundations * Engineering foundations == Code examples == To show how I'm implementing these ideas in my own code, I'll refer to [https://github.com/thinkulum my GitHub repositories] throughout the project, mainly my templates for [https://github.com/audreyr/cookiecutter cookiecutter], a Python app that creates project skeletons for any language, and my snippets for [https://www.sublimetext.com/ Sublime Text 2], the text editor I use. Snippets are templates Sublime inserts wherever you type the corresponding trigger strings. Here are projects that show up in lists of high quality code, so I'll examine some of them and include any relevant discoveries in the project. All the projects I'm listing for now are in Python. * [https://launchpad.net/bzr Bazaar] * [https://github.com/boto/boto3 boto3] * [https://github.com/django/django Django] * [https://github.com/pallets/flask Flask] * [https://github.com/gevent/gevent gevent] * [https://www.mercurial-scm.org/downloads Mercurial] * [https://github.com/nltk/nltk NLTK] * [https://github.com/Pylons/pyramid Pyramid] * [https://github.com/reddit/reddit reddit] * [https://github.com/kennethreitz/requests Requests] * [https://github.com/zzzeek/sqlalchemy SQLAlchemy] * [https://github.com/kennethreitz/tablib Tablib] * [https://github.com/tornadoweb/tornado Tornado] * [http://trac.edgewall.org/browser/trunk/trac trac] * [https://github.com/twisted/twisted Twisted] * [https://github.com/rg3/youtube-dl youtube-dl] In addition to these, I keep a mental list of software with features I might want to emulate, even if I don't plan to study their code very thoroughly: * [https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Mozilla/Developer_guide/Source_Code Firefox] - automatic updating; possibly its add-on architecture, if it ever settles down * [https://wordpress.org/download/source/ WordPress] - plugin hooks == Bibliography == === Architecture === Buschmann, Frank, ed. ''Pattern-Oriented Software Architecture: A System of Patterns''. Chichester ; New York: Wiley, 1996. Fowler, Martin. ''Patterns of Enterprise Application Architecture''. The Addison-Wesley Signature Series. Boston: Addison-Wesley, 2003. Martin, Robert C. ''Clean Architecture: A Craftsman’s Guide to Software Structure and Design''. Boston: Prentice Hall, 2018. === Continuous delivery === Humble, Jez, and David Farley. ''Continuous Delivery: Reliable Software Releases through Build, Test, and Deployment Automation''. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Addison-Wesley, 2010. === Debugging === Agans, David J. ''Debugging: The Nine Indispensable Rules for Finding Even the Most Elusive Software and Hardware Problems''. New York: Amacom, 2002. === Design === Evans, Eric. ''Domain-Driven Design: Tackling Complexity in the Heart of Software''. Boston: Addison-Wesley, 2004. Gamma, Erich, ed. ''Design Patterns: Elements of Reusable Object-Oriented Software''. Addison-Wesley Professional Computing Series. Reading, Mass: Addison-Wesley, 1995. Martin, Robert C., ed. ''Clean Code: A Handbook of Agile Software Craftsmanship''. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall, 2009. McConnell, Steve. ''Code Complete''. 2nd ed. Redmond, Wash: Microsoft Press, 2004. Raymond, Eric S. ''The Art of UNIX Programming: With Contributions from Thirteen UNIX Pioneers, Including Its Inventor, Ken Thompson''. Nachdr. Addison-Wesley Professional Computing Series. Boston: Addison-Wesley, 2008. === Privacy === Bowman, Courtney, Ari Gesher, John K. Grant, Daniel Slate, and Elissa Lerner. ''The Architecture of Privacy: On Engineering Technologies That Can Deliver Trustworthy Safeguards''. First edition. Sebastopol, CA: O’Reilly Media, 2015. === Project management === Fogel, Karl. ''Producing Open Source Software: How to Run a Successful Free Software Project''. Version 2.3106., 2018. https://producingoss.com/. McConnell, Steve. ''Rapid Development: Taming Wild Software Schedules''. Redmond, Wash: Microsoft Press, 1996. Stellman, Andrew, and Jennifer Greene. ''Learning Agile''. First edition. Beijing: O’Reilly, 2014. === Refactoring === Fowler, Martin, and Kent Beck. ''Refactoring: Improving the Design of Existing Code''. The Addison-Wesley Object Technology Series. Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley, 1999. === Requirements === McDonald, Kent J. ''Beyond Requirements: Analysis with an Agile Mindset''. New York: Addison-Wesley, 2016. Patton, Jeff. ''User Story Mapping: Discover the Whole Story, Build the Right Product''. First edition. Beijing ; Sebastopol, CA: O’Reilly, 2014. === Security === Howard, Michael, David LeBlanc, and John Viega. ''24 Deadly Sins of Software Security: Programming Flaws and How to Fix Them''. New York: McGraw-Hill, 2010. === Stability === Nygard, Michael T. ''Release It! Design and Deploy Production-Ready Software''. Second edition. The Pragmatic Programmers. Raleigh, North Carolina: The Pragmatic Bookshelf, 2018. === Testing === Beck, Kent. ''Test-Driven Development: By Example''. The Addison-Wesley Signature Series. Boston: Addison-Wesley, 2003. Feathers, Michael C., and Robert C. Martin. ''Working Effectively with Legacy Code''. Robert C. Martin Series. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall Professional Technical Reference, 2005. Freeman, Steve, and Nat Pryce. ''Growing Object-Oriented Software, Guided by Tests''. The Addison-Wesley Signature Series. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Addison Wesley, 2010. Meszaros, Gerard, and Martin Fowler. ''XUnit Test Patterns: Refactoring Test Code''. Upper Saddle River, New Jersey: Addison-Wesley, 2007. === User interface === Cooper, Alan. ''About Face: The Essentials of Interaction Design''. 4th edition. Indianapolis, IN: John Wiley and Sons, 2014. Rosenfeld, Louis, Peter Morville, and Jorge Arango. ''Information Architecture: For the Web and Beyond''. Fourth edition. Sebastopol, CA: O’Reilly Media, Inc, 2015. <disqus/> [[Category:Programming]] [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Developing]] 13a282f730be753795507de88d8325ce32ed21d6 403 402 2019-02-23T22:44:26Z Andy Culbertson 1 Moved the code examples and bibliography to a separate Sources article. wikitext text/x-wiki == Introduction == === Purpose === This project is a growing set of notes on various aspects of software development. Its purpose is to define a set of standard operating procedures for my programming projects. === Background === For most of my coding life, I have been the only user of my programs. I wrote them to aid my work or personal life, and only rarely did anyone else even see my code or watch it run. This wasn't on purpose. It just turned out that way. In my current job I do belong to a small development team, but our programs are still only for in-house use, so the only needs we have to consider are our own. This situation is starting to change. My programming projects are becoming more relevant to the outside world, and I want to share some of them as open source. This means I'm needing to reshape some of my programming practices and learn some areas of software development I've had the luxury of ignoring all these years. I haven't completely ignored these areas, though. I pick up on them here and there as I read about how other people code or as I see them in the software I use. Knowing that I'll probably need to know about them someday, I've kept a list. And now the time has come for me to fill in the details. I'm filling in the details here in this project for two reasons. First, as I learn, writing helps me clarify my thoughts and keep them flowing. And second, posting my writing might help other people. So if you're like me and you've programmed mainly for yourself--what I call private coding--and you're starting to share your work with others--public coding--then maybe what I've learned so far can grease some of your own planning. === Method === This project consists of my reading other developers' advice, examining their code, deciding what to adopt and how to adapt it to my needs and preferences, and creating templates, procedures, reference materials, and anything else that might help me code well for a public user base. To show how I'm implementing these ideas in my own code, I'll refer to [https://github.com/thinkulum my GitHub repositories] throughout the project, mainly my templates for [https://github.com/audreyr/cookiecutter cookiecutter], a Python app that creates project skeletons for any language, and my snippets for [https://www.sublimetext.com/ Sublime Text 2], the text editor I use. Snippets are templates Sublime inserts wherever you type the corresponding trigger strings. === Limitations === To give you an idea of my background, I've worked for the past 15 or so years in the publishing industry doing mostly text processing and some web development. The languages I'm most familiar with are Perl, Python, XSLT, and some JavaScript, with a smattering of PHP and VBA. I've spent almost all my time in Windows. I hope to branch out into at least Linux in the future, if only to expand my mind. This project will be oriented toward Python for now, but I imagine a lot of its suggestions apply to other languages too. At this point it also centers around desktop command-line programs, but I'm hoping to expand it into other interfaces and environments. === Feedback === Since this project is a place for me to learn, I welcome feedback, and I'm always open to arguments that my choices could be improved or suggestions for things I've missed. == Topics == As a way to organize my notes and make sure I don't miss anything important, I'll use the structure of IEEE's ''Guide to the Software Engineering Body of Knowledge'' (SWEBOK). It's a standard that overviews the entire field and forms the basis for creating things like curricula and certifications. You can download it for free [https://www.computer.org/web/swebok/index as a PDF] or read it online [https://www.iso.org/obp/ui/#iso:std:iso-iec:tr:19759:ed-2:v2:en as HTML]. The items under the first level link to my notes on those topics. * Software requirements * Software design * Software construction ** [[/Code Style/]] ** [[/Project Structure/]] ** [[/Installation/]] ** [[/Metadata/]] ** [[/Command Line Interface/]] ** [[/Documentation/]] *** [[/Comments/]] *** [[/Literate Programming/]] *** [[/Docstrings/]] *** [[/Project Documentation/]] *** [[/READMEs/]] *** [[/Command Line Help/]] ** [[/Application Configuration/]] ** [[/Logging/]] ** [[/Test-First Programming/]] * Software testing ** [[/Testing/]] * Software maintenance ** [[/Refactoring/]] * Software configuration management ** [[/Version Control/]] ** [[/Version Numbers/]] ** [[/Distribution/]] * Software engineering management * Software engineering process ** [[/Software Development Methodology/]] *** [[/Iterative and Incremental Development/]] * Software engineering models and methods * Software quality * Software engineering professional practice ** [[/License/]] * Software engineering economics * Computing foundations * Mathematical foundations * Engineering foundations == [[/Sources/]] == See the article linked in the heading for a list of code examples and other sources I'm drawing from. <disqus/> [[Category:Programming]] [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Developing]] 7fac14a1b8b60a17fc872140e341e18f103e6b9a 0 155 404 2019-02-23T22:45:26Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the article. wikitext text/x-wiki == Code examples == Here are projects that show up in lists of high quality code, so I'll examine some of them and include any relevant discoveries in the project. All the projects I'm listing for now are in Python. * [https://launchpad.net/bzr Bazaar] * [https://github.com/boto/boto3 boto3] * [https://github.com/django/django Django] * [https://github.com/pallets/flask Flask] * [https://github.com/gevent/gevent gevent] * [https://www.mercurial-scm.org/downloads Mercurial] * [https://github.com/nltk/nltk NLTK] * [https://github.com/Pylons/pyramid Pyramid] * [https://github.com/reddit/reddit reddit] * [https://github.com/kennethreitz/requests Requests] * [https://github.com/zzzeek/sqlalchemy SQLAlchemy] * [https://github.com/kennethreitz/tablib Tablib] * [https://github.com/tornadoweb/tornado Tornado] * [http://trac.edgewall.org/browser/trunk/trac trac] * [https://github.com/twisted/twisted Twisted] * [https://github.com/rg3/youtube-dl youtube-dl] In addition to these, I keep a mental list of software with features I might want to emulate, even if I don't plan to study their code very thoroughly: * [https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Mozilla/Developer_guide/Source_Code Firefox] - automatic updating; possibly its add-on architecture, if it ever settles down * [https://wordpress.org/download/source/ WordPress] - plugin hooks == Bibliography == === Architecture === Buschmann, Frank, ed. ''Pattern-Oriented Software Architecture: A System of Patterns''. Chichester ; New York: Wiley, 1996. Fowler, Martin. ''Patterns of Enterprise Application Architecture''. The Addison-Wesley Signature Series. Boston: Addison-Wesley, 2003. Martin, Robert C. ''Clean Architecture: A Craftsman’s Guide to Software Structure and Design''. Boston: Prentice Hall, 2018. === Continuous delivery === Humble, Jez, and David Farley. ''Continuous Delivery: Reliable Software Releases through Build, Test, and Deployment Automation''. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Addison-Wesley, 2010. === Debugging === Agans, David J. ''Debugging: The Nine Indispensable Rules for Finding Even the Most Elusive Software and Hardware Problems''. New York: Amacom, 2002. === Design === Evans, Eric. ''Domain-Driven Design: Tackling Complexity in the Heart of Software''. Boston: Addison-Wesley, 2004. Gamma, Erich, ed. ''Design Patterns: Elements of Reusable Object-Oriented Software''. Addison-Wesley Professional Computing Series. Reading, Mass: Addison-Wesley, 1995. Martin, Robert C., ed. ''Clean Code: A Handbook of Agile Software Craftsmanship''. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall, 2009. McConnell, Steve. ''Code Complete''. 2nd ed. Redmond, Wash: Microsoft Press, 2004. Raymond, Eric S. ''The Art of UNIX Programming: With Contributions from Thirteen UNIX Pioneers, Including Its Inventor, Ken Thompson''. Nachdr. Addison-Wesley Professional Computing Series. Boston: Addison-Wesley, 2008. === Privacy === Bowman, Courtney, Ari Gesher, John K. Grant, Daniel Slate, and Elissa Lerner. ''The Architecture of Privacy: On Engineering Technologies That Can Deliver Trustworthy Safeguards''. First edition. Sebastopol, CA: O’Reilly Media, 2015. === Project management === Fogel, Karl. ''Producing Open Source Software: How to Run a Successful Free Software Project''. Version 2.3106., 2018. https://producingoss.com/. McConnell, Steve. ''Rapid Development: Taming Wild Software Schedules''. Redmond, Wash: Microsoft Press, 1996. Stellman, Andrew, and Jennifer Greene. ''Learning Agile''. First edition. Beijing: O’Reilly, 2014. === Refactoring === Fowler, Martin, and Kent Beck. ''Refactoring: Improving the Design of Existing Code''. The Addison-Wesley Object Technology Series. Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley, 1999. === Requirements === McDonald, Kent J. ''Beyond Requirements: Analysis with an Agile Mindset''. New York: Addison-Wesley, 2016. Patton, Jeff. ''User Story Mapping: Discover the Whole Story, Build the Right Product''. First edition. Beijing ; Sebastopol, CA: O’Reilly, 2014. === Security === Howard, Michael, David LeBlanc, and John Viega. ''24 Deadly Sins of Software Security: Programming Flaws and How to Fix Them''. New York: McGraw-Hill, 2010. === Stability === Nygard, Michael T. ''Release It! Design and Deploy Production-Ready Software''. Second edition. The Pragmatic Programmers. Raleigh, North Carolina: The Pragmatic Bookshelf, 2018. === Testing === Beck, Kent. ''Test-Driven Development: By Example''. The Addison-Wesley Signature Series. Boston: Addison-Wesley, 2003. Feathers, Michael C., and Robert C. Martin. ''Working Effectively with Legacy Code''. Robert C. Martin Series. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall Professional Technical Reference, 2005. Freeman, Steve, and Nat Pryce. ''Growing Object-Oriented Software, Guided by Tests''. The Addison-Wesley Signature Series. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Addison Wesley, 2010. Meszaros, Gerard, and Martin Fowler. ''XUnit Test Patterns: Refactoring Test Code''. Upper Saddle River, New Jersey: Addison-Wesley, 2007. === User interface === Cooper, Alan. ''About Face: The Essentials of Interaction Design''. 4th edition. Indianapolis, IN: John Wiley and Sons, 2014. Rosenfeld, Louis, Peter Morville, and Jorge Arango. ''Information Architecture: For the Web and Beyond''. Fourth edition. Sebastopol, CA: O’Reilly Media, Inc, 2015. [[Category:Programming]] [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Developing]] 89c8542c51e363f24be4d4cf0dc67de85c3ef2fa 442 404 2019-05-07T14:08:21Z Andy Culbertson 1 Merged the Privacy section into Security. wikitext text/x-wiki == Code examples == Here are projects that show up in lists of high quality code, so I'll examine some of them and include any relevant discoveries in the project. All the projects I'm listing for now are in Python. * [https://launchpad.net/bzr Bazaar] * [https://github.com/boto/boto3 boto3] * [https://github.com/django/django Django] * [https://github.com/pallets/flask Flask] * [https://github.com/gevent/gevent gevent] * [https://www.mercurial-scm.org/downloads Mercurial] * [https://github.com/nltk/nltk NLTK] * [https://github.com/Pylons/pyramid Pyramid] * [https://github.com/reddit/reddit reddit] * [https://github.com/kennethreitz/requests Requests] * [https://github.com/zzzeek/sqlalchemy SQLAlchemy] * [https://github.com/kennethreitz/tablib Tablib] * [https://github.com/tornadoweb/tornado Tornado] * [http://trac.edgewall.org/browser/trunk/trac trac] * [https://github.com/twisted/twisted Twisted] * [https://github.com/rg3/youtube-dl youtube-dl] In addition to these, I keep a mental list of software with features I might want to emulate, even if I don't plan to study their code very thoroughly: * [https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Mozilla/Developer_guide/Source_Code Firefox] - automatic updating; possibly its add-on architecture, if it ever settles down * [https://wordpress.org/download/source/ WordPress] - plugin hooks == Bibliography == === Architecture === Buschmann, Frank, ed. ''Pattern-Oriented Software Architecture: A System of Patterns''. Chichester ; New York: Wiley, 1996. Fowler, Martin. ''Patterns of Enterprise Application Architecture''. The Addison-Wesley Signature Series. Boston: Addison-Wesley, 2003. Martin, Robert C. ''Clean Architecture: A Craftsman’s Guide to Software Structure and Design''. Boston: Prentice Hall, 2018. === Continuous delivery === Humble, Jez, and David Farley. ''Continuous Delivery: Reliable Software Releases through Build, Test, and Deployment Automation''. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Addison-Wesley, 2010. === Debugging === Agans, David J. ''Debugging: The Nine Indispensable Rules for Finding Even the Most Elusive Software and Hardware Problems''. New York: Amacom, 2002. === Design === Evans, Eric. ''Domain-Driven Design: Tackling Complexity in the Heart of Software''. Boston: Addison-Wesley, 2004. Gamma, Erich, ed. ''Design Patterns: Elements of Reusable Object-Oriented Software''. Addison-Wesley Professional Computing Series. Reading, Mass: Addison-Wesley, 1995. Martin, Robert C., ed. ''Clean Code: A Handbook of Agile Software Craftsmanship''. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall, 2009. McConnell, Steve. ''Code Complete''. 2nd ed. Redmond, Wash: Microsoft Press, 2004. Raymond, Eric S. ''The Art of UNIX Programming: With Contributions from Thirteen UNIX Pioneers, Including Its Inventor, Ken Thompson''. Nachdr. Addison-Wesley Professional Computing Series. Boston: Addison-Wesley, 2008. === Project management === Fogel, Karl. ''Producing Open Source Software: How to Run a Successful Free Software Project''. Version 2.3106., 2018. https://producingoss.com/. McConnell, Steve. ''Rapid Development: Taming Wild Software Schedules''. Redmond, Wash: Microsoft Press, 1996. Stellman, Andrew, and Jennifer Greene. ''Learning Agile''. First edition. Beijing: O’Reilly, 2014. === Refactoring === Fowler, Martin, and Kent Beck. ''Refactoring: Improving the Design of Existing Code''. The Addison-Wesley Object Technology Series. Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley, 1999. === Requirements === McDonald, Kent J. ''Beyond Requirements: Analysis with an Agile Mindset''. New York: Addison-Wesley, 2016. Patton, Jeff. ''User Story Mapping: Discover the Whole Story, Build the Right Product''. First edition. Beijing ; Sebastopol, CA: O’Reilly, 2014. === Security === Bowman, Courtney, Ari Gesher, John K. Grant, Daniel Slate, and Elissa Lerner. ''The Architecture of Privacy: On Engineering Technologies That Can Deliver Trustworthy Safeguards''. First edition. Sebastopol, CA: O’Reilly Media, 2015. Howard, Michael, David LeBlanc, and John Viega. ''24 Deadly Sins of Software Security: Programming Flaws and How to Fix Them''. New York: McGraw-Hill, 2010. === Stability === Nygard, Michael T. ''Release It! Design and Deploy Production-Ready Software''. Second edition. The Pragmatic Programmers. Raleigh, North Carolina: The Pragmatic Bookshelf, 2018. === Testing === Beck, Kent. ''Test-Driven Development: By Example''. The Addison-Wesley Signature Series. Boston: Addison-Wesley, 2003. Feathers, Michael C., and Robert C. Martin. ''Working Effectively with Legacy Code''. Robert C. Martin Series. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall Professional Technical Reference, 2005. Freeman, Steve, and Nat Pryce. ''Growing Object-Oriented Software, Guided by Tests''. The Addison-Wesley Signature Series. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Addison Wesley, 2010. Meszaros, Gerard, and Martin Fowler. ''XUnit Test Patterns: Refactoring Test Code''. Upper Saddle River, New Jersey: Addison-Wesley, 2007. === User interface === Cooper, Alan. ''About Face: The Essentials of Interaction Design''. 4th edition. Indianapolis, IN: John Wiley and Sons, 2014. Rosenfeld, Louis, Peter Morville, and Jorge Arango. ''Information Architecture: For the Web and Beyond''. Fourth edition. Sebastopol, CA: O’Reilly Media, Inc, 2015. [[Category:Programming]] [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Developing]] 5aaac016cca1f6d2c4f5e5a56fb1358803558135 0 103 405 279 2019-03-23T16:14:04Z Andy Culbertson 1 Replaced the Arts category with Experimental Literature. wikitext text/x-wiki == Definition == ''Superbook'' is my term for a broad, fuzzy, subjective category of books that use various techniques to add dimensions to their parent genre or format, preferably in dynamic, imaginative ways. In this article I'll list examples and techniques, and hopefully over time I can refine and crystallize my definition. The word ''superbook'' has been used for a lot of other things already, so I might try to find another term, but that's what I have for now. === Normal books === When defining something, it's helpful to contrast it with other, similar things. Here are some qualities of books I'd think of as normal, which can serve as a baseline for noticing the traits of works that might be superbooks. Think of a typical novel, and you'll see what I have in mind as a normal book. * '''Textual''' - It might help to define the baseline narrowly, so I'm going to say a normal book contains only text. * '''Flat''' - The normal book is bound in traditional codex form with flat, thin, single-layer pages you can easily turn. * '''Linear''' - This prototype of a normal book relates its contents as a single train of thought that runs straightforwardly from the book's beginning to its end. * '''Self-contained''' - A normal book is primarily concerned with its stated topic, whether that's the events of an invented story or an analysis of real-world affairs, and it pipes content directly from the author to the readers. "Self-contained" in this sense isn't the same as standalone, so a normal book can be part of a series. * '''Static''' - Once it's packaged as a book and delivered to the reader, the content doesn't change. It can have new editions, but each edition stays the same. To count as a superbook it's not enough to vary from only one of these qualities; you'd need to depart from this list in particular ways, probably complex ones. But the list gives me some guidelines for thinking about the differences. === Effects === I primarily recognize superbooks by their effects on me. I'll touch on these in the three areas of thoughts, feelings, and actions. I feel a sense of wonder, curiosity, and excitement. I think about the possible ideas and scenarios the book's content suggests. And I act to explore the possibilities in ways beyond simply running my eyes down each page and flipping to the next one. There's a sense in which any book could act as a superbook if it has these effects on someone, even the most conventional of novels or the driest of reference manuals. It's important to know that you can find inspiration in surprising places. It keeps your eyes open and keeps you exploring to find it. But in the interests of defining a category of books that tend to inspire me in particular ways, I don't want to make the category too broad, so I wouldn't solely rely on these effects to define it. Superbooks produce these effects because they have certain physical, conceptual, or stylistic features. == Examples == Since I'm working out the superbook category by feel, I might remove some of these examples in the future because my sense of the category has shifted away from them. Within the category I find that some types of books are closer to the center of my idea for it, and others are closer to the edges because they embody the idea less fully. === Works === This section is for miscellaneous examples. I ended up finding categories for the ones I put here originally. === Genres and formats === A genre or format of superbooks adds a dimension to others it emerges from or could be compared to. Some of these are categories rather than recognized genres or formats. ==== Gamebooks ==== ==== Puzzle books ==== * Maze ==== Creativity prompts ==== These are books that are specifically meant to spark the reader's imagination and motivate them to create content of some kind. ===== Writing prompts ===== Some of books of writing prompts are written for professional writers, and others are meant for children or casual writers. In either case their purpose is to exercise the imagination, hone writing skills, or help the reader move past writer's block. * Harris Burdick ===== Doodle books ===== This kind of book has been around for decades, but the genre doesn't seem to have a common name. I'm using the name of one author's series. The general idea is that each page contains part of a drawing, and the reader is supposed to complete it creatively. ==== Experimental fiction ==== ===== Epistolary novels ===== ===== Metafiction ===== Metafiction is a set of techniques a work of fiction uses to call attention to the fact that it's a work of fiction. A common example is breaking the fourth wall, where a character in the work speaks directly to the audience. For me these techniques put metafiction into the superbook category because breaking fiction's conventions draws my attention to them, changes my perspective, and opens conceptual doors. It makes me wonder what other hidden features fiction has and how else we could play with them to reveal other ideas and depths of meaning. It makes me feel that the book is special and magical, that there's more happening there than in a normal book. * Animated Thumbtack ==== Movable books ==== Movable book is an umbrella term library catalogers use that covers a range of formats. Some of these are closer to the center of my superbook idea than others. The overall idea is that movable books depart from the flatness feature of normal books. Their pages are structured or bound differently, or they have parts other than normal pages that the reader can interact with. * http://www.movablebooksociety.org/ * http://www.loc.gov/aba/cyac/toys.html ===== Split page books ===== * Graham Oakley ===== Vinyl sticker books ===== ==== Interactive ebooks ==== === Boundary cases === I'm not sure if these examples fit my idea of a superbook. ==== Pop-up books ==== ==== Graphic novels ==== ==== Flip books ==== ==== Enhanced print books ==== ==== Activity books ==== ==== Picture books ==== ==== Study guides ==== == Techniques == * Reader participation - invite the reader to complete or enhance their content. [[Category:Experimental Literature]] [[Category:Seeds]] [[Category:Developing]] 24e775bd3858ce37a6571cce4a573ae8bd8d6482 14 156 406 2019-03-23T16:14:49Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the category. wikitext text/x-wiki [[Category:Arts]] d1506439f9d51e39e313798ac6599a2cee896a8e 0 157 407 2019-03-23T17:01:50Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the article. wikitext text/x-wiki == Introduction == This article is a list of links to authors, works, and categories in experimental literature. Its purpose is to give you a starting point for exploring works in this set of genres. I've based the list's organization on ''The Routledge Companion to Experimental Literature'' (RECL), a collection of scholarly essays on the subject. This project is a work in progress. == How to use this list == If a category is well established in the field, I've linked to its Wikipedia article. If the author of the RECL article was conducting their own survey of the category, I've listed the authors and works they cover with links to Wikipedia and LibraryThing wherever corresponding pages are available. I've also included links to a work's full text when that's available and links to background information from other sources. === Wikipedia === Wikipedia articles will give you background information on their subject, and they'll usually contain bibliographies that will point you to works related to that subject, such as works in the category or works by the author. === LibraryThing === LibraryThing is a social library catalog website that lets you catalog your collection. Here I'm using it for its recommendation features and its links to other sites. When you visit a work's LibraryThing page, you can find related works in the "LibraryThing Recommendations" section and the "Member recommendations" section. You can also click on the tags users have assigned to it. Each tag link takes you to a page for that tag, which lists other works that have been assigned it, as well as related tags, subjects, and tagmashes, which are combinations of tags. You can [https://wiki.librarything.com/index.php/HelpThing:Tagmash create your own tagmashes]. In the upper right sidebar of a work's LibraryThing page, you'll find links to its corresponding page on other catalog websites, such as Amazon, Google Books, and WorldCat, a shared catalog of physical libraries worldwide. These sites will often let you look through a preview of the book. They'll also give you ways to find other related works, usually by recommendations or subject links on the work's page. If you're logged in, you can edit this section to show links from a long list of other sites. == General == [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Experimental_literature Experimental literature - Wikipedia] Bray, Joe, Alison Gibbons, and Brian McHale, eds. ''The Routledge Companion to Experimental Literature''. Routledge Companions. London: Routledge, 2015. [[https://www.librarything.com/work/18336113 LibraryThing]] == Planned updates == * Add a description for each category. * Add authors and works for the categories that only have general links. * Add links from other sites. [[Category:Developing]] [[Category:Lists]] [[Category:Experimental Literature]] 30067550b557798da029a4c37848c2494515aec6 408 407 2019-03-24T07:22:22Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the RCEL outline. wikitext text/x-wiki == Introduction == This article is a list of links to authors, works, and categories in experimental literature. Its purpose is to give you a starting point for exploring works in this set of genres. I've based the list's organization on ''The Routledge Companion to Experimental Literature'' (RECL), a collection of scholarly essays on the subject. This project is a work in progress. == How to use this list == If a category is well established in the field, I've linked to its Wikipedia article. If the author of the RECL article was conducting their own survey of the category, I've listed the authors and works they cover with links to Wikipedia and LibraryThing wherever corresponding pages are available. I've also included links to a work's full text when that's available and links to background information from other sources. === Wikipedia === Wikipedia articles will give you background information on their subject, and they'll usually contain bibliographies that will point you to works related to that subject, such as works in the category or works by the author. === LibraryThing === LibraryThing is a social library catalog website that lets you catalog your collection. Here I'm using it for its recommendation features and its links to other sites. When you visit a work's LibraryThing page, you can find related works in the "LibraryThing Recommendations" section and the "Member recommendations" section. You can also click on the tags users have assigned to it. Each tag link takes you to a page for that tag, which lists other works that have been assigned it, as well as related tags, subjects, and tagmashes, which are combinations of tags. You can [https://wiki.librarything.com/index.php/HelpThing:Tagmash create your own tagmashes]. In the upper right sidebar of a work's LibraryThing page, you'll find links to its corresponding page on other catalog websites, such as Amazon, Google Books, and WorldCat, a shared catalog of physical libraries worldwide. These sites will often let you look through a preview of the book. They'll also give you ways to find other related works, usually by recommendations or subject links on the work's page. If you're logged in, you can edit this section to show links from a long list of other sites. == General == [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Experimental_literature Experimental literature - Wikipedia] Bray, Joe, Alison Gibbons, and Brian McHale, eds. ''The Routledge Companion to Experimental Literature''. Routledge Companions. London: Routledge, 2015. [[https://www.librarything.com/work/18336113 LibraryThing]] == The historical avant-gardes == === Modernist-era experimentalism === ==== Italian Futurism and Russian Cubo-Futurism ==== ==== The poetics of animism ==== ==== The surrealist experiments with language ==== ==== The literary absurd ==== === Postmodernist experimentalism === ==== Spontaneity and improvisation in postwar experimental poetry ==== ==== The nouveau roman and Tel Quel ==== ==== Lettrism and situationism ==== ==== OuLiPo and proceduralism ==== ==== Metafiction ==== ==== Postmodernism and experiment ==== === Experiments with identity === ==== Sexing the text ==== ==== Experiments in black ==== ==== The limits of hybridity ==== === The new experimentalism === ==== Avant-Pop ==== ==== Post-postmodernism ==== ==== Globalization and transnationalism ==== ==== Altermodernist fiction ==== ==== Manifestos and Ars Poetica ==== ==== Post-criticism ==== == Experiment now: printed matter == === Experiments with language === ==== The expanded field of L=A=N=G=U=A=G=E ==== ==== Concrete poetry and prose ==== ==== Found poetry, "uncreative writing," and the art of appropriation ==== ==== Words in visual art ==== ==== Hoax-poetry and inauthenticity ==== === Experiments with narrative and fiction === ==== Unnatural voices, minds, and narration ==== ==== Impossible worlds ==== ==== Experimental life writing ==== ==== Rotting time ==== === Experiments with form and design === ==== Graphic narrative ==== ==== Multimodal literature and experimentation ==== ==== Information design, emergent culture and experimental form in the novel ==== ==== Interactive fiction ==== == Experiment now: beyond the page == === The digital age === ==== Digital fiction ==== ==== Code poetry and new-media literature ==== ==== Computer gaming ==== ==== Virtual autobiography ==== ==== Transmedia narrative ==== == Planned updates == * Add a description for each category. * Add authors and works for the categories that only have general links. * Add links from other sites. [[Category:Developing]] [[Category:Lists]] [[Category:Experimental Literature]] c116efa45d7767adf0635dd230f99f9faf8f7e39 409 408 2019-03-24T07:23:34Z Andy Culbertson 1 Fixed the RCEL abbreviations. wikitext text/x-wiki == Introduction == This article is a list of links to authors, works, and categories in experimental literature. Its purpose is to give you a starting point for exploring works in this set of genres. I've based the list's organization on ''The Routledge Companion to Experimental Literature'' (RCEL), a collection of scholarly essays on the subject. This project is a work in progress. == How to use this list == If a category is well established in the field, I've linked to its Wikipedia article. If the author of the RCEL article was conducting their own survey of the category, I've listed the authors and works they cover with links to Wikipedia and LibraryThing wherever corresponding pages are available. I've also included links to a work's full text when that's available and links to background information from other sources. === Wikipedia === Wikipedia articles will give you background information on their subject, and they'll usually contain bibliographies that will point you to works related to that subject, such as works in the category or works by the author. === LibraryThing === LibraryThing is a social library catalog website that lets you catalog your collection. Here I'm using it for its recommendation features and its links to other sites. When you visit a work's LibraryThing page, you can find related works in the "LibraryThing Recommendations" section and the "Member recommendations" section. You can also click on the tags users have assigned to it. Each tag link takes you to a page for that tag, which lists other works that have been assigned it, as well as related tags, subjects, and tagmashes, which are combinations of tags. You can [https://wiki.librarything.com/index.php/HelpThing:Tagmash create your own tagmashes]. In the upper right sidebar of a work's LibraryThing page, you'll find links to its corresponding page on other catalog websites, such as Amazon, Google Books, and WorldCat, a shared catalog of physical libraries worldwide. These sites will often let you look through a preview of the book. They'll also give you ways to find other related works, usually by recommendations or subject links on the work's page. If you're logged in, you can edit this section to show links from a long list of other sites. == General == [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Experimental_literature Experimental literature - Wikipedia] Bray, Joe, Alison Gibbons, and Brian McHale, eds. ''The Routledge Companion to Experimental Literature''. Routledge Companions. London: Routledge, 2015. [[https://www.librarything.com/work/18336113 LibraryThing]] == The historical avant-gardes == === Modernist-era experimentalism === ==== Italian Futurism and Russian Cubo-Futurism ==== ==== The poetics of animism ==== ==== The surrealist experiments with language ==== ==== The literary absurd ==== === Postmodernist experimentalism === ==== Spontaneity and improvisation in postwar experimental poetry ==== ==== The nouveau roman and Tel Quel ==== ==== Lettrism and situationism ==== ==== OuLiPo and proceduralism ==== ==== Metafiction ==== ==== Postmodernism and experiment ==== === Experiments with identity === ==== Sexing the text ==== ==== Experiments in black ==== ==== The limits of hybridity ==== === The new experimentalism === ==== Avant-Pop ==== ==== Post-postmodernism ==== ==== Globalization and transnationalism ==== ==== Altermodernist fiction ==== ==== Manifestos and Ars Poetica ==== ==== Post-criticism ==== == Experiment now: printed matter == === Experiments with language === ==== The expanded field of L=A=N=G=U=A=G=E ==== ==== Concrete poetry and prose ==== ==== Found poetry, "uncreative writing," and the art of appropriation ==== ==== Words in visual art ==== ==== Hoax-poetry and inauthenticity ==== === Experiments with narrative and fiction === ==== Unnatural voices, minds, and narration ==== ==== Impossible worlds ==== ==== Experimental life writing ==== ==== Rotting time ==== === Experiments with form and design === ==== Graphic narrative ==== ==== Multimodal literature and experimentation ==== ==== Information design, emergent culture and experimental form in the novel ==== ==== Interactive fiction ==== == Experiment now: beyond the page == === The digital age === ==== Digital fiction ==== ==== Code poetry and new-media literature ==== ==== Computer gaming ==== ==== Virtual autobiography ==== ==== Transmedia narrative ==== == Planned updates == * Add a description for each category. * Add authors and works for the categories that only have general links. * Add links from other sites. [[Category:Developing]] [[Category:Lists]] [[Category:Experimental Literature]] baf84883f626dadcef5d0420e66389c5e21b029e 410 409 2019-03-24T08:25:45Z Andy Culbertson 1 Streamlined the headings. Removed Transmedia narrative for now. wikitext text/x-wiki == Introduction == This article is a list of links to authors, works, and categories in experimental literature. Its purpose is to give you a starting point for exploring works in this set of genres. I've based the list's organization on ''The Routledge Companion to Experimental Literature'' (RCEL), a collection of scholarly essays on the subject. This project is a work in progress. == How to use this list == If a category is well established in the field, I've linked to its Wikipedia article. If the author of the RCEL article was conducting their own survey of the category, I've listed the authors and works they cover with links to Wikipedia and LibraryThing wherever corresponding pages are available. I've also included links to a work's full text when that's available and links to background information from other sources. === Wikipedia === Wikipedia articles will give you background information on their subject, and they'll usually contain bibliographies that will point you to works related to that subject, such as works in the category or works by the author. === LibraryThing === LibraryThing is a social library catalog website that lets you catalog your collection. Here I'm using it for its recommendation features and its links to other sites. When you visit a work's LibraryThing page, you can find related works in the "LibraryThing Recommendations" section and the "Member recommendations" section. You can also click on the tags users have assigned to it. Each tag link takes you to a page for that tag, which lists other works that have been assigned it, as well as related tags, subjects, and tagmashes, which are combinations of tags. You can [https://wiki.librarything.com/index.php/HelpThing:Tagmash create your own tagmashes]. In the upper right sidebar of a work's LibraryThing page, you'll find links to its corresponding page on other catalog websites, such as Amazon, Google Books, and WorldCat, a shared catalog of physical libraries worldwide. These sites will often let you look through a preview of the book. They'll also give you ways to find other related works, usually by recommendations or subject links on the work's page. If you're logged in, you can edit this section to show links from a long list of other sites. == General == [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Experimental_literature Experimental literature - Wikipedia] Bray, Joe, Alison Gibbons, and Brian McHale, eds. ''The Routledge Companion to Experimental Literature''. Routledge Companions. London: Routledge, 2015. [[https://www.librarything.com/work/18336113 LibraryThing]] == The historical avant-gardes == === Modernist-era experimentalism === ==== Futurism ==== ==== Expressionism ==== ==== Surrealism ==== ==== Absurdism ==== === Postmodernist experimentalism === ==== Postwar experimental poetry ==== ==== The nouveau roman and Tel Quel ==== ==== Lettrism and situationism ==== ==== OuLiPo and proceduralism ==== ==== Metafiction ==== ==== Postmodern literature ==== === Experiments with identity === ==== Twentieth century avant-garde women writers ==== ==== Twentieth century avant-garde African-American poets ==== ==== Anglophone postcolonial poetry ==== === The new experimentalism === ==== Avant-Pop ==== ==== Post-postmodernism ==== ==== Globalization and transnationalism ==== ==== Altermodernist fiction ==== ==== Manifestos and ''Ars Poetica'' ==== ==== Post-criticism ==== == Experiment now: printed matter == === Experiments with language === ==== Language poetry ==== ==== Concrete poetry and prose ==== ==== Found poetry and "uncreative writing" ==== ==== Words in visual art ==== ==== Literary inauthenticity ==== === Experiments with narrative and fiction === ==== Unnatural narratives ==== ==== Impossible worlds ==== ==== Experimental life writing ==== ==== Experimental genre fiction ==== === Experiments with form and design === ==== Graphic narrative ==== ==== Multimodal literature ==== ==== Information design ==== ==== Interactive fiction ==== == Experiment now: beyond the page == === The digital age === ==== Digital fiction ==== ==== Code poetry and new-media literature ==== ==== Computer gaming ==== ==== Virtual autobiography ==== == Planned updates == * Add a description for each category. * Add authors and works for the categories that only have general links. * Add links from other sites. [[Category:Developing]] [[Category:Lists]] [[Category:Experimental Literature]] 63602f4d55aaf54d3d3e1c1a12945a1aeb8908ed 411 410 2019-03-24T08:35:17Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added topical Wikipedia links. wikitext text/x-wiki == Introduction == This article is a list of links to authors, works, and categories in experimental literature. Its purpose is to give you a starting point for exploring works in this set of genres. I've based the list's organization on ''The Routledge Companion to Experimental Literature'' (RCEL), a collection of scholarly essays on the subject. This project is a work in progress. == How to use this list == If a category is well established in the field, I've linked to its Wikipedia article. If the author of the RCEL article was conducting their own survey of the category, I've listed the authors and works they cover with links to Wikipedia and LibraryThing wherever corresponding pages are available. I've also included links to a work's full text when that's available and links to background information from other sources. === Wikipedia === Wikipedia articles will give you background information on their subject, and they'll usually contain bibliographies that will point you to works related to that subject, such as works in the category or works by the author. === LibraryThing === LibraryThing is a social library catalog website that lets you catalog your collection. Here I'm using it for its recommendation features and its links to other sites. When you visit a work's LibraryThing page, you can find related works in the "LibraryThing Recommendations" section and the "Member recommendations" section. You can also click on the tags users have assigned to it. Each tag link takes you to a page for that tag, which lists other works that have been assigned it, as well as related tags, subjects, and tagmashes, which are combinations of tags. You can [https://wiki.librarything.com/index.php/HelpThing:Tagmash create your own tagmashes]. In the upper right sidebar of a work's LibraryThing page, you'll find links to its corresponding page on other catalog websites, such as Amazon, Google Books, and WorldCat, a shared catalog of physical libraries worldwide. These sites will often let you look through a preview of the book. They'll also give you ways to find other related works, usually by recommendations or subject links on the work's page. If you're logged in, you can edit this section to show links from a long list of other sites. == General == [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Experimental_literature Experimental literature - Wikipedia] Bray, Joe, Alison Gibbons, and Brian McHale, eds. ''The Routledge Companion to Experimental Literature''. Routledge Companions. London: Routledge, 2015. [[https://www.librarything.com/work/18336113 LibraryThing]] == The historical avant-gardes == === Modernist-era experimentalism === ==== Futurism ==== [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Futurism_(literature) Futurism (literature) - Wikipedia] ==== Expressionism ==== [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Expressionism Expressionism - Wikipedia] ==== Surrealism ==== [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surrealism Surrealism - Wikipedia] ==== Absurdism ==== [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Absurdist_fiction Absurdist fiction - Wikipedia] === Postmodernist experimentalism === ==== Postwar experimental poetry ==== [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_New_American_Poetry_1945%E2%80%931960 The New American Poetry 1945–1960 - Wikipedia] ==== The nouveau roman and Tel Quel ==== [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nouveau_roman Nouveau roman - Wikipedia] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tel_Quel Tel Quel - Wikipedia] ==== Lettrism and situationism ==== [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lettrism Lettrism - Wikipedia] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Situationist_International Situationist International - Wikipedia] ==== OuLiPo and proceduralism ==== [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constrained_writing Constrained writing - Wikipedia] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oulipo Oulipo - Wikipedia] ==== Metafiction ==== [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metafiction Metafiction - Wikipedia] ==== Postmodern literature ==== [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Postmodern_literature Postmodern literature - Wikipedia] === Experiments with identity === ==== Twentieth century avant-garde women writers ==== ==== Twentieth century avant-garde African-American poets ==== ==== Anglophone postcolonial poetry ==== [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Postcolonial_literature Postcolonial literature - Wikipedia] === The new experimentalism === ==== Avant-Pop ==== ==== Post-postmodernism ==== [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Post-postmodernism Post-postmodernism - Wikipedia] ==== Globalization and transnationalism ==== ==== Altermodernist fiction ==== ==== Manifestos and ''Ars Poetica'' ==== [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manifesto Manifesto - Wikipedia] ==== Post-criticism ==== == Experiment now: printed matter == === Experiments with language === ==== Language poetry ==== [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Language_poets Language poets - Wikipedia] ==== Concrete poetry and prose ==== [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Concrete_poetry Concrete poetry - Wikipedia] ==== Found poetry and "uncreative writing" ==== [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Found_poetry Found poetry - Wikipedia] ==== Words in visual art ==== ==== Literary inauthenticity ==== === Experiments with narrative and fiction === ==== Unnatural narratives ==== ==== Impossible worlds ==== ==== Experimental life writing ==== ==== Experimental genre fiction ==== === Experiments with form and design === ==== Graphic narrative ==== [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alternative_comics Alternative comics - Wikipedia] ==== Multimodal literature ==== [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberature Liberature - Wikipedia] ==== Information design ==== ==== Interactive fiction ==== [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interactive_fiction Interactive fiction - Wikipedia] == Experiment now: beyond the page == === The digital age === ==== Digital fiction ==== ==== Code poetry and new-media literature ==== [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Code_poetry Code poetry - Wikipedia] ==== Computer gaming ==== [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Art_game Art game - Wikipedia] ==== Virtual autobiography ==== == Planned updates == * Add a description for each category. * Add authors and works for the categories that only have general links. * Add links from other sites. [[Category:Developing]] [[Category:Lists]] [[Category:Experimental Literature]] ecc5b8039aaebbcf45a65f5b704396e00cd7982f 412 411 2019-03-24T22:50:58Z Andy Culbertson 1 Converted link paragraphs to list items. wikitext text/x-wiki == Introduction == This article is a list of links to authors, works, and categories in experimental literature. Its purpose is to give you a starting point for exploring works in this set of genres. I've based the list's organization on ''The Routledge Companion to Experimental Literature'' (RCEL), a collection of scholarly essays on the subject. This project is a work in progress. == How to use this list == If a category is well established in the field, I've linked to its Wikipedia article. If the author of the RCEL article was conducting their own survey of the category, I've listed the authors and works they cover with links to Wikipedia and LibraryThing wherever corresponding pages are available. I've also included links to a work's full text when that's available and links to background information from other sources. === Wikipedia === Wikipedia articles will give you background information on their subject, and they'll usually contain bibliographies that will point you to works related to that subject, such as works in the category or works by the author. === LibraryThing === LibraryThing is a social library catalog website that lets you catalog your collection. Here I'm using it for its recommendation features and its links to other sites. When you visit a work's LibraryThing page, you can find related works in the "LibraryThing Recommendations" section and the "Member recommendations" section. You can also click on the tags users have assigned to it. Each tag link takes you to a page for that tag, which lists other works that have been assigned it, as well as related tags, subjects, and tagmashes, which are combinations of tags. You can [https://wiki.librarything.com/index.php/HelpThing:Tagmash create your own tagmashes]. In the upper right sidebar of a work's LibraryThing page, you'll find links to its corresponding page on other catalog websites, such as Amazon, Google Books, and WorldCat, a shared catalog of physical libraries worldwide. These sites will often let you look through a preview of the book. They'll also give you ways to find other related works, usually by recommendations or subject links on the work's page. If you're logged in, you can edit this section to show links from a long list of other sites. == General == * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Experimental_literature Experimental literature - Wikipedia] * Bray, Joe, Alison Gibbons, and Brian McHale, eds. ''The Routledge Companion to Experimental Literature''. Routledge Companions. London: Routledge, 2015. [[https://www.librarything.com/work/18336113 LibraryThing]] == The historical avant-gardes == === Modernist-era experimentalism === ==== Futurism ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Futurism_(literature) Futurism (literature) - Wikipedia] ==== Expressionism ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Expressionism Expressionism - Wikipedia] ==== Surrealism ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surrealism Surrealism - Wikipedia] ==== Absurdism ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Absurdist_fiction Absurdist fiction - Wikipedia] === Postmodernist experimentalism === ==== Postwar experimental poetry ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_New_American_Poetry_1945%E2%80%931960 The New American Poetry 1945–1960 - Wikipedia] ==== The nouveau roman and Tel Quel ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nouveau_roman Nouveau roman - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tel_Quel Tel Quel - Wikipedia] ==== Lettrism and situationism ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lettrism Lettrism - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Situationist_International Situationist International - Wikipedia] ==== OuLiPo and proceduralism ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constrained_writing Constrained writing - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oulipo Oulipo - Wikipedia] ==== Metafiction ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metafiction Metafiction - Wikipedia] ==== Postmodern literature ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Postmodern_literature Postmodern literature - Wikipedia] === Experiments with identity === ==== Twentieth century avant-garde women writers ==== ==== Twentieth century avant-garde African-American poets ==== ==== Anglophone postcolonial poetry ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Postcolonial_literature Postcolonial literature - Wikipedia] === The new experimentalism === ==== Avant-Pop ==== ==== Post-postmodernism ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Post-postmodernism Post-postmodernism - Wikipedia] ==== Globalization and transnationalism ==== ==== Altermodernist fiction ==== ==== Manifestos and ''Ars Poetica'' ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manifesto Manifesto - Wikipedia] ==== Post-criticism ==== == Experiment now: printed matter == === Experiments with language === ==== Language poetry ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Language_poets Language poets - Wikipedia] ==== Concrete poetry and prose ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Concrete_poetry Concrete poetry - Wikipedia] ==== Found poetry and "uncreative writing" ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Found_poetry Found poetry - Wikipedia] ==== Words in visual art ==== ==== Literary inauthenticity ==== === Experiments with narrative and fiction === ==== Unnatural narratives ==== ==== Impossible worlds ==== ==== Experimental life writing ==== ==== Experimental genre fiction ==== === Experiments with form and design === ==== Graphic narrative ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alternative_comics Alternative comics - Wikipedia] ==== Multimodal literature ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberature Liberature - Wikipedia] ==== Information design ==== ==== Interactive fiction ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interactive_fiction Interactive fiction - Wikipedia] == Experiment now: beyond the page == === The digital age === ==== Digital fiction ==== ==== Code poetry and new-media literature ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Code_poetry Code poetry - Wikipedia] ==== Computer gaming ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Art_game Art game - Wikipedia] ==== Virtual autobiography ==== == Planned updates == * Add a description for each category. * Add authors and works for the categories that only have general links. * Add links from other sites. [[Category:Developing]] [[Category:Lists]] [[Category:Experimental Literature]] 6dc9238e23dfb44786a17ada5e62af65598487d9 413 412 2019-03-24T22:58:19Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added author Wikipedia links to the women writer and African-American poet sections. wikitext text/x-wiki == Introduction == This article is a list of links to authors, works, and categories in experimental literature. Its purpose is to give you a starting point for exploring works in this set of genres. I've based the list's organization on ''The Routledge Companion to Experimental Literature'' (RCEL), a collection of scholarly essays on the subject. This project is a work in progress. == How to use this list == If a category is well established in the field, I've linked to its Wikipedia article. If the author of the RCEL article was conducting their own survey of the category, I've listed the authors and works they cover with links to Wikipedia and LibraryThing wherever corresponding pages are available. I've also included links to a work's full text when that's available and links to background information from other sources. === Wikipedia === Wikipedia articles will give you background information on their subject, and they'll usually contain bibliographies that will point you to works related to that subject, such as works in the category or works by the author. === LibraryThing === LibraryThing is a social library catalog website that lets you catalog your collection. Here I'm using it for its recommendation features and its links to other sites. When you visit a work's LibraryThing page, you can find related works in the "LibraryThing Recommendations" section and the "Member recommendations" section. You can also click on the tags users have assigned to it. Each tag link takes you to a page for that tag, which lists other works that have been assigned it, as well as related tags, subjects, and tagmashes, which are combinations of tags. You can [https://wiki.librarything.com/index.php/HelpThing:Tagmash create your own tagmashes]. In the upper right sidebar of a work's LibraryThing page, you'll find links to its corresponding page on other catalog websites, such as Amazon, Google Books, and WorldCat, a shared catalog of physical libraries worldwide. These sites will often let you look through a preview of the book. They'll also give you ways to find other related works, usually by recommendations or subject links on the work's page. If you're logged in, you can edit this section to show links from a long list of other sites. == General == * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Experimental_literature Experimental literature - Wikipedia] * Bray, Joe, Alison Gibbons, and Brian McHale, eds. ''The Routledge Companion to Experimental Literature''. Routledge Companions. London: Routledge, 2015. [[https://www.librarything.com/work/18336113 LibraryThing]] == The historical avant-gardes == === Modernist-era experimentalism === ==== Futurism ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Futurism_(literature) Futurism (literature) - Wikipedia] ==== Expressionism ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Expressionism Expressionism - Wikipedia] ==== Surrealism ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surrealism Surrealism - Wikipedia] ==== Absurdism ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Absurdist_fiction Absurdist fiction - Wikipedia] === Postmodernist experimentalism === ==== Postwar experimental poetry ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_New_American_Poetry_1945%E2%80%931960 The New American Poetry 1945–1960 - Wikipedia] ==== The nouveau roman and Tel Quel ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nouveau_roman Nouveau roman - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tel_Quel Tel Quel - Wikipedia] ==== Lettrism and situationism ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lettrism Lettrism - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Situationist_International Situationist International - Wikipedia] ==== OuLiPo and proceduralism ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constrained_writing Constrained writing - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oulipo Oulipo - Wikipedia] ==== Metafiction ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metafiction Metafiction - Wikipedia] ==== Postmodern literature ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Postmodern_literature Postmodern literature - Wikipedia] === Experiments with identity === ==== Twentieth century avant-garde women writers ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kathy_Acker Kathy Acker - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Djuna_Barnes Djuna Barnes - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jane_Bowles Jane Bowles - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H.D. H.D. - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toni_Morrison Toni Morrison - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bharati_Mukherjee Bharati Mukherjee - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ana%C3%AFs_Nin Anaïs Nin - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joyce_Carol_Oates Joyce Carol Oates - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_Rhys Jean Rhys - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dorothy_Richardson Dorothy Richardson - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gertrude_Stein Gertrude Stein - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virginia_Woolf Virginia Woolf - Wikipedia] ==== Twentieth century avant-garde African-American poets ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russell_Atkins Russell Atkins - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amiri_Baraka Amiri Baraka - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jayne_Cortez Jayne Cortez - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Negro_Digest Negro Digest - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Langston_Hughes Langston Hughes - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ted_Joans Ted Joans - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Percy_Johnston Percy Johnston - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bob_Kaufman Bob Kaufman - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Melvin_Kelley William Melvin Kelley - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nathaniel_Mackey Nathaniel Mackey - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clarence_Major Clarence Major - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tracie_Morris Tracie Morris - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harryette_Mullen Harryette Mullen - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Claudia_Rankine Claudia Rankine - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gil_Scott-Heron Gil Scott-Heron - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lorenzo_Thomas_(poet) Lorenzo Thomas (poet) - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Melvin_B._Tolson Melvin B. Tolson - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_Toomer Jean Toomer - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Umbra_(poets) Umbra (poets) - Wikipedia] ==== Anglophone postcolonial poetry ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Postcolonial_literature Postcolonial literature - Wikipedia] === The new experimentalism === ==== Avant-Pop ==== ==== Post-postmodernism ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Post-postmodernism Post-postmodernism - Wikipedia] ==== Globalization and transnationalism ==== ==== Altermodernist fiction ==== ==== Manifestos and ''Ars Poetica'' ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manifesto Manifesto - Wikipedia] ==== Post-criticism ==== == Experiment now: printed matter == === Experiments with language === ==== Language poetry ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Language_poets Language poets - Wikipedia] ==== Concrete poetry and prose ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Concrete_poetry Concrete poetry - Wikipedia] ==== Found poetry and "uncreative writing" ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Found_poetry Found poetry - Wikipedia] ==== Words in visual art ==== ==== Literary inauthenticity ==== === Experiments with narrative and fiction === ==== Unnatural narratives ==== ==== Impossible worlds ==== ==== Experimental life writing ==== ==== Experimental genre fiction ==== === Experiments with form and design === ==== Graphic narrative ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alternative_comics Alternative comics - Wikipedia] ==== Multimodal literature ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberature Liberature - Wikipedia] ==== Information design ==== ==== Interactive fiction ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interactive_fiction Interactive fiction - Wikipedia] == Experiment now: beyond the page == === The digital age === ==== Digital fiction ==== ==== Code poetry and new-media literature ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Code_poetry Code poetry - Wikipedia] ==== Computer gaming ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Art_game Art game - Wikipedia] ==== Virtual autobiography ==== == Planned updates == * Add a description for each category. * Add authors and works for the categories that only have general links. * Add links from other sites. [[Category:Developing]] [[Category:Lists]] [[Category:Experimental Literature]] e88c62cfc80f158a600239d2c9ed828e7c4539c8 414 413 2019-03-24T23:17:00Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added links to Anglophone postcolonial poetry, Avant-Pop, Manifestos and Ars Poetica, Post-criticism, Experimental genre fiction, and Information design. wikitext text/x-wiki == Introduction == This article is a list of links to authors, works, and categories in experimental literature. Its purpose is to give you a starting point for exploring works in this set of genres. I've based the list's organization on ''The Routledge Companion to Experimental Literature'' (RCEL), a collection of scholarly essays on the subject. This project is a work in progress. == How to use this list == If a category is well established in the field, I've linked to its Wikipedia article. If the author of the RCEL article was conducting their own survey of the category, I've listed the authors and works they cover with links to Wikipedia and LibraryThing wherever corresponding pages are available. I've also included links to a work's full text when that's available and links to background information from other sources. === Wikipedia === Wikipedia articles will give you background information on their subject, and they'll usually contain bibliographies that will point you to works related to that subject, such as works in the category or works by the author. === LibraryThing === LibraryThing is a social library catalog website that lets you catalog your collection. Here I'm using it for its recommendation features and its links to other sites. When you visit a work's LibraryThing page, you can find related works in the "LibraryThing Recommendations" section and the "Member recommendations" section. You can also click on the tags users have assigned to it. Each tag link takes you to a page for that tag, which lists other works that have been assigned it, as well as related tags, subjects, and tagmashes, which are combinations of tags. You can [https://wiki.librarything.com/index.php/HelpThing:Tagmash create your own tagmashes]. In the upper right sidebar of a work's LibraryThing page, you'll find links to its corresponding page on other catalog websites, such as Amazon, Google Books, and WorldCat, a shared catalog of physical libraries worldwide. These sites will often let you look through a preview of the book. They'll also give you ways to find other related works, usually by recommendations or subject links on the work's page. If you're logged in, you can edit this section to show links from a long list of other sites. == General == * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Experimental_literature Experimental literature - Wikipedia] * Bray, Joe, Alison Gibbons, and Brian McHale, eds. ''The Routledge Companion to Experimental Literature''. Routledge Companions. London: Routledge, 2015. [[https://www.librarything.com/work/18336113 LibraryThing]] == The historical avant-gardes == === Modernist-era experimentalism === ==== Futurism ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Futurism_(literature) Futurism (literature) - Wikipedia] ==== Expressionism ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Expressionism Expressionism - Wikipedia] ==== Surrealism ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surrealism Surrealism - Wikipedia] ==== Absurdism ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Absurdist_fiction Absurdist fiction - Wikipedia] === Postmodernist experimentalism === ==== Postwar experimental poetry ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_New_American_Poetry_1945%E2%80%931960 The New American Poetry 1945–1960 - Wikipedia] ==== The nouveau roman and Tel Quel ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nouveau_roman Nouveau roman - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tel_Quel Tel Quel - Wikipedia] ==== Lettrism and situationism ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lettrism Lettrism - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Situationist_International Situationist International - Wikipedia] ==== OuLiPo and proceduralism ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constrained_writing Constrained writing - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oulipo Oulipo - Wikipedia] ==== Metafiction ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metafiction Metafiction - Wikipedia] ==== Postmodern literature ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Postmodern_literature Postmodern literature - Wikipedia] === Experiments with identity === ==== Twentieth century avant-garde women writers ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kathy_Acker Kathy Acker - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Djuna_Barnes Djuna Barnes - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jane_Bowles Jane Bowles - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H.D. H.D. - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toni_Morrison Toni Morrison - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bharati_Mukherjee Bharati Mukherjee - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ana%C3%AFs_Nin Anaïs Nin - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joyce_Carol_Oates Joyce Carol Oates - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_Rhys Jean Rhys - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dorothy_Richardson Dorothy Richardson - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gertrude_Stein Gertrude Stein - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virginia_Woolf Virginia Woolf - Wikipedia] ==== Twentieth century avant-garde African-American poets ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russell_Atkins Russell Atkins - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amiri_Baraka Amiri Baraka - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jayne_Cortez Jayne Cortez - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Negro_Digest Negro Digest - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Langston_Hughes Langston Hughes - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ted_Joans Ted Joans - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Percy_Johnston Percy Johnston - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bob_Kaufman Bob Kaufman - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Melvin_Kelley William Melvin Kelley - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nathaniel_Mackey Nathaniel Mackey - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clarence_Major Clarence Major - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tracie_Morris Tracie Morris - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harryette_Mullen Harryette Mullen - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Claudia_Rankine Claudia Rankine - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gil_Scott-Heron Gil Scott-Heron - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lorenzo_Thomas_(poet) Lorenzo Thomas (poet) - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Melvin_B._Tolson Melvin B. Tolson - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_Toomer Jean Toomer - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Umbra_(poets) Umbra (poets) - Wikipedia] ==== Anglophone postcolonial poetry ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Postcolonial_literature Postcolonial literature - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G._V._Desani G. V. Desani - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wilson_Harris Wilson Harris - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dambudzo_Marechera Dambudzo Marechera - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mudrooroo Mudrooroo - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ben_Okri Ben Okri - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salman_Rushdie Salman Rushdie - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vikram_Seth Vikram Seth - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wole_Soyinka Wole Soyinka - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amos_Tutuola Amos Tutuola - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Derek_Walcott Derek Walcott - Wikipedia] === The new experimentalism === ==== Avant-Pop ==== * Avant-Pop: Fiction for a Daydream Nation (Black Ice Books) by Larry McCaffery [[https://www.librarything.com/work/512144 LibraryThing]] * After Yesterday's Crash: The Avant-Pop Anthology by Larry McCaffery [[https://www.librarything.com/work/771064 LibraryThing]] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tomas_Alfredson Tomas Alfredson - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Italo_Calvino Italo Calvino - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Umberto_Eco Umberto Eco - Wikipedia] * Betrayed by Rita Hayworth by Manuel Puig [[https://www.librarything.com/work/128453 LibraryThing]] * Naked Lunch by William S. Burroughs [[https://www.librarything.com/work/5852 LibraryThing]] * Lost in the Funhouse by John Barth [[https://www.librarything.com/work/29286 LibraryThing]] * Industrial Poetics: Demo Tracks for a Mobile Culture (Contemp North American Poetry) by Joe Amato [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2881291 LibraryThing]] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kenneth_Goldsmith Kenneth Goldsmith - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Coover Robert Coover - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angela_Carter Angela Carter - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aimee_Bender Aimee Bender - Wikipedia] * White Noise by Don DeLillo [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4953 LibraryThing]] * Gravity's Rainbow by Thomas Pynchon [[https://www.librarything.com/work/10088 LibraryThing]] * Mark Z. Danielewski's House of leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1488 LibraryThing]] * Europeana: A Brief History of the Twentieth Century by Patrik Ouředník [[https://www.librarything.com/work/179330 LibraryThing]] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mark_Leyner Mark Leyner - Wikipedia] * Traveling to Utopia: With a Brief History of the Technology by Young-Hae Chang Heavy Industries [[https://www.librarything.com/work/11864011 LibraryThing]] ==== Post-postmodernism ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Post-postmodernism Post-postmodernism - Wikipedia] ==== Globalization and transnationalism ==== ==== Altermodernist fiction ==== ==== Manifestos and ''Ars Poetica'' ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manifesto Manifesto - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ars_Poetica_(Horace) Ars Poetica (Horace) - Wikipedia] * Ars Poetica by Archibald MacLeish [[https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poetrymagazine/poems/17168/ars-poetica full text]] ==== Post-criticism ==== * Heuretics: The Logic of Invention by Gregory L. Ulmer [[https://www.librarything.com/work/173585 LibraryThing]] == Experiment now: printed matter == === Experiments with language === ==== Language poetry ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Language_poets Language poets - Wikipedia] ==== Concrete poetry and prose ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Concrete_poetry Concrete poetry - Wikipedia] ==== Found poetry and "uncreative writing" ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Found_poetry Found poetry - Wikipedia] ==== Words in visual art ==== ==== Literary inauthenticity ==== === Experiments with narrative and fiction === ==== Unnatural narratives ==== ==== Impossible worlds ==== ==== Experimental life writing ==== ==== Experimental genre fiction ==== * Iron Council by China Miéville [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4813 LibraryThing]] * Vellum: The Book of All Hours by Hal Duncan [[https://www.librarything.com/work/47894 LibraryThing]] * Ink: The Book of All Hours by Hal Duncan [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1162726 LibraryThing]] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iain_Banks Iain Banks - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephen_Baxter_(author) Stephen Baxter (author) - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Park Paul Park - Wikipedia] * Century Rain by Alastair Reynolds [[https://www.librarything.com/work/48231 LibraryThing]] * Blindsight by Peter Watts [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1333265 LibraryThing]] * Books of Blood | Series [[https://www.librarything.com/series/Books+of+Blood LibraryThing]] * Neverwhere: The Author's Preferred Text by Neil Gaiman [[https://www.librarything.com/work/14623622 LibraryThing]] * Mark Z. Danielewski's House of leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1488 LibraryThing]] * The Everlasting by Tim Lebbon [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2811046 LibraryThing]] === Experiments with form and design === ==== Graphic narrative ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alternative_comics Alternative comics - Wikipedia] ==== Multimodal literature ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberature Liberature - Wikipedia] ==== Information design ==== * Exercises in Style by Raymond Queneau [[https://www.librarything.com/work/39048 LibraryThing]] * Double or Nothing by Raymond Federman [[https://www.librarything.com/work/151208 LibraryThing]] * The Gettysburg Powerpoint Presentation by Peter Norvig [[https://norvig.com/Gettysburg/ full text]] * Europeana: A Brief History of the Twentieth Century by Patrik Ouředník [[https://www.librarything.com/work/179330 LibraryThing]] * 2666 by Roberto Bolaño [[https://www.librarything.com/work/996213 LibraryThing]] ==== Interactive fiction ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interactive_fiction Interactive fiction - Wikipedia] == Experiment now: beyond the page == === The digital age === ==== Digital fiction ==== ==== Code poetry and new-media literature ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Code_poetry Code poetry - Wikipedia] ==== Computer gaming ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Art_game Art game - Wikipedia] ==== Virtual autobiography ==== == Planned updates == * Add a description for each category. * Add authors and works for the categories that only have general links. * Add links from other sites. [[Category:Developing]] [[Category:Lists]] [[Category:Experimental Literature]] 8c186490c3d770f57f6cba8675d4ecbb935c5ce3 415 414 2019-03-24T23:19:13Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added item on empty categories to the planned updates. wikitext text/x-wiki == Introduction == This article is a list of links to authors, works, and categories in experimental literature. Its purpose is to give you a starting point for exploring works in this set of genres. I've based the list's organization on ''The Routledge Companion to Experimental Literature'' (RCEL), a collection of scholarly essays on the subject. This project is a work in progress. == How to use this list == If a category is well established in the field, I've linked to its Wikipedia article. If the author of the RCEL article was conducting their own survey of the category, I've listed the authors and works they cover with links to Wikipedia and LibraryThing wherever corresponding pages are available. I've also included links to a work's full text when that's available and links to background information from other sources. === Wikipedia === Wikipedia articles will give you background information on their subject, and they'll usually contain bibliographies that will point you to works related to that subject, such as works in the category or works by the author. === LibraryThing === LibraryThing is a social library catalog website that lets you catalog your collection. Here I'm using it for its recommendation features and its links to other sites. When you visit a work's LibraryThing page, you can find related works in the "LibraryThing Recommendations" section and the "Member recommendations" section. You can also click on the tags users have assigned to it. Each tag link takes you to a page for that tag, which lists other works that have been assigned it, as well as related tags, subjects, and tagmashes, which are combinations of tags. You can [https://wiki.librarything.com/index.php/HelpThing:Tagmash create your own tagmashes]. In the upper right sidebar of a work's LibraryThing page, you'll find links to its corresponding page on other catalog websites, such as Amazon, Google Books, and WorldCat, a shared catalog of physical libraries worldwide. These sites will often let you look through a preview of the book. They'll also give you ways to find other related works, usually by recommendations or subject links on the work's page. If you're logged in, you can edit this section to show links from a long list of other sites. == General == * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Experimental_literature Experimental literature - Wikipedia] * Bray, Joe, Alison Gibbons, and Brian McHale, eds. ''The Routledge Companion to Experimental Literature''. Routledge Companions. London: Routledge, 2015. [[https://www.librarything.com/work/18336113 LibraryThing]] == The historical avant-gardes == === Modernist-era experimentalism === ==== Futurism ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Futurism_(literature) Futurism (literature) - Wikipedia] ==== Expressionism ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Expressionism Expressionism - Wikipedia] ==== Surrealism ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surrealism Surrealism - Wikipedia] ==== Absurdism ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Absurdist_fiction Absurdist fiction - Wikipedia] === Postmodernist experimentalism === ==== Postwar experimental poetry ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_New_American_Poetry_1945%E2%80%931960 The New American Poetry 1945–1960 - Wikipedia] ==== The nouveau roman and Tel Quel ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nouveau_roman Nouveau roman - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tel_Quel Tel Quel - Wikipedia] ==== Lettrism and situationism ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lettrism Lettrism - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Situationist_International Situationist International - Wikipedia] ==== OuLiPo and proceduralism ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constrained_writing Constrained writing - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oulipo Oulipo - Wikipedia] ==== Metafiction ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metafiction Metafiction - Wikipedia] ==== Postmodern literature ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Postmodern_literature Postmodern literature - Wikipedia] === Experiments with identity === ==== Twentieth century avant-garde women writers ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kathy_Acker Kathy Acker - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Djuna_Barnes Djuna Barnes - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jane_Bowles Jane Bowles - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H.D. H.D. - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toni_Morrison Toni Morrison - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bharati_Mukherjee Bharati Mukherjee - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ana%C3%AFs_Nin Anaïs Nin - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joyce_Carol_Oates Joyce Carol Oates - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_Rhys Jean Rhys - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dorothy_Richardson Dorothy Richardson - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gertrude_Stein Gertrude Stein - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virginia_Woolf Virginia Woolf - Wikipedia] ==== Twentieth century avant-garde African-American poets ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russell_Atkins Russell Atkins - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amiri_Baraka Amiri Baraka - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jayne_Cortez Jayne Cortez - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Negro_Digest Negro Digest - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Langston_Hughes Langston Hughes - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ted_Joans Ted Joans - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Percy_Johnston Percy Johnston - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bob_Kaufman Bob Kaufman - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Melvin_Kelley William Melvin Kelley - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nathaniel_Mackey Nathaniel Mackey - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clarence_Major Clarence Major - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tracie_Morris Tracie Morris - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harryette_Mullen Harryette Mullen - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Claudia_Rankine Claudia Rankine - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gil_Scott-Heron Gil Scott-Heron - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lorenzo_Thomas_(poet) Lorenzo Thomas (poet) - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Melvin_B._Tolson Melvin B. Tolson - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_Toomer Jean Toomer - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Umbra_(poets) Umbra (poets) - Wikipedia] ==== Anglophone postcolonial poetry ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Postcolonial_literature Postcolonial literature - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G._V._Desani G. V. Desani - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wilson_Harris Wilson Harris - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dambudzo_Marechera Dambudzo Marechera - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mudrooroo Mudrooroo - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ben_Okri Ben Okri - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salman_Rushdie Salman Rushdie - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vikram_Seth Vikram Seth - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wole_Soyinka Wole Soyinka - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amos_Tutuola Amos Tutuola - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Derek_Walcott Derek Walcott - Wikipedia] === The new experimentalism === ==== Avant-Pop ==== * Avant-Pop: Fiction for a Daydream Nation (Black Ice Books) by Larry McCaffery [[https://www.librarything.com/work/512144 LibraryThing]] * After Yesterday's Crash: The Avant-Pop Anthology by Larry McCaffery [[https://www.librarything.com/work/771064 LibraryThing]] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tomas_Alfredson Tomas Alfredson - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Italo_Calvino Italo Calvino - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Umberto_Eco Umberto Eco - Wikipedia] * Betrayed by Rita Hayworth by Manuel Puig [[https://www.librarything.com/work/128453 LibraryThing]] * Naked Lunch by William S. Burroughs [[https://www.librarything.com/work/5852 LibraryThing]] * Lost in the Funhouse by John Barth [[https://www.librarything.com/work/29286 LibraryThing]] * Industrial Poetics: Demo Tracks for a Mobile Culture (Contemp North American Poetry) by Joe Amato [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2881291 LibraryThing]] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kenneth_Goldsmith Kenneth Goldsmith - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Coover Robert Coover - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angela_Carter Angela Carter - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aimee_Bender Aimee Bender - Wikipedia] * White Noise by Don DeLillo [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4953 LibraryThing]] * Gravity's Rainbow by Thomas Pynchon [[https://www.librarything.com/work/10088 LibraryThing]] * Mark Z. Danielewski's House of leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1488 LibraryThing]] * Europeana: A Brief History of the Twentieth Century by Patrik Ouředník [[https://www.librarything.com/work/179330 LibraryThing]] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mark_Leyner Mark Leyner - Wikipedia] * Traveling to Utopia: With a Brief History of the Technology by Young-Hae Chang Heavy Industries [[https://www.librarything.com/work/11864011 LibraryThing]] ==== Post-postmodernism ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Post-postmodernism Post-postmodernism - Wikipedia] ==== Globalization and transnationalism ==== ==== Altermodernist fiction ==== ==== Manifestos and ''Ars Poetica'' ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manifesto Manifesto - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ars_Poetica_(Horace) Ars Poetica (Horace) - Wikipedia] * Ars Poetica by Archibald MacLeish [[https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poetrymagazine/poems/17168/ars-poetica full text]] ==== Post-criticism ==== * Heuretics: The Logic of Invention by Gregory L. Ulmer [[https://www.librarything.com/work/173585 LibraryThing]] == Experiment now: printed matter == === Experiments with language === ==== Language poetry ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Language_poets Language poets - Wikipedia] ==== Concrete poetry and prose ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Concrete_poetry Concrete poetry - Wikipedia] ==== Found poetry and "uncreative writing" ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Found_poetry Found poetry - Wikipedia] ==== Words in visual art ==== ==== Literary inauthenticity ==== === Experiments with narrative and fiction === ==== Unnatural narratives ==== ==== Impossible worlds ==== ==== Experimental life writing ==== ==== Experimental genre fiction ==== * Iron Council by China Miéville [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4813 LibraryThing]] * Vellum: The Book of All Hours by Hal Duncan [[https://www.librarything.com/work/47894 LibraryThing]] * Ink: The Book of All Hours by Hal Duncan [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1162726 LibraryThing]] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iain_Banks Iain Banks - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephen_Baxter_(author) Stephen Baxter (author) - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Park Paul Park - Wikipedia] * Century Rain by Alastair Reynolds [[https://www.librarything.com/work/48231 LibraryThing]] * Blindsight by Peter Watts [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1333265 LibraryThing]] * Books of Blood | Series [[https://www.librarything.com/series/Books+of+Blood LibraryThing]] * Neverwhere: The Author's Preferred Text by Neil Gaiman [[https://www.librarything.com/work/14623622 LibraryThing]] * Mark Z. Danielewski's House of leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1488 LibraryThing]] * The Everlasting by Tim Lebbon [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2811046 LibraryThing]] === Experiments with form and design === ==== Graphic narrative ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alternative_comics Alternative comics - Wikipedia] ==== Multimodal literature ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberature Liberature - Wikipedia] ==== Information design ==== * Exercises in Style by Raymond Queneau [[https://www.librarything.com/work/39048 LibraryThing]] * Double or Nothing by Raymond Federman [[https://www.librarything.com/work/151208 LibraryThing]] * The Gettysburg Powerpoint Presentation by Peter Norvig [[https://norvig.com/Gettysburg/ full text]] * Europeana: A Brief History of the Twentieth Century by Patrik Ouředník [[https://www.librarything.com/work/179330 LibraryThing]] * 2666 by Roberto Bolaño [[https://www.librarything.com/work/996213 LibraryThing]] ==== Interactive fiction ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interactive_fiction Interactive fiction - Wikipedia] == Experiment now: beyond the page == === The digital age === ==== Digital fiction ==== ==== Code poetry and new-media literature ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Code_poetry Code poetry - Wikipedia] ==== Computer gaming ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Art_game Art game - Wikipedia] ==== Virtual autobiography ==== == Planned updates == * Add links to the empty categories. * Add a description for each category. * Add authors and works for the categories that only have general links. * Add links from other sites. [[Category:Developing]] [[Category:Lists]] [[Category:Experimental Literature]] acae17ec694d219526e53b28181942eb55299b66 416 415 2019-03-24T23:22:05Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added an item on reference formatting to the planned updates. wikitext text/x-wiki == Introduction == This article is a list of links to authors, works, and categories in experimental literature. Its purpose is to give you a starting point for exploring works in this set of genres. I've based the list's organization on ''The Routledge Companion to Experimental Literature'' (RCEL), a collection of scholarly essays on the subject. This project is a work in progress. == How to use this list == If a category is well established in the field, I've linked to its Wikipedia article. If the author of the RCEL article was conducting their own survey of the category, I've listed the authors and works they cover with links to Wikipedia and LibraryThing wherever corresponding pages are available. I've also included links to a work's full text when that's available and links to background information from other sources. === Wikipedia === Wikipedia articles will give you background information on their subject, and they'll usually contain bibliographies that will point you to works related to that subject, such as works in the category or works by the author. === LibraryThing === LibraryThing is a social library catalog website that lets you catalog your collection. Here I'm using it for its recommendation features and its links to other sites. When you visit a work's LibraryThing page, you can find related works in the "LibraryThing Recommendations" section and the "Member recommendations" section. You can also click on the tags users have assigned to it. Each tag link takes you to a page for that tag, which lists other works that have been assigned it, as well as related tags, subjects, and tagmashes, which are combinations of tags. You can [https://wiki.librarything.com/index.php/HelpThing:Tagmash create your own tagmashes]. In the upper right sidebar of a work's LibraryThing page, you'll find links to its corresponding page on other catalog websites, such as Amazon, Google Books, and WorldCat, a shared catalog of physical libraries worldwide. These sites will often let you look through a preview of the book. They'll also give you ways to find other related works, usually by recommendations or subject links on the work's page. If you're logged in, you can edit this section to show links from a long list of other sites. == General == * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Experimental_literature Experimental literature - Wikipedia] * Bray, Joe, Alison Gibbons, and Brian McHale, eds. ''The Routledge Companion to Experimental Literature''. Routledge Companions. London: Routledge, 2015. [[https://www.librarything.com/work/18336113 LibraryThing]] == The historical avant-gardes == === Modernist-era experimentalism === ==== Futurism ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Futurism_(literature) Futurism (literature) - Wikipedia] ==== Expressionism ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Expressionism Expressionism - Wikipedia] ==== Surrealism ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surrealism Surrealism - Wikipedia] ==== Absurdism ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Absurdist_fiction Absurdist fiction - Wikipedia] === Postmodernist experimentalism === ==== Postwar experimental poetry ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_New_American_Poetry_1945%E2%80%931960 The New American Poetry 1945–1960 - Wikipedia] ==== The nouveau roman and Tel Quel ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nouveau_roman Nouveau roman - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tel_Quel Tel Quel - Wikipedia] ==== Lettrism and situationism ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lettrism Lettrism - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Situationist_International Situationist International - Wikipedia] ==== OuLiPo and proceduralism ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constrained_writing Constrained writing - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oulipo Oulipo - Wikipedia] ==== Metafiction ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metafiction Metafiction - Wikipedia] ==== Postmodern literature ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Postmodern_literature Postmodern literature - Wikipedia] === Experiments with identity === ==== Twentieth century avant-garde women writers ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kathy_Acker Kathy Acker - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Djuna_Barnes Djuna Barnes - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jane_Bowles Jane Bowles - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H.D. H.D. - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toni_Morrison Toni Morrison - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bharati_Mukherjee Bharati Mukherjee - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ana%C3%AFs_Nin Anaïs Nin - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joyce_Carol_Oates Joyce Carol Oates - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_Rhys Jean Rhys - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dorothy_Richardson Dorothy Richardson - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gertrude_Stein Gertrude Stein - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virginia_Woolf Virginia Woolf - Wikipedia] ==== Twentieth century avant-garde African-American poets ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russell_Atkins Russell Atkins - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amiri_Baraka Amiri Baraka - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jayne_Cortez Jayne Cortez - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Negro_Digest Negro Digest - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Langston_Hughes Langston Hughes - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ted_Joans Ted Joans - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Percy_Johnston Percy Johnston - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bob_Kaufman Bob Kaufman - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Melvin_Kelley William Melvin Kelley - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nathaniel_Mackey Nathaniel Mackey - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clarence_Major Clarence Major - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tracie_Morris Tracie Morris - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harryette_Mullen Harryette Mullen - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Claudia_Rankine Claudia Rankine - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gil_Scott-Heron Gil Scott-Heron - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lorenzo_Thomas_(poet) Lorenzo Thomas (poet) - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Melvin_B._Tolson Melvin B. Tolson - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_Toomer Jean Toomer - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Umbra_(poets) Umbra (poets) - Wikipedia] ==== Anglophone postcolonial poetry ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Postcolonial_literature Postcolonial literature - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G._V._Desani G. V. Desani - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wilson_Harris Wilson Harris - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dambudzo_Marechera Dambudzo Marechera - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mudrooroo Mudrooroo - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ben_Okri Ben Okri - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salman_Rushdie Salman Rushdie - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vikram_Seth Vikram Seth - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wole_Soyinka Wole Soyinka - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amos_Tutuola Amos Tutuola - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Derek_Walcott Derek Walcott - Wikipedia] === The new experimentalism === ==== Avant-Pop ==== * Avant-Pop: Fiction for a Daydream Nation (Black Ice Books) by Larry McCaffery [[https://www.librarything.com/work/512144 LibraryThing]] * After Yesterday's Crash: The Avant-Pop Anthology by Larry McCaffery [[https://www.librarything.com/work/771064 LibraryThing]] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tomas_Alfredson Tomas Alfredson - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Italo_Calvino Italo Calvino - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Umberto_Eco Umberto Eco - Wikipedia] * Betrayed by Rita Hayworth by Manuel Puig [[https://www.librarything.com/work/128453 LibraryThing]] * Naked Lunch by William S. Burroughs [[https://www.librarything.com/work/5852 LibraryThing]] * Lost in the Funhouse by John Barth [[https://www.librarything.com/work/29286 LibraryThing]] * Industrial Poetics: Demo Tracks for a Mobile Culture (Contemp North American Poetry) by Joe Amato [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2881291 LibraryThing]] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kenneth_Goldsmith Kenneth Goldsmith - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Coover Robert Coover - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angela_Carter Angela Carter - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aimee_Bender Aimee Bender - Wikipedia] * White Noise by Don DeLillo [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4953 LibraryThing]] * Gravity's Rainbow by Thomas Pynchon [[https://www.librarything.com/work/10088 LibraryThing]] * Mark Z. Danielewski's House of leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1488 LibraryThing]] * Europeana: A Brief History of the Twentieth Century by Patrik Ouředník [[https://www.librarything.com/work/179330 LibraryThing]] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mark_Leyner Mark Leyner - Wikipedia] * Traveling to Utopia: With a Brief History of the Technology by Young-Hae Chang Heavy Industries [[https://www.librarything.com/work/11864011 LibraryThing]] ==== Post-postmodernism ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Post-postmodernism Post-postmodernism - Wikipedia] ==== Globalization and transnationalism ==== ==== Altermodernist fiction ==== ==== Manifestos and ''Ars Poetica'' ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manifesto Manifesto - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ars_Poetica_(Horace) Ars Poetica (Horace) - Wikipedia] * Ars Poetica by Archibald MacLeish [[https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poetrymagazine/poems/17168/ars-poetica full text]] ==== Post-criticism ==== * Heuretics: The Logic of Invention by Gregory L. Ulmer [[https://www.librarything.com/work/173585 LibraryThing]] == Experiment now: printed matter == === Experiments with language === ==== Language poetry ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Language_poets Language poets - Wikipedia] ==== Concrete poetry and prose ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Concrete_poetry Concrete poetry - Wikipedia] ==== Found poetry and "uncreative writing" ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Found_poetry Found poetry - Wikipedia] ==== Words in visual art ==== ==== Literary inauthenticity ==== === Experiments with narrative and fiction === ==== Unnatural narratives ==== ==== Impossible worlds ==== ==== Experimental life writing ==== ==== Experimental genre fiction ==== * Iron Council by China Miéville [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4813 LibraryThing]] * Vellum: The Book of All Hours by Hal Duncan [[https://www.librarything.com/work/47894 LibraryThing]] * Ink: The Book of All Hours by Hal Duncan [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1162726 LibraryThing]] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iain_Banks Iain Banks - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephen_Baxter_(author) Stephen Baxter (author) - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Park Paul Park - Wikipedia] * Century Rain by Alastair Reynolds [[https://www.librarything.com/work/48231 LibraryThing]] * Blindsight by Peter Watts [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1333265 LibraryThing]] * Books of Blood | Series [[https://www.librarything.com/series/Books+of+Blood LibraryThing]] * Neverwhere: The Author's Preferred Text by Neil Gaiman [[https://www.librarything.com/work/14623622 LibraryThing]] * Mark Z. Danielewski's House of leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1488 LibraryThing]] * The Everlasting by Tim Lebbon [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2811046 LibraryThing]] === Experiments with form and design === ==== Graphic narrative ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alternative_comics Alternative comics - Wikipedia] ==== Multimodal literature ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberature Liberature - Wikipedia] ==== Information design ==== * Exercises in Style by Raymond Queneau [[https://www.librarything.com/work/39048 LibraryThing]] * Double or Nothing by Raymond Federman [[https://www.librarything.com/work/151208 LibraryThing]] * The Gettysburg Powerpoint Presentation by Peter Norvig [[https://norvig.com/Gettysburg/ full text]] * Europeana: A Brief History of the Twentieth Century by Patrik Ouředník [[https://www.librarything.com/work/179330 LibraryThing]] * 2666 by Roberto Bolaño [[https://www.librarything.com/work/996213 LibraryThing]] ==== Interactive fiction ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interactive_fiction Interactive fiction - Wikipedia] == Experiment now: beyond the page == === The digital age === ==== Digital fiction ==== ==== Code poetry and new-media literature ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Code_poetry Code poetry - Wikipedia] ==== Computer gaming ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Art_game Art game - Wikipedia] ==== Virtual autobiography ==== == Planned updates == * Add links to the empty categories. * Add a description for each category. * Add authors and works for the categories that only have general links. * Add links from other sites. * Normalize the reference formatting. [[Category:Developing]] [[Category:Lists]] [[Category:Experimental Literature]] 5076b99413bb81b0cd9cc7e84717452b767aecba 425 416 2019-04-10T09:22:27Z Andy Culbertson 1 Hyphenated the twentieth-century headings. wikitext text/x-wiki == Introduction == This article is a list of links to authors, works, and categories in experimental literature. Its purpose is to give you a starting point for exploring works in this set of genres. I've based the list's organization on ''The Routledge Companion to Experimental Literature'' (RCEL), a collection of scholarly essays on the subject. This project is a work in progress. == How to use this list == If a category is well established in the field, I've linked to its Wikipedia article. If the author of the RCEL article was conducting their own survey of the category, I've listed the authors and works they cover with links to Wikipedia and LibraryThing wherever corresponding pages are available. I've also included links to a work's full text when that's available and links to background information from other sources. === Wikipedia === Wikipedia articles will give you background information on their subject, and they'll usually contain bibliographies that will point you to works related to that subject, such as works in the category or works by the author. === LibraryThing === LibraryThing is a social library catalog website that lets you catalog your collection. Here I'm using it for its recommendation features and its links to other sites. When you visit a work's LibraryThing page, you can find related works in the "LibraryThing Recommendations" section and the "Member recommendations" section. You can also click on the tags users have assigned to it. Each tag link takes you to a page for that tag, which lists other works that have been assigned it, as well as related tags, subjects, and tagmashes, which are combinations of tags. You can [https://wiki.librarything.com/index.php/HelpThing:Tagmash create your own tagmashes]. In the upper right sidebar of a work's LibraryThing page, you'll find links to its corresponding page on other catalog websites, such as Amazon, Google Books, and WorldCat, a shared catalog of physical libraries worldwide. These sites will often let you look through a preview of the book. They'll also give you ways to find other related works, usually by recommendations or subject links on the work's page. If you're logged in, you can edit this section to show links from a long list of other sites. == General == * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Experimental_literature Experimental literature - Wikipedia] * Bray, Joe, Alison Gibbons, and Brian McHale, eds. ''The Routledge Companion to Experimental Literature''. Routledge Companions. London: Routledge, 2015. [[https://www.librarything.com/work/18336113 LibraryThing]] == The historical avant-gardes == === Modernist-era experimentalism === ==== Futurism ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Futurism_(literature) Futurism (literature) - Wikipedia] ==== Expressionism ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Expressionism Expressionism - Wikipedia] ==== Surrealism ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surrealism Surrealism - Wikipedia] ==== Absurdism ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Absurdist_fiction Absurdist fiction - Wikipedia] === Postmodernist experimentalism === ==== Postwar experimental poetry ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_New_American_Poetry_1945%E2%80%931960 The New American Poetry 1945–1960 - Wikipedia] ==== The nouveau roman and Tel Quel ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nouveau_roman Nouveau roman - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tel_Quel Tel Quel - Wikipedia] ==== Lettrism and situationism ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lettrism Lettrism - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Situationist_International Situationist International - Wikipedia] ==== OuLiPo and proceduralism ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constrained_writing Constrained writing - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oulipo Oulipo - Wikipedia] ==== Metafiction ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metafiction Metafiction - Wikipedia] ==== Postmodern literature ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Postmodern_literature Postmodern literature - Wikipedia] === Experiments with identity === ==== Twentieth-century avant-garde women writers ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kathy_Acker Kathy Acker - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Djuna_Barnes Djuna Barnes - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jane_Bowles Jane Bowles - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H.D. H.D. - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toni_Morrison Toni Morrison - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bharati_Mukherjee Bharati Mukherjee - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ana%C3%AFs_Nin Anaïs Nin - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joyce_Carol_Oates Joyce Carol Oates - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_Rhys Jean Rhys - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dorothy_Richardson Dorothy Richardson - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gertrude_Stein Gertrude Stein - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virginia_Woolf Virginia Woolf - Wikipedia] ==== Twentieth-century avant-garde African-American poets ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russell_Atkins Russell Atkins - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amiri_Baraka Amiri Baraka - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jayne_Cortez Jayne Cortez - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Negro_Digest Negro Digest - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Langston_Hughes Langston Hughes - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ted_Joans Ted Joans - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Percy_Johnston Percy Johnston - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bob_Kaufman Bob Kaufman - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Melvin_Kelley William Melvin Kelley - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nathaniel_Mackey Nathaniel Mackey - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clarence_Major Clarence Major - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tracie_Morris Tracie Morris - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harryette_Mullen Harryette Mullen - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Claudia_Rankine Claudia Rankine - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gil_Scott-Heron Gil Scott-Heron - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lorenzo_Thomas_(poet) Lorenzo Thomas (poet) - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Melvin_B._Tolson Melvin B. Tolson - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_Toomer Jean Toomer - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Umbra_(poets) Umbra (poets) - Wikipedia] ==== Anglophone postcolonial poetry ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Postcolonial_literature Postcolonial literature - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G._V._Desani G. V. Desani - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wilson_Harris Wilson Harris - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dambudzo_Marechera Dambudzo Marechera - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mudrooroo Mudrooroo - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ben_Okri Ben Okri - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salman_Rushdie Salman Rushdie - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vikram_Seth Vikram Seth - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wole_Soyinka Wole Soyinka - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amos_Tutuola Amos Tutuola - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Derek_Walcott Derek Walcott - Wikipedia] === The new experimentalism === ==== Avant-Pop ==== * Avant-Pop: Fiction for a Daydream Nation (Black Ice Books) by Larry McCaffery [[https://www.librarything.com/work/512144 LibraryThing]] * After Yesterday's Crash: The Avant-Pop Anthology by Larry McCaffery [[https://www.librarything.com/work/771064 LibraryThing]] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tomas_Alfredson Tomas Alfredson - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Italo_Calvino Italo Calvino - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Umberto_Eco Umberto Eco - Wikipedia] * Betrayed by Rita Hayworth by Manuel Puig [[https://www.librarything.com/work/128453 LibraryThing]] * Naked Lunch by William S. Burroughs [[https://www.librarything.com/work/5852 LibraryThing]] * Lost in the Funhouse by John Barth [[https://www.librarything.com/work/29286 LibraryThing]] * Industrial Poetics: Demo Tracks for a Mobile Culture (Contemp North American Poetry) by Joe Amato [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2881291 LibraryThing]] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kenneth_Goldsmith Kenneth Goldsmith - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Coover Robert Coover - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angela_Carter Angela Carter - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aimee_Bender Aimee Bender - Wikipedia] * White Noise by Don DeLillo [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4953 LibraryThing]] * Gravity's Rainbow by Thomas Pynchon [[https://www.librarything.com/work/10088 LibraryThing]] * Mark Z. Danielewski's House of leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1488 LibraryThing]] * Europeana: A Brief History of the Twentieth Century by Patrik Ouředník [[https://www.librarything.com/work/179330 LibraryThing]] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mark_Leyner Mark Leyner - Wikipedia] * Traveling to Utopia: With a Brief History of the Technology by Young-Hae Chang Heavy Industries [[https://www.librarything.com/work/11864011 LibraryThing]] ==== Post-postmodernism ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Post-postmodernism Post-postmodernism - Wikipedia] ==== Globalization and transnationalism ==== ==== Altermodernist fiction ==== ==== Manifestos and ''Ars Poetica'' ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manifesto Manifesto - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ars_Poetica_(Horace) Ars Poetica (Horace) - Wikipedia] * Ars Poetica by Archibald MacLeish [[https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poetrymagazine/poems/17168/ars-poetica full text]] ==== Post-criticism ==== * Heuretics: The Logic of Invention by Gregory L. Ulmer [[https://www.librarything.com/work/173585 LibraryThing]] == Experiment now: printed matter == === Experiments with language === ==== Language poetry ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Language_poets Language poets - Wikipedia] ==== Concrete poetry and prose ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Concrete_poetry Concrete poetry - Wikipedia] ==== Found poetry and "uncreative writing" ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Found_poetry Found poetry - Wikipedia] ==== Words in visual art ==== ==== Literary inauthenticity ==== === Experiments with narrative and fiction === ==== Unnatural narratives ==== ==== Impossible worlds ==== ==== Experimental life writing ==== ==== Experimental genre fiction ==== * Iron Council by China Miéville [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4813 LibraryThing]] * Vellum: The Book of All Hours by Hal Duncan [[https://www.librarything.com/work/47894 LibraryThing]] * Ink: The Book of All Hours by Hal Duncan [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1162726 LibraryThing]] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iain_Banks Iain Banks - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephen_Baxter_(author) Stephen Baxter (author) - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Park Paul Park - Wikipedia] * Century Rain by Alastair Reynolds [[https://www.librarything.com/work/48231 LibraryThing]] * Blindsight by Peter Watts [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1333265 LibraryThing]] * Books of Blood | Series [[https://www.librarything.com/series/Books+of+Blood LibraryThing]] * Neverwhere: The Author's Preferred Text by Neil Gaiman [[https://www.librarything.com/work/14623622 LibraryThing]] * Mark Z. Danielewski's House of leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1488 LibraryThing]] * The Everlasting by Tim Lebbon [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2811046 LibraryThing]] === Experiments with form and design === ==== Graphic narrative ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alternative_comics Alternative comics - Wikipedia] ==== Multimodal literature ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberature Liberature - Wikipedia] ==== Information design ==== * Exercises in Style by Raymond Queneau [[https://www.librarything.com/work/39048 LibraryThing]] * Double or Nothing by Raymond Federman [[https://www.librarything.com/work/151208 LibraryThing]] * The Gettysburg Powerpoint Presentation by Peter Norvig [[https://norvig.com/Gettysburg/ full text]] * Europeana: A Brief History of the Twentieth Century by Patrik Ouředník [[https://www.librarything.com/work/179330 LibraryThing]] * 2666 by Roberto Bolaño [[https://www.librarything.com/work/996213 LibraryThing]] ==== Interactive fiction ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interactive_fiction Interactive fiction - Wikipedia] == Experiment now: beyond the page == === The digital age === ==== Digital fiction ==== ==== Code poetry and new-media literature ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Code_poetry Code poetry - Wikipedia] ==== Computer gaming ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Art_game Art game - Wikipedia] ==== Virtual autobiography ==== == Planned updates == * Add links to the empty categories. * Add a description for each category. * Add authors and works for the categories that only have general links. * Add links from other sites. * Normalize the reference formatting. [[Category:Developing]] [[Category:Lists]] [[Category:Experimental Literature]] cae449773225c2a307f9a62ca497c36a9152fa9a 426 425 2019-04-10T09:23:29Z Andy Culbertson 1 Categorized the genre fiction. wikitext text/x-wiki == Introduction == This article is a list of links to authors, works, and categories in experimental literature. Its purpose is to give you a starting point for exploring works in this set of genres. I've based the list's organization on ''The Routledge Companion to Experimental Literature'' (RCEL), a collection of scholarly essays on the subject. This project is a work in progress. == How to use this list == If a category is well established in the field, I've linked to its Wikipedia article. If the author of the RCEL article was conducting their own survey of the category, I've listed the authors and works they cover with links to Wikipedia and LibraryThing wherever corresponding pages are available. I've also included links to a work's full text when that's available and links to background information from other sources. === Wikipedia === Wikipedia articles will give you background information on their subject, and they'll usually contain bibliographies that will point you to works related to that subject, such as works in the category or works by the author. === LibraryThing === LibraryThing is a social library catalog website that lets you catalog your collection. Here I'm using it for its recommendation features and its links to other sites. When you visit a work's LibraryThing page, you can find related works in the "LibraryThing Recommendations" section and the "Member recommendations" section. You can also click on the tags users have assigned to it. Each tag link takes you to a page for that tag, which lists other works that have been assigned it, as well as related tags, subjects, and tagmashes, which are combinations of tags. You can [https://wiki.librarything.com/index.php/HelpThing:Tagmash create your own tagmashes]. In the upper right sidebar of a work's LibraryThing page, you'll find links to its corresponding page on other catalog websites, such as Amazon, Google Books, and WorldCat, a shared catalog of physical libraries worldwide. These sites will often let you look through a preview of the book. They'll also give you ways to find other related works, usually by recommendations or subject links on the work's page. If you're logged in, you can edit this section to show links from a long list of other sites. == General == * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Experimental_literature Experimental literature - Wikipedia] * Bray, Joe, Alison Gibbons, and Brian McHale, eds. ''The Routledge Companion to Experimental Literature''. Routledge Companions. London: Routledge, 2015. [[https://www.librarything.com/work/18336113 LibraryThing]] == The historical avant-gardes == === Modernist-era experimentalism === ==== Futurism ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Futurism_(literature) Futurism (literature) - Wikipedia] ==== Expressionism ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Expressionism Expressionism - Wikipedia] ==== Surrealism ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surrealism Surrealism - Wikipedia] ==== Absurdism ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Absurdist_fiction Absurdist fiction - Wikipedia] === Postmodernist experimentalism === ==== Postwar experimental poetry ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_New_American_Poetry_1945%E2%80%931960 The New American Poetry 1945–1960 - Wikipedia] ==== The nouveau roman and Tel Quel ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nouveau_roman Nouveau roman - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tel_Quel Tel Quel - Wikipedia] ==== Lettrism and situationism ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lettrism Lettrism - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Situationist_International Situationist International - Wikipedia] ==== OuLiPo and proceduralism ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constrained_writing Constrained writing - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oulipo Oulipo - Wikipedia] ==== Metafiction ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metafiction Metafiction - Wikipedia] ==== Postmodern literature ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Postmodern_literature Postmodern literature - Wikipedia] === Experiments with identity === ==== Twentieth-century avant-garde women writers ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kathy_Acker Kathy Acker - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Djuna_Barnes Djuna Barnes - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jane_Bowles Jane Bowles - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H.D. H.D. - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toni_Morrison Toni Morrison - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bharati_Mukherjee Bharati Mukherjee - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ana%C3%AFs_Nin Anaïs Nin - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joyce_Carol_Oates Joyce Carol Oates - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_Rhys Jean Rhys - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dorothy_Richardson Dorothy Richardson - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gertrude_Stein Gertrude Stein - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virginia_Woolf Virginia Woolf - Wikipedia] ==== Twentieth-century avant-garde African-American poets ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russell_Atkins Russell Atkins - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amiri_Baraka Amiri Baraka - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jayne_Cortez Jayne Cortez - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Negro_Digest Negro Digest - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Langston_Hughes Langston Hughes - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ted_Joans Ted Joans - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Percy_Johnston Percy Johnston - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bob_Kaufman Bob Kaufman - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Melvin_Kelley William Melvin Kelley - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nathaniel_Mackey Nathaniel Mackey - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clarence_Major Clarence Major - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tracie_Morris Tracie Morris - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harryette_Mullen Harryette Mullen - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Claudia_Rankine Claudia Rankine - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gil_Scott-Heron Gil Scott-Heron - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lorenzo_Thomas_(poet) Lorenzo Thomas (poet) - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Melvin_B._Tolson Melvin B. Tolson - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_Toomer Jean Toomer - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Umbra_(poets) Umbra (poets) - Wikipedia] ==== Anglophone postcolonial poetry ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Postcolonial_literature Postcolonial literature - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G._V._Desani G. V. Desani - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wilson_Harris Wilson Harris - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dambudzo_Marechera Dambudzo Marechera - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mudrooroo Mudrooroo - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ben_Okri Ben Okri - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salman_Rushdie Salman Rushdie - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vikram_Seth Vikram Seth - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wole_Soyinka Wole Soyinka - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amos_Tutuola Amos Tutuola - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Derek_Walcott Derek Walcott - Wikipedia] === The new experimentalism === ==== Avant-Pop ==== * Avant-Pop: Fiction for a Daydream Nation (Black Ice Books) by Larry McCaffery [[https://www.librarything.com/work/512144 LibraryThing]] * After Yesterday's Crash: The Avant-Pop Anthology by Larry McCaffery [[https://www.librarything.com/work/771064 LibraryThing]] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tomas_Alfredson Tomas Alfredson - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Italo_Calvino Italo Calvino - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Umberto_Eco Umberto Eco - Wikipedia] * Betrayed by Rita Hayworth by Manuel Puig [[https://www.librarything.com/work/128453 LibraryThing]] * Naked Lunch by William S. Burroughs [[https://www.librarything.com/work/5852 LibraryThing]] * Lost in the Funhouse by John Barth [[https://www.librarything.com/work/29286 LibraryThing]] * Industrial Poetics: Demo Tracks for a Mobile Culture (Contemp North American Poetry) by Joe Amato [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2881291 LibraryThing]] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kenneth_Goldsmith Kenneth Goldsmith - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Coover Robert Coover - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angela_Carter Angela Carter - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aimee_Bender Aimee Bender - Wikipedia] * White Noise by Don DeLillo [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4953 LibraryThing]] * Gravity's Rainbow by Thomas Pynchon [[https://www.librarything.com/work/10088 LibraryThing]] * Mark Z. Danielewski's House of leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1488 LibraryThing]] * Europeana: A Brief History of the Twentieth Century by Patrik Ouředník [[https://www.librarything.com/work/179330 LibraryThing]] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mark_Leyner Mark Leyner - Wikipedia] * Traveling to Utopia: With a Brief History of the Technology by Young-Hae Chang Heavy Industries [[https://www.librarything.com/work/11864011 LibraryThing]] ==== Post-postmodernism ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Post-postmodernism Post-postmodernism - Wikipedia] ==== Globalization and transnationalism ==== ==== Altermodernist fiction ==== ==== Manifestos and ''Ars Poetica'' ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manifesto Manifesto - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ars_Poetica_(Horace) Ars Poetica (Horace) - Wikipedia] * Ars Poetica by Archibald MacLeish [[https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poetrymagazine/poems/17168/ars-poetica full text]] ==== Post-criticism ==== * Heuretics: The Logic of Invention by Gregory L. Ulmer [[https://www.librarything.com/work/173585 LibraryThing]] == Experiment now: printed matter == === Experiments with language === ==== Language poetry ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Language_poets Language poets - Wikipedia] ==== Concrete poetry and prose ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Concrete_poetry Concrete poetry - Wikipedia] ==== Found poetry and "uncreative writing" ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Found_poetry Found poetry - Wikipedia] ==== Words in visual art ==== ==== Literary inauthenticity ==== === Experiments with narrative and fiction === ==== Unnatural narratives ==== ==== Impossible worlds ==== ==== Experimental life writing ==== ==== Experimental genre fiction ==== ===== Fantasy ===== * Iron Council by China Miéville [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4813 LibraryThing]] * Vellum: The Book of All Hours by Hal Duncan [[https://www.librarything.com/work/47894 LibraryThing]] * Ink: The Book of All Hours by Hal Duncan [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1162726 LibraryThing]] ===== Science fiction ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iain_Banks Iain Banks - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephen_Baxter_(author) Stephen Baxter (author) - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Park Paul Park - Wikipedia] * Century Rain by Alastair Reynolds [[https://www.librarything.com/work/48231 LibraryThing]] * Blindsight by Peter Watts [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1333265 LibraryThing]] ===== Horror ===== * Books of Blood | Series [[https://www.librarything.com/series/Books+of+Blood LibraryThing]] * Neverwhere: The Author's Preferred Text by Neil Gaiman [[https://www.librarything.com/work/14623622 LibraryThing]] * Mark Z. Danielewski's House of leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1488 LibraryThing]] * The Everlasting by Tim Lebbon [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2811046 LibraryThing]] === Experiments with form and design === ==== Graphic narrative ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alternative_comics Alternative comics - Wikipedia] ==== Multimodal literature ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberature Liberature - Wikipedia] ==== Information design ==== * Exercises in Style by Raymond Queneau [[https://www.librarything.com/work/39048 LibraryThing]] * Double or Nothing by Raymond Federman [[https://www.librarything.com/work/151208 LibraryThing]] * The Gettysburg Powerpoint Presentation by Peter Norvig [[https://norvig.com/Gettysburg/ full text]] * Europeana: A Brief History of the Twentieth Century by Patrik Ouředník [[https://www.librarything.com/work/179330 LibraryThing]] * 2666 by Roberto Bolaño [[https://www.librarything.com/work/996213 LibraryThing]] ==== Interactive fiction ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interactive_fiction Interactive fiction - Wikipedia] == Experiment now: beyond the page == === The digital age === ==== Digital fiction ==== ==== Code poetry and new-media literature ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Code_poetry Code poetry - Wikipedia] ==== Computer gaming ==== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Art_game Art game - Wikipedia] ==== Virtual autobiography ==== == Planned updates == * Add links to the empty categories. * Add a description for each category. * Add authors and works for the categories that only have general links. * Add links from other sites. * Normalize the reference formatting. [[Category:Developing]] [[Category:Lists]] [[Category:Experimental Literature]] 7d31264d1f08beed9f1358a50bb35d667080439e 427 426 2019-04-21T04:28:03Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the RCEL chapters. wikitext text/x-wiki == Introduction == This article is a list of links to authors, works, and categories in experimental literature. Its purpose is to give you a starting point for exploring works in this set of genres. I've based the list's organization on ''The Routledge Companion to Experimental Literature'' (RCEL), a collection of scholarly essays on the subject. This project is a work in progress. == How to use this list == If a category is well established in the field, I've linked to its Wikipedia article. If the author of the RCEL article was conducting their own survey of the category, I've listed the authors and works they cover with links to Wikipedia and LibraryThing wherever corresponding pages are available. I've also included links to a work's full text when that's available and links to background information from other sources. === Wikipedia === Wikipedia articles will give you background information on their subject, and they'll usually contain bibliographies that will point you to works related to that subject, such as works in the category or works by the author. === LibraryThing === LibraryThing is a social library catalog website that lets you catalog your collection. Here I'm using it for its recommendation features and its links to other sites. When you visit a work's LibraryThing page, you can find related works in the "LibraryThing Recommendations" section and the "Member recommendations" section. You can also click on the tags users have assigned to it. Each tag link takes you to a page for that tag, which lists other works that have been assigned it, as well as related tags, subjects, and tagmashes, which are combinations of tags. You can [https://wiki.librarything.com/index.php/HelpThing:Tagmash create your own tagmashes]. In the upper right sidebar of a work's LibraryThing page, you'll find links to its corresponding page on other catalog websites, such as Amazon, Google Books, and WorldCat, a shared catalog of physical libraries worldwide. These sites will often let you look through a preview of the book. They'll also give you ways to find other related works, usually by recommendations or subject links on the work's page. If you're logged in, you can edit this section to show links from a long list of other sites. == General == * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Experimental_literature Experimental literature - Wikipedia] * Bray, Joe, Alison Gibbons, and Brian McHale, eds. ''The Routledge Companion to Experimental Literature''. Routledge Companions. London: Routledge, 2015. [[https://www.librarything.com/work/18336113 LibraryThing]] == The historical avant-gardes == === Modernist-era experimentalism === ==== Futurism ==== * RCEL Chapter 2: "Italian Futurism and Russian Cubo-Futurism" by John White * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Futurism_(literature) Futurism (literature) - Wikipedia] ==== Expressionism ==== * RCEL Chapter 3: "The poetics of animism: Realism and the fantastic in expressionist literature and film" by Richard Murphy * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Expressionism Expressionism - Wikipedia] ==== Surrealism ==== * RCEL Chapter 4: "The surrealist experiments with language" by Peter Stockwell * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surrealism Surrealism - Wikipedia] ==== Absurdism ==== * RCEL Chapter 5: "The literary absurd" by Joanna Gavins * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Absurdist_fiction Absurdist fiction - Wikipedia] === Postmodernist experimentalism === ==== Postwar experimental poetry ==== * RCEL Chapter 6: "Spontaneity and improvisation in postwar experimental poetry" by Benjamin Lee * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_New_American_Poetry_1945%E2%80%931960 The New American Poetry 1945–1960 - Wikipedia] ==== The ''nouveau roman'' and ''Tel Quel'' ==== * RCEL Chapter 7: "The ''nouveau roman'' and ''Tel Quel''" by Danielle Marx-Scouras * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nouveau_roman Nouveau roman - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tel_Quel Tel Quel - Wikipedia] ==== Lettrism and situationism ==== * RCEL Chapter 8: "Lettrism and situationism" by Tyrus Miller * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lettrism Lettrism - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Situationist_International Situationist International - Wikipedia] ==== OuLiPo and proceduralism ==== * RCEL Chapter 9: "OuLiPo and proceduralism" by Jan Baetens * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constrained_writing Constrained writing - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oulipo Oulipo - Wikipedia] ==== Metafiction ==== * RCEL Chapter 10: "Metafiction" by R. M. Berry * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metafiction Metafiction - Wikipedia] ==== Postmodern literature ==== * RCEL Chapter 11: "Postmodernism and experiment" by Brian McHale * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Postmodern_literature Postmodern literature - Wikipedia] === Experiments with identity === ==== Twentieth-century avant-garde women writers ==== * RCEL Chapter 12: "Sexing the text: Women’s avant-garde writing in the twentieth century" by Ellen G. Friedman * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kathy_Acker Kathy Acker - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Djuna_Barnes Djuna Barnes - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jane_Bowles Jane Bowles - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H.D. H.D. - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toni_Morrison Toni Morrison - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bharati_Mukherjee Bharati Mukherjee - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ana%C3%AFs_Nin Anaïs Nin - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joyce_Carol_Oates Joyce Carol Oates - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_Rhys Jean Rhys - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dorothy_Richardson Dorothy Richardson - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gertrude_Stein Gertrude Stein - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virginia_Woolf Virginia Woolf - Wikipedia] ==== Twentieth-century avant-garde African-American poets ==== * RCEL Chapter 13: "Experiments in black: African-American avant-garde poetics" by Aldon Lynn Nielsen * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russell_Atkins Russell Atkins - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amiri_Baraka Amiri Baraka - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jayne_Cortez Jayne Cortez - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Negro_Digest Negro Digest - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Langston_Hughes Langston Hughes - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ted_Joans Ted Joans - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Percy_Johnston Percy Johnston - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bob_Kaufman Bob Kaufman - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Melvin_Kelley William Melvin Kelley - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nathaniel_Mackey Nathaniel Mackey - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clarence_Major Clarence Major - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tracie_Morris Tracie Morris - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harryette_Mullen Harryette Mullen - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Claudia_Rankine Claudia Rankine - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gil_Scott-Heron Gil Scott-Heron - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lorenzo_Thomas_(poet) Lorenzo Thomas (poet) - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Melvin_B._Tolson Melvin B. Tolson - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_Toomer Jean Toomer - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Umbra_(poets) Umbra (poets) - Wikipedia] ==== Anglophone postcolonial poetry ==== * RCEL Chapter 14: "The limits of hybridity: Language and innovation in Anglophone postcolonial poetry" by Priyamvada Gopal * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Postcolonial_literature Postcolonial literature - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G._V._Desani G. V. Desani - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wilson_Harris Wilson Harris - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dambudzo_Marechera Dambudzo Marechera - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mudrooroo Mudrooroo - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ben_Okri Ben Okri - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salman_Rushdie Salman Rushdie - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vikram_Seth Vikram Seth - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wole_Soyinka Wole Soyinka - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amos_Tutuola Amos Tutuola - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Derek_Walcott Derek Walcott - Wikipedia] === The new experimentalism === ==== Avant-Pop ==== * RCEL Chapter 15: "Avant-Pop" by Lance Olsen * Avant-Pop: Fiction for a Daydream Nation (Black Ice Books) by Larry McCaffery [[https://www.librarything.com/work/512144 LibraryThing]] * After Yesterday's Crash: The Avant-Pop Anthology by Larry McCaffery [[https://www.librarything.com/work/771064 LibraryThing]] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tomas_Alfredson Tomas Alfredson - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Italo_Calvino Italo Calvino - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Umberto_Eco Umberto Eco - Wikipedia] * Betrayed by Rita Hayworth by Manuel Puig [[https://www.librarything.com/work/128453 LibraryThing]] * Naked Lunch by William S. Burroughs [[https://www.librarything.com/work/5852 LibraryThing]] * Lost in the Funhouse by John Barth [[https://www.librarything.com/work/29286 LibraryThing]] * Industrial Poetics: Demo Tracks for a Mobile Culture (Contemp North American Poetry) by Joe Amato [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2881291 LibraryThing]] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kenneth_Goldsmith Kenneth Goldsmith - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Coover Robert Coover - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angela_Carter Angela Carter - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aimee_Bender Aimee Bender - Wikipedia] * White Noise by Don DeLillo [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4953 LibraryThing]] * Gravity's Rainbow by Thomas Pynchon [[https://www.librarything.com/work/10088 LibraryThing]] * Mark Z. Danielewski's House of leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1488 LibraryThing]] * Europeana: A Brief History of the Twentieth Century by Patrik Ouředník [[https://www.librarything.com/work/179330 LibraryThing]] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mark_Leyner Mark Leyner - Wikipedia] * Traveling to Utopia: With a Brief History of the Technology by Young-Hae Chang Heavy Industries [[https://www.librarything.com/work/11864011 LibraryThing]] ==== Post-postmodernism ==== * RCEL Chapter 16: "Post-postmodernism" by Robert L. McLaughlin * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Post-postmodernism Post-postmodernism - Wikipedia] ==== Globalization and transnationalism ==== * RCEL Chapter 17: "Globalization and transnationalism" by Liam Connell ==== Altermodernist fiction ==== * RCEL Chapter 18: "Altermodernist fiction" by Alison Gibbons ==== Manifestos and ''Ars Poetica'' ==== * RCEL Chapter 19: "Manifestos and ''Ars Poetica''" by Laura Winkiel * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manifesto Manifesto - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ars_Poetica_(Horace) Ars Poetica (Horace) - Wikipedia] * Ars Poetica by Archibald MacLeish [[https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poetrymagazine/poems/17168/ars-poetica full text]] ==== Post-criticism ==== * RCEL Chapter 20: "Post-criticism: Conceptual takes" by Gregory L. Ulmer * Heuretics: The Logic of Invention by Gregory L. Ulmer [[https://www.librarything.com/work/173585 LibraryThing]] == Experiment now: printed matter == === Experiments with language === ==== Language poetry ==== * RCEL Chapter 21: "The expanded field of ''L=A=N=G=U=A=G=E''" by Charles Bernstein * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Language_poets Language poets - Wikipedia] ==== Concrete poetry and prose ==== * RCEL Chapter 22: "Concrete poetry and prose" by Joe Bray * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Concrete_poetry Concrete poetry - Wikipedia] ==== Found poetry and "uncreative writing" ==== * RCEL Chapter 23: "Found poetry, 'uncreative writing,' and the art of appropriation" by Andrew Epstein * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Found_poetry Found poetry - Wikipedia] ==== Words in visual art ==== * RCEL Chapter 24: "Words in visual art" by Jessica Prinz ==== Literary inauthenticity ==== * RCEL Chapter 25: "Hoax-poetry and inauthenticity" by Philip Mead === Experiments with narrative and fiction === ==== Unnatural narratives ==== * RCEL Chapter 26: "Unnatural voices, minds, and narration" by Jan Alber, Henrik Skov Nielsen, and Brian Richardson ==== Impossible worlds ==== * RCEL Chapter 27: "Impossible worlds" by Marie-Laure Ryan ==== Experimental life writing ==== * RCEL Chapter 28: "Experimental life writing" by Irene Kacandes ==== Experimental genre fiction ==== * RCEL Chapter 29: "'Rotting time': Genre fiction and the avant-garde" by Elana Gomel ===== Fantasy ===== * Iron Council by China Miéville [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4813 LibraryThing]] * Vellum: The Book of All Hours by Hal Duncan [[https://www.librarything.com/work/47894 LibraryThing]] * Ink: The Book of All Hours by Hal Duncan [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1162726 LibraryThing]] ===== Science fiction ===== * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iain_Banks Iain Banks - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephen_Baxter_(author) Stephen Baxter (author) - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Park Paul Park - Wikipedia] * Century Rain by Alastair Reynolds [[https://www.librarything.com/work/48231 LibraryThing]] * Blindsight by Peter Watts [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1333265 LibraryThing]] ===== Horror ===== * Books of Blood | Series [[https://www.librarything.com/series/Books+of+Blood LibraryThing]] * Neverwhere: The Author's Preferred Text by Neil Gaiman [[https://www.librarything.com/work/14623622 LibraryThing]] * Mark Z. Danielewski's House of leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1488 LibraryThing]] * The Everlasting by Tim Lebbon [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2811046 LibraryThing]] === Experiments with form and design === ==== Graphic narrative ==== * RCEL Chapter 30: "Graphic narrative" by Hillary Chute * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alternative_comics Alternative comics - Wikipedia] ==== Multimodal literature ==== * RCEL Chapter 31: "Multimodal literature and experimentation" by Alison Gibbons * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberature Liberature - Wikipedia] ==== Information design ==== * RCEL Chapter 32: "Information design, emergent culture and experimental form in the novel" by Steve Tomasula * Exercises in Style by Raymond Queneau [[https://www.librarything.com/work/39048 LibraryThing]] * Double or Nothing by Raymond Federman [[https://www.librarything.com/work/151208 LibraryThing]] * The Gettysburg Powerpoint Presentation by Peter Norvig [[https://norvig.com/Gettysburg/ full text]] * Europeana: A Brief History of the Twentieth Century by Patrik Ouředník [[https://www.librarything.com/work/179330 LibraryThing]] * 2666 by Roberto Bolaño [[https://www.librarything.com/work/996213 LibraryThing]] ==== Interactive fiction ==== * RCEL Chapter 33: "Interactive fiction" by N. Katherine Hayles And Nick Montfort * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interactive_fiction Interactive fiction - Wikipedia] == Experiment now: beyond the page == === The digital age === ==== Digital fiction ==== * RCEL Chapter 34: "Digital fiction: Networked narratives" by David Ciccoricco ==== Code poetry and new-media literature ==== * RCEL Chapter 35: "Code poetry and new-media literature" by Steve Tomasula * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Code_poetry Code poetry - Wikipedia] ==== Computer gaming ==== * RCEL Chapter 36: "Computer gaming" by Astrid Ensslin * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Art_game Art game - Wikipedia] ==== Virtual autobiography ==== * RCEL Chapter 37: "Virtual autobiography: Autographies, interfaces, and avatars" by Amy J. Elias == Planned updates == * Add links to the empty categories. * Add a description for each category. * Add authors and works for the categories that only have general links. * Add links from other sites. * Normalize the reference formatting. [[Category:Developing]] [[Category:Lists]] [[Category:Experimental Literature]] fbe62e0f6d3ac21be2fb6441e83dd7beb701f160 428 427 2019-04-24T09:56:37Z Andy Culbertson 1 Reformatted the Wikipedia links. wikitext text/x-wiki == Introduction == This article is a list of links to authors, works, and categories in experimental literature. Its purpose is to give you a starting point for exploring works in this set of genres. I've based the list's organization on ''The Routledge Companion to Experimental Literature'' (RCEL), a collection of scholarly essays on the subject. This project is a work in progress. == How to use this list == If a category is well established in the field, I've linked to its Wikipedia article. If the author of the RCEL article was conducting their own survey of the category, I've listed the authors and works they cover with links to Wikipedia and LibraryThing wherever corresponding pages are available. I've also included links to a work's full text when that's available and links to background information from other sources. === Wikipedia === Wikipedia articles will give you background information on their subject, and they'll usually contain bibliographies that will point you to works related to that subject, such as works in the category or works by the author. === LibraryThing === LibraryThing is a social library catalog website that lets you catalog your collection. Here I'm using it for its recommendation features and its links to other sites. When you visit a work's LibraryThing page, you can find related works in the "LibraryThing Recommendations" section and the "Member recommendations" section. You can also click on the tags users have assigned to it. Each tag link takes you to a page for that tag, which lists other works that have been assigned it, as well as related tags, subjects, and tagmashes, which are combinations of tags. You can [https://wiki.librarything.com/index.php/HelpThing:Tagmash create your own tagmashes]. In the upper right sidebar of a work's LibraryThing page, you'll find links to its corresponding page on other catalog websites, such as Amazon, Google Books, and WorldCat, a shared catalog of physical libraries worldwide. These sites will often let you look through a preview of the book. They'll also give you ways to find other related works, usually by recommendations or subject links on the work's page. If you're logged in, you can edit this section to show links from a long list of other sites. == General == * Experimental literature [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Experimental_literature Wikipedia]] * Bray, Joe, Alison Gibbons, and Brian McHale, eds. ''The Routledge Companion to Experimental Literature''. Routledge Companions. London: Routledge, 2015. [[https://www.librarything.com/work/18336113 LibraryThing]] == The historical avant-gardes == === Modernist-era experimentalism === ==== Futurism ==== * RCEL Chapter 2: "Italian Futurism and Russian Cubo-Futurism" by John White * Futurism (literature) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Futurism_(literature) Wikipedia]] ==== Expressionism ==== * RCEL Chapter 3: "The poetics of animism: Realism and the fantastic in expressionist literature and film" by Richard Murphy * Expressionism [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Expressionism Wikipedia]] ==== Surrealism ==== * RCEL Chapter 4: "The surrealist experiments with language" by Peter Stockwell * Surrealism [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surrealism Wikipedia]] ==== Absurdism ==== * RCEL Chapter 5: "The literary absurd" by Joanna Gavins * Absurdist fiction [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Absurdist_fiction Wikipedia]] === Postmodernist experimentalism === ==== Postwar experimental poetry ==== * RCEL Chapter 6: "Spontaneity and improvisation in postwar experimental poetry" by Benjamin Lee * The New American Poetry 1945–1960 [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_New_American_Poetry_1945%E2%80%931960 Wikipedia]] ==== The ''nouveau roman'' and ''Tel Quel'' ==== * RCEL Chapter 7: "The ''nouveau roman'' and ''Tel Quel''" by Danielle Marx-Scouras * Nouveau roman [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nouveau_roman Wikipedia]] * Tel Quel [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tel_Quel Wikipedia]] ==== Lettrism and situationism ==== * RCEL Chapter 8: "Lettrism and situationism" by Tyrus Miller * Lettrism [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lettrism Wikipedia]] * Situationist International [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Situationist_International Wikipedia]] ==== OuLiPo and proceduralism ==== * RCEL Chapter 9: "OuLiPo and proceduralism" by Jan Baetens * Constrained writing [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constrained_writing Wikipedia]] * Oulipo [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oulipo Wikipedia]] ==== Metafiction ==== * RCEL Chapter 10: "Metafiction" by R. M. Berry * Metafiction [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metafiction Wikipedia]] ==== Postmodern literature ==== * RCEL Chapter 11: "Postmodernism and experiment" by Brian McHale * Postmodern literature [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Postmodern_literature Wikipedia]] === Experiments with identity === ==== Twentieth-century avant-garde women writers ==== * RCEL Chapter 12: "Sexing the text: Women’s avant-garde writing in the twentieth century" by Ellen G. Friedman * Kathy Acker [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kathy_Acker Wikipedia]] * Djuna Barnes [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Djuna_Barnes Wikipedia]] * Jane Bowles [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jane_Bowles Wikipedia]] * H.D. [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H.D. Wikipedia]] * Toni Morrison [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toni_Morrison Wikipedia]] * Bharati Mukherjee [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bharati_Mukherjee Wikipedia]] * Anaïs Nin [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ana%C3%AFs_Nin Wikipedia]] * Joyce Carol Oates [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joyce_Carol_Oates Wikipedia]] * Jean Rhys [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_Rhys Wikipedia]] * Dorothy Richardson [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dorothy_Richardson Wikipedia]] * Gertrude Stein [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gertrude_Stein Wikipedia]] * Virginia Woolf [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virginia_Woolf Wikipedia]] ==== Twentieth-century avant-garde African-American poets ==== * RCEL Chapter 13: "Experiments in black: African-American avant-garde poetics" by Aldon Lynn Nielsen * Russell Atkins [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russell_Atkins Wikipedia]] * Amiri Baraka [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amiri_Baraka Wikipedia]] * Jayne Cortez [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jayne_Cortez Wikipedia]] * Negro Digest [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Negro_Digest Wikipedia]] * Langston Hughes [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Langston_Hughes Wikipedia]] * Ted Joans [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ted_Joans Wikipedia]] * Percy Johnston [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Percy_Johnston Wikipedia]] * Bob Kaufman [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bob_Kaufman Wikipedia]] * William Melvin Kelley [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Melvin_Kelley Wikipedia]] * Nathaniel Mackey [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nathaniel_Mackey Wikipedia]] * Clarence Major [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clarence_Major Wikipedia]] * Tracie Morris [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tracie_Morris Wikipedia]] * Harryette Mullen [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harryette_Mullen Wikipedia]] * Claudia Rankine [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Claudia_Rankine Wikipedia]] * Gil Scott-Heron [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gil_Scott-Heron Wikipedia]] * Lorenzo Thomas (poet) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lorenzo_Thomas_(poet) Wikipedia]] * Melvin B. Tolson [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Melvin_B._Tolson Wikipedia]] * Jean Toomer [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_Toomer Wikipedia]] * Umbra (poets) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Umbra_(poets) Wikipedia]] ==== Anglophone postcolonial poetry ==== * RCEL Chapter 14: "The limits of hybridity: Language and innovation in Anglophone postcolonial poetry" by Priyamvada Gopal * Postcolonial literature [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Postcolonial_literature Wikipedia]] * G. V. Desani [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G._V._Desani Wikipedia]] * Wilson Harris [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wilson_Harris Wikipedia]] * Dambudzo Marechera [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dambudzo_Marechera Wikipedia]] * Mudrooroo [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mudrooroo Wikipedia]] * Ben Okri [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ben_Okri Wikipedia]] * Salman Rushdie [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salman_Rushdie Wikipedia]] * Vikram Seth [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vikram_Seth Wikipedia]] * Wole Soyinka [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wole_Soyinka Wikipedia]] * Amos Tutuola [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amos_Tutuola Wikipedia]] * Derek Walcott [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Derek_Walcott Wikipedia]] === The new experimentalism === ==== Avant-Pop ==== * RCEL Chapter 15: "Avant-Pop" by Lance Olsen * Avant-Pop: Fiction for a Daydream Nation (Black Ice Books) by Larry McCaffery [[https://www.librarything.com/work/512144 LibraryThing]] * After Yesterday's Crash: The Avant-Pop Anthology by Larry McCaffery [[https://www.librarything.com/work/771064 LibraryThing]] * Tomas Alfredson [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tomas_Alfredson Wikipedia]] * Italo Calvino [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Italo_Calvino Wikipedia]] * Umberto Eco [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Umberto_Eco Wikipedia]] * Betrayed by Rita Hayworth by Manuel Puig [[https://www.librarything.com/work/128453 LibraryThing]] * Naked Lunch by William S. Burroughs [[https://www.librarything.com/work/5852 LibraryThing]] * Lost in the Funhouse by John Barth [[https://www.librarything.com/work/29286 LibraryThing]] * Industrial Poetics: Demo Tracks for a Mobile Culture (Contemp North American Poetry) by Joe Amato [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2881291 LibraryThing]] * Kenneth Goldsmith [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kenneth_Goldsmith Wikipedia]] * Robert Coover [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Coover Wikipedia]] * Angela Carter [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angela_Carter Wikipedia]] * Aimee Bender [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aimee_Bender Wikipedia]] * White Noise by Don DeLillo [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4953 LibraryThing]] * Gravity's Rainbow by Thomas Pynchon [[https://www.librarything.com/work/10088 LibraryThing]] * Mark Z. Danielewski's House of leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1488 LibraryThing]] * Europeana: A Brief History of the Twentieth Century by Patrik Ouředník [[https://www.librarything.com/work/179330 LibraryThing]] * Mark Leyner [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mark_Leyner Wikipedia]] * Traveling to Utopia: With a Brief History of the Technology by Young-Hae Chang Heavy Industries [[https://www.librarything.com/work/11864011 LibraryThing]] ==== Post-postmodernism ==== * RCEL Chapter 16: "Post-postmodernism" by Robert L. McLaughlin * Post-postmodernism [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Post-postmodernism Wikipedia]] ==== Globalization and transnationalism ==== * RCEL Chapter 17: "Globalization and transnationalism" by Liam Connell ==== Altermodernist fiction ==== * RCEL Chapter 18: "Altermodernist fiction" by Alison Gibbons ==== Manifestos and ''Ars Poetica'' ==== * RCEL Chapter 19: "Manifestos and ''Ars Poetica''" by Laura Winkiel * Manifesto [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manifesto Wikipedia]] * Ars Poetica (Horace) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ars_Poetica_(Horace) Wikipedia]] * Ars Poetica by Archibald MacLeish [[https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poetrymagazine/poems/17168/ars-poetica full text]] ==== Post-criticism ==== * RCEL Chapter 20: "Post-criticism: Conceptual takes" by Gregory L. Ulmer * Heuretics: The Logic of Invention by Gregory L. Ulmer [[https://www.librarything.com/work/173585 LibraryThing]] == Experiment now: printed matter == === Experiments with language === ==== Language poetry ==== * RCEL Chapter 21: "The expanded field of ''L=A=N=G=U=A=G=E''" by Charles Bernstein * Language poets [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Language_poets Wikipedia]] ==== Concrete poetry and prose ==== * RCEL Chapter 22: "Concrete poetry and prose" by Joe Bray * Concrete poetry [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Concrete_poetry Wikipedia]] ==== Found poetry and "uncreative writing" ==== * RCEL Chapter 23: "Found poetry, 'uncreative writing,' and the art of appropriation" by Andrew Epstein * Found poetry [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Found_poetry Wikipedia]] ==== Words in visual art ==== * RCEL Chapter 24: "Words in visual art" by Jessica Prinz ==== Literary inauthenticity ==== * RCEL Chapter 25: "Hoax-poetry and inauthenticity" by Philip Mead === Experiments with narrative and fiction === ==== Unnatural narratives ==== * RCEL Chapter 26: "Unnatural voices, minds, and narration" by Jan Alber, Henrik Skov Nielsen, and Brian Richardson ==== Impossible worlds ==== * RCEL Chapter 27: "Impossible worlds" by Marie-Laure Ryan ==== Experimental life writing ==== * RCEL Chapter 28: "Experimental life writing" by Irene Kacandes ==== Experimental genre fiction ==== * RCEL Chapter 29: "'Rotting time': Genre fiction and the avant-garde" by Elana Gomel ===== Fantasy ===== * Iron Council by China Miéville [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4813 LibraryThing]] * Vellum: The Book of All Hours by Hal Duncan [[https://www.librarything.com/work/47894 LibraryThing]] * Ink: The Book of All Hours by Hal Duncan [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1162726 LibraryThing]] ===== Science fiction ===== * Iain Banks [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iain_Banks Wikipedia]] * Stephen Baxter (author) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephen_Baxter_(author) Wikipedia]] * Paul Park [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Park Wikipedia]] * Century Rain by Alastair Reynolds [[https://www.librarything.com/work/48231 LibraryThing]] * Blindsight by Peter Watts [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1333265 LibraryThing]] ===== Horror ===== * Books of Blood | Series [[https://www.librarything.com/series/Books+of+Blood LibraryThing]] * Neverwhere: The Author's Preferred Text by Neil Gaiman [[https://www.librarything.com/work/14623622 LibraryThing]] * Mark Z. Danielewski's House of leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1488 LibraryThing]] * The Everlasting by Tim Lebbon [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2811046 LibraryThing]] === Experiments with form and design === ==== Graphic narrative ==== * RCEL Chapter 30: "Graphic narrative" by Hillary Chute * Alternative comics [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alternative_comics Wikipedia]] ==== Multimodal literature ==== * RCEL Chapter 31: "Multimodal literature and experimentation" by Alison Gibbons * Liberature [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberature Wikipedia]] ==== Information design ==== * RCEL Chapter 32: "Information design, emergent culture and experimental form in the novel" by Steve Tomasula * Exercises in Style by Raymond Queneau [[https://www.librarything.com/work/39048 LibraryThing]] * Double or Nothing by Raymond Federman [[https://www.librarything.com/work/151208 LibraryThing]] * The Gettysburg Powerpoint Presentation by Peter Norvig [[https://norvig.com/Gettysburg/ full text]] * Europeana: A Brief History of the Twentieth Century by Patrik Ouředník [[https://www.librarything.com/work/179330 LibraryThing]] * 2666 by Roberto Bolaño [[https://www.librarything.com/work/996213 LibraryThing]] ==== Interactive fiction ==== * RCEL Chapter 33: "Interactive fiction" by N. Katherine Hayles And Nick Montfort * Interactive fiction [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interactive_fiction Wikipedia]] == Experiment now: beyond the page == === The digital age === ==== Digital fiction ==== * RCEL Chapter 34: "Digital fiction: Networked narratives" by David Ciccoricco ==== Code poetry and new-media literature ==== * RCEL Chapter 35: "Code poetry and new-media literature" by Steve Tomasula * Code poetry [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Code_poetry Wikipedia]] ==== Computer gaming ==== * RCEL Chapter 36: "Computer gaming" by Astrid Ensslin * Art game [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Art_game Wikipedia]] ==== Virtual autobiography ==== * RCEL Chapter 37: "Virtual autobiography: Autographies, interfaces, and avatars" by Amy J. Elias == Planned updates == * Add links to the empty categories. * Add a description for each category. * Add authors and works for the categories that only have general links. * Add links from other sites. * Normalize the reference formatting. [[Category:Developing]] [[Category:Lists]] [[Category:Experimental Literature]] ae8485de1f1c39aca73216caf01eac9aa8aba169 429 428 2019-04-27T16:01:02Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added Stephen Jonas, David Clark, and the links for "Globalization and transnationalism" and "Altermodernist fiction." wikitext text/x-wiki == Introduction == This article is a list of links to authors, works, and categories in experimental literature. Its purpose is to give you a starting point for exploring works in this set of genres. I've based the list's organization on ''The Routledge Companion to Experimental Literature'' (RCEL), a collection of scholarly essays on the subject. This project is a work in progress. == How to use this list == If a category is well established in the field, I've linked to its Wikipedia article. If the author of the RCEL article was conducting their own survey of the category, I've listed the authors and works they cover with links to Wikipedia and LibraryThing wherever corresponding pages are available. I've also included links to a work's full text when that's available and links to background information from other sources. === Wikipedia === Wikipedia articles will give you background information on their subject, and they'll usually contain bibliographies that will point you to works related to that subject, such as works in the category or works by the author. === LibraryThing === LibraryThing is a social library catalog website that lets you catalog your collection. Here I'm using it for its recommendation features and its links to other sites. When you visit a work's LibraryThing page, you can find related works in the "LibraryThing Recommendations" section and the "Member recommendations" section. You can also click on the tags users have assigned to it. Each tag link takes you to a page for that tag, which lists other works that have been assigned it, as well as related tags, subjects, and tagmashes, which are combinations of tags. You can [https://wiki.librarything.com/index.php/HelpThing:Tagmash create your own tagmashes]. In the upper right sidebar of a work's LibraryThing page, you'll find links to its corresponding page on other catalog websites, such as Amazon, Google Books, and WorldCat, a shared catalog of physical libraries worldwide. These sites will often let you look through a preview of the book. They'll also give you ways to find other related works, usually by recommendations or subject links on the work's page. If you're logged in, you can edit this section to show links from a long list of other sites. == General == * Experimental literature [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Experimental_literature Wikipedia]] * Bray, Joe, Alison Gibbons, and Brian McHale, eds. ''The Routledge Companion to Experimental Literature''. Routledge Companions. London: Routledge, 2015. [[https://www.librarything.com/work/18336113 LibraryThing]] == The historical avant-gardes == === Modernist-era experimentalism === ==== Futurism ==== * RCEL Chapter 2: "Italian Futurism and Russian Cubo-Futurism" by John White * Futurism (literature) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Futurism_(literature) Wikipedia]] ==== Expressionism ==== * RCEL Chapter 3: "The poetics of animism: Realism and the fantastic in expressionist literature and film" by Richard Murphy * Expressionism [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Expressionism Wikipedia]] ==== Surrealism ==== * RCEL Chapter 4: "The surrealist experiments with language" by Peter Stockwell * Surrealism [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surrealism Wikipedia]] ==== Absurdism ==== * RCEL Chapter 5: "The literary absurd" by Joanna Gavins * Absurdist fiction [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Absurdist_fiction Wikipedia]] === Postmodernist experimentalism === ==== Postwar experimental poetry ==== * RCEL Chapter 6: "Spontaneity and improvisation in postwar experimental poetry" by Benjamin Lee * The New American Poetry 1945–1960 [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_New_American_Poetry_1945%E2%80%931960 Wikipedia]] ==== The ''nouveau roman'' and ''Tel Quel'' ==== * RCEL Chapter 7: "The ''nouveau roman'' and ''Tel Quel''" by Danielle Marx-Scouras * Nouveau roman [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nouveau_roman Wikipedia]] * Tel Quel [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tel_Quel Wikipedia]] ==== Lettrism and situationism ==== * RCEL Chapter 8: "Lettrism and situationism" by Tyrus Miller * Lettrism [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lettrism Wikipedia]] * Situationist International [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Situationist_International Wikipedia]] ==== OuLiPo and proceduralism ==== * RCEL Chapter 9: "OuLiPo and proceduralism" by Jan Baetens * Constrained writing [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constrained_writing Wikipedia]] * Oulipo [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oulipo Wikipedia]] ==== Metafiction ==== * RCEL Chapter 10: "Metafiction" by R. M. Berry * Metafiction [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metafiction Wikipedia]] ==== Postmodern literature ==== * RCEL Chapter 11: "Postmodernism and experiment" by Brian McHale * Postmodern literature [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Postmodern_literature Wikipedia]] === Experiments with identity === ==== Twentieth-century avant-garde women writers ==== * RCEL Chapter 12: "Sexing the text: Women’s avant-garde writing in the twentieth century" by Ellen G. Friedman * Kathy Acker [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kathy_Acker Wikipedia]] * Djuna Barnes [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Djuna_Barnes Wikipedia]] * Jane Bowles [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jane_Bowles Wikipedia]] * H.D. [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H.D. Wikipedia]] * Toni Morrison [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toni_Morrison Wikipedia]] * Bharati Mukherjee [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bharati_Mukherjee Wikipedia]] * Anaïs Nin [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ana%C3%AFs_Nin Wikipedia]] * Joyce Carol Oates [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joyce_Carol_Oates Wikipedia]] * Jean Rhys [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_Rhys Wikipedia]] * Dorothy Richardson [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dorothy_Richardson Wikipedia]] * Gertrude Stein [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gertrude_Stein Wikipedia]] * Virginia Woolf [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virginia_Woolf Wikipedia]] ==== Twentieth-century avant-garde African-American poets ==== * RCEL Chapter 13: "Experiments in black: African-American avant-garde poetics" by Aldon Lynn Nielsen * Russell Atkins [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russell_Atkins Wikipedia]] * Amiri Baraka [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amiri_Baraka Wikipedia]] * Jayne Cortez [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jayne_Cortez Wikipedia]] * Negro Digest [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Negro_Digest Wikipedia]] * Langston Hughes [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Langston_Hughes Wikipedia]] * Ted Joans [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ted_Joans Wikipedia]] * Percy Johnston [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Percy_Johnston Wikipedia]] * Bob Kaufman [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bob_Kaufman Wikipedia]] * Stephen Jonas [[https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems-and-poets/poets/detail/stephen-jonas Poetry Foundation]] * William Melvin Kelley [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Melvin_Kelley Wikipedia]] * Nathaniel Mackey [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nathaniel_Mackey Wikipedia]] * Clarence Major [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clarence_Major Wikipedia]] * Tracie Morris [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tracie_Morris Wikipedia]] * Harryette Mullen [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harryette_Mullen Wikipedia]] * Claudia Rankine [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Claudia_Rankine Wikipedia]] * Gil Scott-Heron [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gil_Scott-Heron Wikipedia]] * Lorenzo Thomas (poet) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lorenzo_Thomas_(poet) Wikipedia]] * Melvin B. Tolson [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Melvin_B._Tolson Wikipedia]] * Jean Toomer [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_Toomer Wikipedia]] * Umbra (poets) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Umbra_(poets) Wikipedia]] ==== Anglophone postcolonial poetry ==== * RCEL Chapter 14: "The limits of hybridity: Language and innovation in Anglophone postcolonial poetry" by Priyamvada Gopal * Postcolonial literature [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Postcolonial_literature Wikipedia]] * G. V. Desani [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G._V._Desani Wikipedia]] * Wilson Harris [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wilson_Harris Wikipedia]] * Dambudzo Marechera [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dambudzo_Marechera Wikipedia]] * Mudrooroo [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mudrooroo Wikipedia]] * Ben Okri [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ben_Okri Wikipedia]] * Salman Rushdie [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salman_Rushdie Wikipedia]] * Vikram Seth [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vikram_Seth Wikipedia]] * Wole Soyinka [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wole_Soyinka Wikipedia]] * Amos Tutuola [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amos_Tutuola Wikipedia]] * Derek Walcott [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Derek_Walcott Wikipedia]] === The new experimentalism === ==== Avant-Pop ==== * RCEL Chapter 15: "Avant-Pop" by Lance Olsen * Avant-Pop: Fiction for a Daydream Nation (Black Ice Books) by Larry McCaffery [[https://www.librarything.com/work/512144 LibraryThing]] * After Yesterday's Crash: The Avant-Pop Anthology by Larry McCaffery [[https://www.librarything.com/work/771064 LibraryThing]] * Tomas Alfredson [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tomas_Alfredson Wikipedia]] * Italo Calvino [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Italo_Calvino Wikipedia]] * David Clark [[https://elmcip.net/node/622 ELMCIP]] * Umberto Eco [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Umberto_Eco Wikipedia]] * Betrayed by Rita Hayworth by Manuel Puig [[https://www.librarything.com/work/128453 LibraryThing]] * Naked Lunch by William S. Burroughs [[https://www.librarything.com/work/5852 LibraryThing]] * Lost in the Funhouse by John Barth [[https://www.librarything.com/work/29286 LibraryThing]] * Industrial Poetics: Demo Tracks for a Mobile Culture (Contemp North American Poetry) by Joe Amato [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2881291 LibraryThing]] * Kenneth Goldsmith [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kenneth_Goldsmith Wikipedia]] * Robert Coover [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Coover Wikipedia]] * Angela Carter [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angela_Carter Wikipedia]] * Aimee Bender [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aimee_Bender Wikipedia]] * White Noise by Don DeLillo [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4953 LibraryThing]] * Gravity's Rainbow by Thomas Pynchon [[https://www.librarything.com/work/10088 LibraryThing]] * Mark Z. Danielewski's House of leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1488 LibraryThing]] * Europeana: A Brief History of the Twentieth Century by Patrik Ouředník [[https://www.librarything.com/work/179330 LibraryThing]] * Mark Leyner [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mark_Leyner Wikipedia]] * Traveling to Utopia: With a Brief History of the Technology by Young-Hae Chang Heavy Industries [[https://www.librarything.com/work/11864011 LibraryThing]] ==== Post-postmodernism ==== * RCEL Chapter 16: "Post-postmodernism" by Robert L. McLaughlin * Post-postmodernism [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Post-postmodernism Wikipedia]] ==== Globalization and transnationalism ==== * RCEL Chapter 17: "Globalization and transnationalism" by Liam Connell * Count Zero by William Gibson [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2445 LibraryThing]] * The Fountain at the Centre of the World by Robert Newman [[https://www.librarything.com/work/18226 LibraryThing]] * Tropic of Orange by Karen Tei Yamashita [[https://www.librarything.com/work/509798 LibraryThing]] * Mark Lombardi: Global Networks by Robert Hobbs [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1066 LibraryThing]] * JPod by Douglas Coupland [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1115072 LibraryThing]] * Looking for Headless by K. D. [[https://www.librarything.com/work/10578723 LibraryThing]] ==== Altermodernist fiction ==== * RCEL Chapter 18: "Altermodernist fiction" by Alison Gibbons * The Rings of Saturn by W. G. Sebald [[https://www.librarything.com/work/28135 LibraryThing]] * Erasmus is Late by Liam Gillick [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1319708 LibraryThing]] * Shanghai Dancing by Brian Castro [[https://www.librarything.com/work/581326 LibraryThing]] * The Islanders: An Introduction by Charles Avery [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8086723 LibraryThing]] * The One Facing Us: A Novel by Ronit Matalon [[https://www.librarything.com/work/643371 LibraryThing]] * Istanbul: Memories and the City by Orhan Pamuk [[https://www.librarything.com/work/100731 LibraryThing]] * Only Revolutions by Mark Z. Danielewski [[https://www.librarything.com/work/798583 LibraryThing]] * Headless by Goldin+Senneby [[https://web.archive.org/web/20180506182844/http://www.goldinsenneby.com/gs/?p=116 Goldin+Senneby]] [[http://rhizome.org/editorial/2009/feb/04/interview-with-goldinsenneby/ Interview with Goldin+Senneby - Rhizome]] [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tOGttCSUecM Angus Cameron lecture on Headless - YouTube]] * A Visit from the Goon Squad by Jennifer Egan [[https://www.librarything.com/work/9530166 LibraryThing]] * Open City by Teju Cole [[https://www.librarything.com/work/10577676 LibraryThing]] * Rana Dasgupta [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rana_Dasgupta Wikipedia]] ==== Manifestos and ''Ars Poetica'' ==== * RCEL Chapter 19: "Manifestos and ''Ars Poetica''" by Laura Winkiel * Manifesto [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manifesto Wikipedia]] * Ars Poetica (Horace) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ars_Poetica_(Horace) Wikipedia]] * Ars Poetica by Archibald MacLeish [[https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poetrymagazine/poems/17168/ars-poetica full text]] ==== Post-criticism ==== * RCEL Chapter 20: "Post-criticism: Conceptual takes" by Gregory L. Ulmer * Heuretics: The Logic of Invention by Gregory L. Ulmer [[https://www.librarything.com/work/173585 LibraryThing]] == Experiment now: printed matter == === Experiments with language === ==== Language poetry ==== * RCEL Chapter 21: "The expanded field of ''L=A=N=G=U=A=G=E''" by Charles Bernstein * Language poets [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Language_poets Wikipedia]] ==== Concrete poetry and prose ==== * RCEL Chapter 22: "Concrete poetry and prose" by Joe Bray * Concrete poetry [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Concrete_poetry Wikipedia]] ==== Found poetry and "uncreative writing" ==== * RCEL Chapter 23: "Found poetry, 'uncreative writing,' and the art of appropriation" by Andrew Epstein * Found poetry [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Found_poetry Wikipedia]] ==== Words in visual art ==== * RCEL Chapter 24: "Words in visual art" by Jessica Prinz ==== Literary inauthenticity ==== * RCEL Chapter 25: "Hoax-poetry and inauthenticity" by Philip Mead === Experiments with narrative and fiction === ==== Unnatural narratives ==== * RCEL Chapter 26: "Unnatural voices, minds, and narration" by Jan Alber, Henrik Skov Nielsen, and Brian Richardson ==== Impossible worlds ==== * RCEL Chapter 27: "Impossible worlds" by Marie-Laure Ryan ==== Experimental life writing ==== * RCEL Chapter 28: "Experimental life writing" by Irene Kacandes ==== Experimental genre fiction ==== * RCEL Chapter 29: "'Rotting time': Genre fiction and the avant-garde" by Elana Gomel ===== Fantasy ===== * Iron Council by China Miéville [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4813 LibraryThing]] * Vellum: The Book of All Hours by Hal Duncan [[https://www.librarything.com/work/47894 LibraryThing]] * Ink: The Book of All Hours by Hal Duncan [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1162726 LibraryThing]] ===== Science fiction ===== * Iain Banks [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iain_Banks Wikipedia]] * Stephen Baxter (author) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephen_Baxter_(author) Wikipedia]] * Paul Park [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Park Wikipedia]] * Century Rain by Alastair Reynolds [[https://www.librarything.com/work/48231 LibraryThing]] * Blindsight by Peter Watts [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1333265 LibraryThing]] ===== Horror ===== * Books of Blood | Series [[https://www.librarything.com/series/Books+of+Blood LibraryThing]] * Neverwhere: The Author's Preferred Text by Neil Gaiman [[https://www.librarything.com/work/14623622 LibraryThing]] * Mark Z. Danielewski's House of leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1488 LibraryThing]] * The Everlasting by Tim Lebbon [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2811046 LibraryThing]] === Experiments with form and design === ==== Graphic narrative ==== * RCEL Chapter 30: "Graphic narrative" by Hillary Chute * Alternative comics [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alternative_comics Wikipedia]] ==== Multimodal literature ==== * RCEL Chapter 31: "Multimodal literature and experimentation" by Alison Gibbons * Liberature [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberature Wikipedia]] ==== Information design ==== * RCEL Chapter 32: "Information design, emergent culture and experimental form in the novel" by Steve Tomasula * Exercises in Style by Raymond Queneau [[https://www.librarything.com/work/39048 LibraryThing]] * Double or Nothing by Raymond Federman [[https://www.librarything.com/work/151208 LibraryThing]] * The Gettysburg Powerpoint Presentation by Peter Norvig [[https://norvig.com/Gettysburg/ full text]] * Europeana: A Brief History of the Twentieth Century by Patrik Ouředník [[https://www.librarything.com/work/179330 LibraryThing]] * 2666 by Roberto Bolaño [[https://www.librarything.com/work/996213 LibraryThing]] ==== Interactive fiction ==== * RCEL Chapter 33: "Interactive fiction" by N. Katherine Hayles And Nick Montfort * Interactive fiction [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interactive_fiction Wikipedia]] == Experiment now: beyond the page == === The digital age === ==== Digital fiction ==== * RCEL Chapter 34: "Digital fiction: Networked narratives" by David Ciccoricco ==== Code poetry and new-media literature ==== * RCEL Chapter 35: "Code poetry and new-media literature" by Steve Tomasula * Code poetry [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Code_poetry Wikipedia]] ==== Computer gaming ==== * RCEL Chapter 36: "Computer gaming" by Astrid Ensslin * Art game [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Art_game Wikipedia]] ==== Virtual autobiography ==== * RCEL Chapter 37: "Virtual autobiography: Autographies, interfaces, and avatars" by Amy J. Elias == Planned updates == * Add links to the empty categories. * Add a description for each category. * Add authors and works for the categories that only have general links. * Add links from other sites. * Normalize the reference formatting. [[Category:Developing]] [[Category:Lists]] [[Category:Experimental Literature]] c7053bc27a1d7fbd9dc35287b68c91f2dde97176 430 429 2019-04-27T22:58:41Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added links to "Literary inauthenticity." wikitext text/x-wiki == Introduction == This article is a list of links to authors, works, and categories in experimental literature. Its purpose is to give you a starting point for exploring works in this set of genres. I've based the list's organization on ''The Routledge Companion to Experimental Literature'' (RCEL), a collection of scholarly essays on the subject. This project is a work in progress. == How to use this list == If a category is well established in the field, I've linked to its Wikipedia article. If the author of the RCEL article was conducting their own survey of the category, I've listed the authors and works they cover with links to Wikipedia and LibraryThing wherever corresponding pages are available. I've also included links to a work's full text when that's available and links to background information from other sources. === Wikipedia === Wikipedia articles will give you background information on their subject, and they'll usually contain bibliographies that will point you to works related to that subject, such as works in the category or works by the author. === LibraryThing === LibraryThing is a social library catalog website that lets you catalog your collection. Here I'm using it for its recommendation features and its links to other sites. When you visit a work's LibraryThing page, you can find related works in the "LibraryThing Recommendations" section and the "Member recommendations" section. You can also click on the tags users have assigned to it. Each tag link takes you to a page for that tag, which lists other works that have been assigned it, as well as related tags, subjects, and tagmashes, which are combinations of tags. You can [https://wiki.librarything.com/index.php/HelpThing:Tagmash create your own tagmashes]. In the upper right sidebar of a work's LibraryThing page, you'll find links to its corresponding page on other catalog websites, such as Amazon, Google Books, and WorldCat, a shared catalog of physical libraries worldwide. These sites will often let you look through a preview of the book. They'll also give you ways to find other related works, usually by recommendations or subject links on the work's page. If you're logged in, you can edit this section to show links from a long list of other sites. == General == * Experimental literature [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Experimental_literature Wikipedia]] * Bray, Joe, Alison Gibbons, and Brian McHale, eds. ''The Routledge Companion to Experimental Literature''. Routledge Companions. London: Routledge, 2015. [[https://www.librarything.com/work/18336113 LibraryThing]] == The historical avant-gardes == === Modernist-era experimentalism === ==== Futurism ==== * RCEL Chapter 2: "Italian Futurism and Russian Cubo-Futurism" by John White * Futurism (literature) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Futurism_(literature) Wikipedia]] ==== Expressionism ==== * RCEL Chapter 3: "The poetics of animism: Realism and the fantastic in expressionist literature and film" by Richard Murphy * Expressionism [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Expressionism Wikipedia]] ==== Surrealism ==== * RCEL Chapter 4: "The surrealist experiments with language" by Peter Stockwell * Surrealism [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surrealism Wikipedia]] ==== Absurdism ==== * RCEL Chapter 5: "The literary absurd" by Joanna Gavins * Absurdist fiction [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Absurdist_fiction Wikipedia]] === Postmodernist experimentalism === ==== Postwar experimental poetry ==== * RCEL Chapter 6: "Spontaneity and improvisation in postwar experimental poetry" by Benjamin Lee * The New American Poetry 1945–1960 [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_New_American_Poetry_1945%E2%80%931960 Wikipedia]] ==== The ''nouveau roman'' and ''Tel Quel'' ==== * RCEL Chapter 7: "The ''nouveau roman'' and ''Tel Quel''" by Danielle Marx-Scouras * Nouveau roman [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nouveau_roman Wikipedia]] * Tel Quel [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tel_Quel Wikipedia]] ==== Lettrism and situationism ==== * RCEL Chapter 8: "Lettrism and situationism" by Tyrus Miller * Lettrism [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lettrism Wikipedia]] * Situationist International [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Situationist_International Wikipedia]] ==== OuLiPo and proceduralism ==== * RCEL Chapter 9: "OuLiPo and proceduralism" by Jan Baetens * Constrained writing [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constrained_writing Wikipedia]] * Oulipo [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oulipo Wikipedia]] ==== Metafiction ==== * RCEL Chapter 10: "Metafiction" by R. M. Berry * Metafiction [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metafiction Wikipedia]] ==== Postmodern literature ==== * RCEL Chapter 11: "Postmodernism and experiment" by Brian McHale * Postmodern literature [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Postmodern_literature Wikipedia]] === Experiments with identity === ==== Twentieth-century avant-garde women writers ==== * RCEL Chapter 12: "Sexing the text: Women’s avant-garde writing in the twentieth century" by Ellen G. Friedman * Kathy Acker [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kathy_Acker Wikipedia]] * Djuna Barnes [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Djuna_Barnes Wikipedia]] * Jane Bowles [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jane_Bowles Wikipedia]] * H.D. [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H.D. Wikipedia]] * Toni Morrison [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toni_Morrison Wikipedia]] * Bharati Mukherjee [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bharati_Mukherjee Wikipedia]] * Anaïs Nin [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ana%C3%AFs_Nin Wikipedia]] * Joyce Carol Oates [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joyce_Carol_Oates Wikipedia]] * Jean Rhys [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_Rhys Wikipedia]] * Dorothy Richardson [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dorothy_Richardson Wikipedia]] * Gertrude Stein [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gertrude_Stein Wikipedia]] * Virginia Woolf [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virginia_Woolf Wikipedia]] ==== Twentieth-century avant-garde African-American poets ==== * RCEL Chapter 13: "Experiments in black: African-American avant-garde poetics" by Aldon Lynn Nielsen * Russell Atkins [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russell_Atkins Wikipedia]] * Amiri Baraka [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amiri_Baraka Wikipedia]] * Jayne Cortez [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jayne_Cortez Wikipedia]] * Negro Digest [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Negro_Digest Wikipedia]] * Langston Hughes [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Langston_Hughes Wikipedia]] * Ted Joans [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ted_Joans Wikipedia]] * Percy Johnston [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Percy_Johnston Wikipedia]] * Bob Kaufman [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bob_Kaufman Wikipedia]] * Stephen Jonas [[https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems-and-poets/poets/detail/stephen-jonas Poetry Foundation]] * William Melvin Kelley [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Melvin_Kelley Wikipedia]] * Nathaniel Mackey [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nathaniel_Mackey Wikipedia]] * Clarence Major [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clarence_Major Wikipedia]] * Tracie Morris [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tracie_Morris Wikipedia]] * Harryette Mullen [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harryette_Mullen Wikipedia]] * Claudia Rankine [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Claudia_Rankine Wikipedia]] * Gil Scott-Heron [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gil_Scott-Heron Wikipedia]] * Lorenzo Thomas (poet) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lorenzo_Thomas_(poet) Wikipedia]] * Melvin B. Tolson [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Melvin_B._Tolson Wikipedia]] * Jean Toomer [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_Toomer Wikipedia]] * Umbra (poets) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Umbra_(poets) Wikipedia]] ==== Anglophone postcolonial poetry ==== * RCEL Chapter 14: "The limits of hybridity: Language and innovation in Anglophone postcolonial poetry" by Priyamvada Gopal * Postcolonial literature [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Postcolonial_literature Wikipedia]] * G. V. Desani [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G._V._Desani Wikipedia]] * Wilson Harris [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wilson_Harris Wikipedia]] * Dambudzo Marechera [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dambudzo_Marechera Wikipedia]] * Mudrooroo [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mudrooroo Wikipedia]] * Ben Okri [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ben_Okri Wikipedia]] * Salman Rushdie [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salman_Rushdie Wikipedia]] * Vikram Seth [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vikram_Seth Wikipedia]] * Wole Soyinka [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wole_Soyinka Wikipedia]] * Amos Tutuola [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amos_Tutuola Wikipedia]] * Derek Walcott [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Derek_Walcott Wikipedia]] === The new experimentalism === ==== Avant-Pop ==== * RCEL Chapter 15: "Avant-Pop" by Lance Olsen * Avant-Pop: Fiction for a Daydream Nation (Black Ice Books) by Larry McCaffery [[https://www.librarything.com/work/512144 LibraryThing]] * After Yesterday's Crash: The Avant-Pop Anthology by Larry McCaffery [[https://www.librarything.com/work/771064 LibraryThing]] * Tomas Alfredson [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tomas_Alfredson Wikipedia]] * Italo Calvino [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Italo_Calvino Wikipedia]] * David Clark [[https://elmcip.net/node/622 ELMCIP]] * Umberto Eco [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Umberto_Eco Wikipedia]] * Betrayed by Rita Hayworth by Manuel Puig [[https://www.librarything.com/work/128453 LibraryThing]] * Naked Lunch by William S. Burroughs [[https://www.librarything.com/work/5852 LibraryThing]] * Lost in the Funhouse by John Barth [[https://www.librarything.com/work/29286 LibraryThing]] * Industrial Poetics: Demo Tracks for a Mobile Culture (Contemp North American Poetry) by Joe Amato [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2881291 LibraryThing]] * Kenneth Goldsmith [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kenneth_Goldsmith Wikipedia]] * Robert Coover [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Coover Wikipedia]] * Angela Carter [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angela_Carter Wikipedia]] * Aimee Bender [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aimee_Bender Wikipedia]] * White Noise by Don DeLillo [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4953 LibraryThing]] * Gravity's Rainbow by Thomas Pynchon [[https://www.librarything.com/work/10088 LibraryThing]] * Mark Z. Danielewski's House of leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1488 LibraryThing]] * Europeana: A Brief History of the Twentieth Century by Patrik Ouředník [[https://www.librarything.com/work/179330 LibraryThing]] * Mark Leyner [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mark_Leyner Wikipedia]] * Traveling to Utopia: With a Brief History of the Technology by Young-Hae Chang Heavy Industries [[https://www.librarything.com/work/11864011 LibraryThing]] ==== Post-postmodernism ==== * RCEL Chapter 16: "Post-postmodernism" by Robert L. McLaughlin * Post-postmodernism [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Post-postmodernism Wikipedia]] ==== Globalization and transnationalism ==== * RCEL Chapter 17: "Globalization and transnationalism" by Liam Connell * Count Zero by William Gibson [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2445 LibraryThing]] * The Fountain at the Centre of the World by Robert Newman [[https://www.librarything.com/work/18226 LibraryThing]] * Tropic of Orange by Karen Tei Yamashita [[https://www.librarything.com/work/509798 LibraryThing]] * Mark Lombardi: Global Networks by Robert Hobbs [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1066 LibraryThing]] * JPod by Douglas Coupland [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1115072 LibraryThing]] * Looking for Headless by K. D. [[https://www.librarything.com/work/10578723 LibraryThing]] ==== Altermodernist fiction ==== * RCEL Chapter 18: "Altermodernist fiction" by Alison Gibbons * The Rings of Saturn by W. G. Sebald [[https://www.librarything.com/work/28135 LibraryThing]] * Erasmus is Late by Liam Gillick [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1319708 LibraryThing]] * Shanghai Dancing by Brian Castro [[https://www.librarything.com/work/581326 LibraryThing]] * The Islanders: An Introduction by Charles Avery [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8086723 LibraryThing]] * The One Facing Us: A Novel by Ronit Matalon [[https://www.librarything.com/work/643371 LibraryThing]] * Istanbul: Memories and the City by Orhan Pamuk [[https://www.librarything.com/work/100731 LibraryThing]] * Only Revolutions by Mark Z. Danielewski [[https://www.librarything.com/work/798583 LibraryThing]] * Headless by Goldin+Senneby [[https://web.archive.org/web/20180506182844/http://www.goldinsenneby.com/gs/?p=116 Goldin+Senneby]] [[http://rhizome.org/editorial/2009/feb/04/interview-with-goldinsenneby/ Interview with Goldin+Senneby - Rhizome]] [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tOGttCSUecM Angus Cameron lecture on Headless - YouTube]] * A Visit from the Goon Squad by Jennifer Egan [[https://www.librarything.com/work/9530166 LibraryThing]] * Open City by Teju Cole [[https://www.librarything.com/work/10577676 LibraryThing]] * Rana Dasgupta [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rana_Dasgupta Wikipedia]] ==== Manifestos and ''Ars Poetica'' ==== * RCEL Chapter 19: "Manifestos and ''Ars Poetica''" by Laura Winkiel * Manifesto [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manifesto Wikipedia]] * Ars Poetica (Horace) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ars_Poetica_(Horace) Wikipedia]] * Ars Poetica by Archibald MacLeish [[https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poetrymagazine/poems/17168/ars-poetica full text]] ==== Post-criticism ==== * RCEL Chapter 20: "Post-criticism: Conceptual takes" by Gregory L. Ulmer * Heuretics: The Logic of Invention by Gregory L. Ulmer [[https://www.librarything.com/work/173585 LibraryThing]] == Experiment now: printed matter == === Experiments with language === ==== Language poetry ==== * RCEL Chapter 21: "The expanded field of ''L=A=N=G=U=A=G=E''" by Charles Bernstein * Language poets [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Language_poets Wikipedia]] ==== Concrete poetry and prose ==== * RCEL Chapter 22: "Concrete poetry and prose" by Joe Bray * Concrete poetry [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Concrete_poetry Wikipedia]] ==== Found poetry and "uncreative writing" ==== * RCEL Chapter 23: "Found poetry, 'uncreative writing,' and the art of appropriation" by Andrew Epstein * Found poetry [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Found_poetry Wikipedia]] ==== Words in visual art ==== * RCEL Chapter 24: "Words in visual art" by Jessica Prinz ==== Literary inauthenticity ==== * RCEL Chapter 25: "Hoax-poetry and inauthenticity" by Philip Mead ===== Classical ===== * The Rowley Poems by Thomas Chatterton [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2002159 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Chatterton Thomas Chatterton - Wikipedia]] * The poems of Ossian by James MacPherson [[https://www.librarything.com/work/422650 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Macpherson James Macpherson - Wikipedia]] * Kalevala by Elias Lönnrot [[https://www.librarything.com/work/158724 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kalevala Wikipedia]] * The Tablets by Armand Schwerner [[https://www.librarything.com/work/335430 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Armand_Schwerner Armand Schwerner - Wikipedia]] ===== Modern ===== * A Million Little Pieces by James Frey [[https://www.librarything.com/work/444 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Million_Little_Pieces Wikipedia]] * Angel at the Fence: The True Story of a Love that Survived by Herman Rosenblat [[https://www.librarything.com/work/6304567 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angel_at_the_Fence Wikipedia]] * Fragments: Memories of a Wartime Childhood by Binjamin Wilkomirski [[https://www.librarything.com/work/188668 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Binjamin_Wilkomirski Binjamin Wilkomirski - Wikipedia]] * Down the Road, Worlds Away by Rahila Khan [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1737627 LibraryThing]] [[https://www.lrb.co.uk/v10/n03/toby-forward/diary Diary - Toby Forward - London Review of Books]] * The Hand That Signed The Paper by Helen Darville [[https://www.librarything.com/work/336438 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helen_Dale Helen Dale - Wikipedia]] * B. Wongar [[https://www.librarything.com/author/wongarb LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/B._Wongar Wikipedia]] [[http://sf-encyclopedia.com/entry/wongar_b Science Fiction Encyclopedia]] * My own sweet time by Wanda Koolmatrie [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1908840 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leon_Carmen Leon Carmen - Wikipedia]] * Honor Lost: Love and Death in Modern-Day Jordan by Norma Khouri [[https://www.librarything.com/work/245918 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Forbidden_Love_(novel) Wikipedia]] * The darkening ecliptic by Ern Malley [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4591077 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ern_Malley Ern Malley - Wikipedia]] * Araki Yasusada [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Araki_Yasusada Wikipedia]] [[https://hereshebe.wordpress.com/2008/09/29/on-the-araki-yasusada-hoax/ On the Araki Yasusada Hoax - Here She Be — The Battlements]] ** Doubled Flowering: From the Notebooks of Araki Yasusada by Araki Yasusada [[https://www.librarything.com/work/515083 LibraryThing]] ** Also, With My Throat, I Shall Swallow Ten Thousand Swords: Araki Yasusada's Letters in English by Tosa Motokiyu [[https://www.librarything.com/work/515079 LibraryThing]] ===== Post-hoax ===== * Fernando Pessoa [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fernando_Pessoa Wikipedia]] * Ecopoetry: a critical introduction by Scott Bryson [[https://www.librarything.com/work/129941 LibraryThing]] * Women and ecopoetics: an introduction in context by Harriet Tarlo [[https://www.asu.edu/pipercwcenter/how2journal/vol_3_no_2/ecopoetics/introstatements/tarlo_intro.html full text - HOW2]] * ecopoetics [[https://ecopoetics.wordpress.com/ full text - ecopoetics]] * Media Poetry: An International Anthology by Eduardo Kac [[https://www.librarything.com/work/5074311 LibraryThing]] * Flarf [[http://mainstreampoetry.blogspot.com/ full text - Flarf]] === Experiments with narrative and fiction === ==== Unnatural narratives ==== * RCEL Chapter 26: "Unnatural voices, minds, and narration" by Jan Alber, Henrik Skov Nielsen, and Brian Richardson ==== Impossible worlds ==== * RCEL Chapter 27: "Impossible worlds" by Marie-Laure Ryan ==== Experimental life writing ==== * RCEL Chapter 28: "Experimental life writing" by Irene Kacandes ==== Experimental genre fiction ==== * RCEL Chapter 29: "'Rotting time': Genre fiction and the avant-garde" by Elana Gomel ===== Fantasy ===== * Iron Council by China Miéville [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4813 LibraryThing]] * Vellum: The Book of All Hours by Hal Duncan [[https://www.librarything.com/work/47894 LibraryThing]] * Ink: The Book of All Hours by Hal Duncan [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1162726 LibraryThing]] ===== Science fiction ===== * Iain Banks [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iain_Banks Wikipedia]] * Stephen Baxter (author) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephen_Baxter_(author) Wikipedia]] * Paul Park [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Park Wikipedia]] * Century Rain by Alastair Reynolds [[https://www.librarything.com/work/48231 LibraryThing]] * Blindsight by Peter Watts [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1333265 LibraryThing]] ===== Horror ===== * Books of Blood | Series [[https://www.librarything.com/series/Books+of+Blood LibraryThing]] * Neverwhere: The Author's Preferred Text by Neil Gaiman [[https://www.librarything.com/work/14623622 LibraryThing]] * Mark Z. Danielewski's House of leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1488 LibraryThing]] * The Everlasting by Tim Lebbon [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2811046 LibraryThing]] === Experiments with form and design === ==== Graphic narrative ==== * RCEL Chapter 30: "Graphic narrative" by Hillary Chute * Alternative comics [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alternative_comics Wikipedia]] ==== Multimodal literature ==== * RCEL Chapter 31: "Multimodal literature and experimentation" by Alison Gibbons * Liberature [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberature Wikipedia]] ==== Information design ==== * RCEL Chapter 32: "Information design, emergent culture and experimental form in the novel" by Steve Tomasula * Exercises in Style by Raymond Queneau [[https://www.librarything.com/work/39048 LibraryThing]] * Double or Nothing by Raymond Federman [[https://www.librarything.com/work/151208 LibraryThing]] * The Gettysburg Powerpoint Presentation by Peter Norvig [[https://norvig.com/Gettysburg/ full text]] * Europeana: A Brief History of the Twentieth Century by Patrik Ouředník [[https://www.librarything.com/work/179330 LibraryThing]] * 2666 by Roberto Bolaño [[https://www.librarything.com/work/996213 LibraryThing]] ==== Interactive fiction ==== * RCEL Chapter 33: "Interactive fiction" by N. Katherine Hayles And Nick Montfort * Interactive fiction [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interactive_fiction Wikipedia]] == Experiment now: beyond the page == === The digital age === ==== Digital fiction ==== * RCEL Chapter 34: "Digital fiction: Networked narratives" by David Ciccoricco ==== Code poetry and new-media literature ==== * RCEL Chapter 35: "Code poetry and new-media literature" by Steve Tomasula * Code poetry [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Code_poetry Wikipedia]] ==== Computer gaming ==== * RCEL Chapter 36: "Computer gaming" by Astrid Ensslin * Art game [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Art_game Wikipedia]] ==== Virtual autobiography ==== * RCEL Chapter 37: "Virtual autobiography: Autographies, interfaces, and avatars" by Amy J. Elias == Planned updates == * Add links to the empty categories. * Add a description for each category. * Add authors and works for the categories that only have general links. * Add links from other sites. * Normalize the reference formatting. [[Category:Developing]] [[Category:Lists]] [[Category:Experimental Literature]] 0a52d9a8f02ee9e319310feb2a57a089e3193629 431 430 2019-04-28T00:44:30Z Andy Culbertson 1 Changed "Unnatural narratives" to "Unnatural narration," and added links to the section. wikitext text/x-wiki == Introduction == This article is a list of links to authors, works, and categories in experimental literature. Its purpose is to give you a starting point for exploring works in this set of genres. I've based the list's organization on ''The Routledge Companion to Experimental Literature'' (RCEL), a collection of scholarly essays on the subject. This project is a work in progress. == How to use this list == If a category is well established in the field, I've linked to its Wikipedia article. If the author of the RCEL article was conducting their own survey of the category, I've listed the authors and works they cover with links to Wikipedia and LibraryThing wherever corresponding pages are available. I've also included links to a work's full text when that's available and links to background information from other sources. === Wikipedia === Wikipedia articles will give you background information on their subject, and they'll usually contain bibliographies that will point you to works related to that subject, such as works in the category or works by the author. === LibraryThing === LibraryThing is a social library catalog website that lets you catalog your collection. Here I'm using it for its recommendation features and its links to other sites. When you visit a work's LibraryThing page, you can find related works in the "LibraryThing Recommendations" section and the "Member recommendations" section. You can also click on the tags users have assigned to it. Each tag link takes you to a page for that tag, which lists other works that have been assigned it, as well as related tags, subjects, and tagmashes, which are combinations of tags. You can [https://wiki.librarything.com/index.php/HelpThing:Tagmash create your own tagmashes]. In the upper right sidebar of a work's LibraryThing page, you'll find links to its corresponding page on other catalog websites, such as Amazon, Google Books, and WorldCat, a shared catalog of physical libraries worldwide. These sites will often let you look through a preview of the book. They'll also give you ways to find other related works, usually by recommendations or subject links on the work's page. If you're logged in, you can edit this section to show links from a long list of other sites. == General == * Experimental literature [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Experimental_literature Wikipedia]] * Bray, Joe, Alison Gibbons, and Brian McHale, eds. ''The Routledge Companion to Experimental Literature''. Routledge Companions. London: Routledge, 2015. [[https://www.librarything.com/work/18336113 LibraryThing]] == The historical avant-gardes == === Modernist-era experimentalism === ==== Futurism ==== * RCEL Chapter 2: "Italian Futurism and Russian Cubo-Futurism" by John White * Futurism (literature) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Futurism_(literature) Wikipedia]] ==== Expressionism ==== * RCEL Chapter 3: "The poetics of animism: Realism and the fantastic in expressionist literature and film" by Richard Murphy * Expressionism [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Expressionism Wikipedia]] ==== Surrealism ==== * RCEL Chapter 4: "The surrealist experiments with language" by Peter Stockwell * Surrealism [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surrealism Wikipedia]] ==== Absurdism ==== * RCEL Chapter 5: "The literary absurd" by Joanna Gavins * Absurdist fiction [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Absurdist_fiction Wikipedia]] === Postmodernist experimentalism === ==== Postwar experimental poetry ==== * RCEL Chapter 6: "Spontaneity and improvisation in postwar experimental poetry" by Benjamin Lee * The New American Poetry 1945–1960 [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_New_American_Poetry_1945%E2%80%931960 Wikipedia]] ==== The ''nouveau roman'' and ''Tel Quel'' ==== * RCEL Chapter 7: "The ''nouveau roman'' and ''Tel Quel''" by Danielle Marx-Scouras * Nouveau roman [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nouveau_roman Wikipedia]] * Tel Quel [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tel_Quel Wikipedia]] ==== Lettrism and situationism ==== * RCEL Chapter 8: "Lettrism and situationism" by Tyrus Miller * Lettrism [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lettrism Wikipedia]] * Situationist International [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Situationist_International Wikipedia]] ==== OuLiPo and proceduralism ==== * RCEL Chapter 9: "OuLiPo and proceduralism" by Jan Baetens * Constrained writing [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constrained_writing Wikipedia]] * Oulipo [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oulipo Wikipedia]] ==== Metafiction ==== * RCEL Chapter 10: "Metafiction" by R. M. Berry * Metafiction [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metafiction Wikipedia]] ==== Postmodern literature ==== * RCEL Chapter 11: "Postmodernism and experiment" by Brian McHale * Postmodern literature [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Postmodern_literature Wikipedia]] === Experiments with identity === ==== Twentieth-century avant-garde women writers ==== * RCEL Chapter 12: "Sexing the text: Women’s avant-garde writing in the twentieth century" by Ellen G. Friedman * Kathy Acker [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kathy_Acker Wikipedia]] * Djuna Barnes [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Djuna_Barnes Wikipedia]] * Jane Bowles [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jane_Bowles Wikipedia]] * H.D. [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H.D. Wikipedia]] * Toni Morrison [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toni_Morrison Wikipedia]] * Bharati Mukherjee [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bharati_Mukherjee Wikipedia]] * Anaïs Nin [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ana%C3%AFs_Nin Wikipedia]] * Joyce Carol Oates [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joyce_Carol_Oates Wikipedia]] * Jean Rhys [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_Rhys Wikipedia]] * Dorothy Richardson [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dorothy_Richardson Wikipedia]] * Gertrude Stein [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gertrude_Stein Wikipedia]] * Virginia Woolf [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virginia_Woolf Wikipedia]] ==== Twentieth-century avant-garde African-American poets ==== * RCEL Chapter 13: "Experiments in black: African-American avant-garde poetics" by Aldon Lynn Nielsen * Russell Atkins [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russell_Atkins Wikipedia]] * Amiri Baraka [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amiri_Baraka Wikipedia]] * Jayne Cortez [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jayne_Cortez Wikipedia]] * Negro Digest [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Negro_Digest Wikipedia]] * Langston Hughes [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Langston_Hughes Wikipedia]] * Ted Joans [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ted_Joans Wikipedia]] * Percy Johnston [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Percy_Johnston Wikipedia]] * Bob Kaufman [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bob_Kaufman Wikipedia]] * Stephen Jonas [[https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems-and-poets/poets/detail/stephen-jonas Poetry Foundation]] * William Melvin Kelley [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Melvin_Kelley Wikipedia]] * Nathaniel Mackey [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nathaniel_Mackey Wikipedia]] * Clarence Major [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clarence_Major Wikipedia]] * Tracie Morris [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tracie_Morris Wikipedia]] * Harryette Mullen [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harryette_Mullen Wikipedia]] * Claudia Rankine [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Claudia_Rankine Wikipedia]] * Gil Scott-Heron [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gil_Scott-Heron Wikipedia]] * Lorenzo Thomas (poet) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lorenzo_Thomas_(poet) Wikipedia]] * Melvin B. Tolson [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Melvin_B._Tolson Wikipedia]] * Jean Toomer [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_Toomer Wikipedia]] * Umbra (poets) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Umbra_(poets) Wikipedia]] ==== Anglophone postcolonial poetry ==== * RCEL Chapter 14: "The limits of hybridity: Language and innovation in Anglophone postcolonial poetry" by Priyamvada Gopal * Postcolonial literature [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Postcolonial_literature Wikipedia]] * G. V. Desani [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G._V._Desani Wikipedia]] * Wilson Harris [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wilson_Harris Wikipedia]] * Dambudzo Marechera [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dambudzo_Marechera Wikipedia]] * Mudrooroo [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mudrooroo Wikipedia]] * Ben Okri [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ben_Okri Wikipedia]] * Salman Rushdie [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salman_Rushdie Wikipedia]] * Vikram Seth [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vikram_Seth Wikipedia]] * Wole Soyinka [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wole_Soyinka Wikipedia]] * Amos Tutuola [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amos_Tutuola Wikipedia]] * Derek Walcott [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Derek_Walcott Wikipedia]] === The new experimentalism === ==== Avant-Pop ==== * RCEL Chapter 15: "Avant-Pop" by Lance Olsen * Avant-Pop: Fiction for a Daydream Nation (Black Ice Books) by Larry McCaffery [[https://www.librarything.com/work/512144 LibraryThing]] * After Yesterday's Crash: The Avant-Pop Anthology by Larry McCaffery [[https://www.librarything.com/work/771064 LibraryThing]] * Tomas Alfredson [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tomas_Alfredson Wikipedia]] * Italo Calvino [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Italo_Calvino Wikipedia]] * David Clark [[https://elmcip.net/node/622 ELMCIP]] * Umberto Eco [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Umberto_Eco Wikipedia]] * Betrayed by Rita Hayworth by Manuel Puig [[https://www.librarything.com/work/128453 LibraryThing]] * Naked Lunch by William S. Burroughs [[https://www.librarything.com/work/5852 LibraryThing]] * Lost in the Funhouse by John Barth [[https://www.librarything.com/work/29286 LibraryThing]] * Industrial Poetics: Demo Tracks for a Mobile Culture (Contemp North American Poetry) by Joe Amato [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2881291 LibraryThing]] * Kenneth Goldsmith [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kenneth_Goldsmith Wikipedia]] * Robert Coover [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Coover Wikipedia]] * Angela Carter [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angela_Carter Wikipedia]] * Aimee Bender [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aimee_Bender Wikipedia]] * White Noise by Don DeLillo [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4953 LibraryThing]] * Gravity's Rainbow by Thomas Pynchon [[https://www.librarything.com/work/10088 LibraryThing]] * Mark Z. Danielewski's House of leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1488 LibraryThing]] * Europeana: A Brief History of the Twentieth Century by Patrik Ouředník [[https://www.librarything.com/work/179330 LibraryThing]] * Mark Leyner [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mark_Leyner Wikipedia]] * Traveling to Utopia: With a Brief History of the Technology by Young-Hae Chang Heavy Industries [[https://www.librarything.com/work/11864011 LibraryThing]] ==== Post-postmodernism ==== * RCEL Chapter 16: "Post-postmodernism" by Robert L. McLaughlin * Post-postmodernism [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Post-postmodernism Wikipedia]] ==== Globalization and transnationalism ==== * RCEL Chapter 17: "Globalization and transnationalism" by Liam Connell * Count Zero by William Gibson [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2445 LibraryThing]] * The Fountain at the Centre of the World by Robert Newman [[https://www.librarything.com/work/18226 LibraryThing]] * Tropic of Orange by Karen Tei Yamashita [[https://www.librarything.com/work/509798 LibraryThing]] * Mark Lombardi: Global Networks by Robert Hobbs [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1066 LibraryThing]] * JPod by Douglas Coupland [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1115072 LibraryThing]] * Looking for Headless by K. D. [[https://www.librarything.com/work/10578723 LibraryThing]] ==== Altermodernist fiction ==== * RCEL Chapter 18: "Altermodernist fiction" by Alison Gibbons * The Rings of Saturn by W. G. Sebald [[https://www.librarything.com/work/28135 LibraryThing]] * Erasmus is Late by Liam Gillick [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1319708 LibraryThing]] * Shanghai Dancing by Brian Castro [[https://www.librarything.com/work/581326 LibraryThing]] * The Islanders: An Introduction by Charles Avery [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8086723 LibraryThing]] * The One Facing Us: A Novel by Ronit Matalon [[https://www.librarything.com/work/643371 LibraryThing]] * Istanbul: Memories and the City by Orhan Pamuk [[https://www.librarything.com/work/100731 LibraryThing]] * Only Revolutions by Mark Z. Danielewski [[https://www.librarything.com/work/798583 LibraryThing]] * Headless by Goldin+Senneby [[https://web.archive.org/web/20180506182844/http://www.goldinsenneby.com/gs/?p=116 Goldin+Senneby]] [[http://rhizome.org/editorial/2009/feb/04/interview-with-goldinsenneby/ Interview with Goldin+Senneby - Rhizome]] [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tOGttCSUecM Angus Cameron lecture on Headless - YouTube]] * A Visit from the Goon Squad by Jennifer Egan [[https://www.librarything.com/work/9530166 LibraryThing]] * Open City by Teju Cole [[https://www.librarything.com/work/10577676 LibraryThing]] * Rana Dasgupta [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rana_Dasgupta Wikipedia]] ==== Manifestos and ''Ars Poetica'' ==== * RCEL Chapter 19: "Manifestos and ''Ars Poetica''" by Laura Winkiel * Manifesto [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manifesto Wikipedia]] * Ars Poetica (Horace) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ars_Poetica_(Horace) Wikipedia]] * Ars Poetica by Archibald MacLeish [[https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poetrymagazine/poems/17168/ars-poetica full text]] ==== Post-criticism ==== * RCEL Chapter 20: "Post-criticism: Conceptual takes" by Gregory L. Ulmer * Heuretics: The Logic of Invention by Gregory L. Ulmer [[https://www.librarything.com/work/173585 LibraryThing]] == Experiment now: printed matter == === Experiments with language === ==== Language poetry ==== * RCEL Chapter 21: "The expanded field of ''L=A=N=G=U=A=G=E''" by Charles Bernstein * Language poets [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Language_poets Wikipedia]] ==== Concrete poetry and prose ==== * RCEL Chapter 22: "Concrete poetry and prose" by Joe Bray * Concrete poetry [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Concrete_poetry Wikipedia]] ==== Found poetry and "uncreative writing" ==== * RCEL Chapter 23: "Found poetry, 'uncreative writing,' and the art of appropriation" by Andrew Epstein * Found poetry [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Found_poetry Wikipedia]] ==== Words in visual art ==== * RCEL Chapter 24: "Words in visual art" by Jessica Prinz ==== Literary inauthenticity ==== * RCEL Chapter 25: "Hoax-poetry and inauthenticity" by Philip Mead ===== Classical ===== * The Rowley Poems by Thomas Chatterton [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2002159 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Chatterton Thomas Chatterton - Wikipedia]] * The poems of Ossian by James MacPherson [[https://www.librarything.com/work/422650 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Macpherson James Macpherson - Wikipedia]] * Kalevala by Elias Lönnrot [[https://www.librarything.com/work/158724 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kalevala Wikipedia]] * The Tablets by Armand Schwerner [[https://www.librarything.com/work/335430 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Armand_Schwerner Armand Schwerner - Wikipedia]] ===== Modern ===== * A Million Little Pieces by James Frey [[https://www.librarything.com/work/444 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Million_Little_Pieces Wikipedia]] * Angel at the Fence: The True Story of a Love that Survived by Herman Rosenblat [[https://www.librarything.com/work/6304567 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angel_at_the_Fence Wikipedia]] * Fragments: Memories of a Wartime Childhood by Binjamin Wilkomirski [[https://www.librarything.com/work/188668 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Binjamin_Wilkomirski Binjamin Wilkomirski - Wikipedia]] * Down the Road, Worlds Away by Rahila Khan [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1737627 LibraryThing]] [[https://www.lrb.co.uk/v10/n03/toby-forward/diary Diary - Toby Forward - London Review of Books]] * The Hand That Signed The Paper by Helen Darville [[https://www.librarything.com/work/336438 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helen_Dale Helen Dale - Wikipedia]] * B. Wongar [[https://www.librarything.com/author/wongarb LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/B._Wongar Wikipedia]] [[http://sf-encyclopedia.com/entry/wongar_b Science Fiction Encyclopedia]] * My own sweet time by Wanda Koolmatrie [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1908840 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leon_Carmen Leon Carmen - Wikipedia]] * Honor Lost: Love and Death in Modern-Day Jordan by Norma Khouri [[https://www.librarything.com/work/245918 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Forbidden_Love_(novel) Wikipedia]] * The darkening ecliptic by Ern Malley [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4591077 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ern_Malley Ern Malley - Wikipedia]] * Araki Yasusada [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Araki_Yasusada Wikipedia]] [[https://hereshebe.wordpress.com/2008/09/29/on-the-araki-yasusada-hoax/ On the Araki Yasusada Hoax - Here She Be — The Battlements]] ** Doubled Flowering: From the Notebooks of Araki Yasusada by Araki Yasusada [[https://www.librarything.com/work/515083 LibraryThing]] ** Also, With My Throat, I Shall Swallow Ten Thousand Swords: Araki Yasusada's Letters in English by Tosa Motokiyu [[https://www.librarything.com/work/515079 LibraryThing]] ===== Post-hoax ===== * Fernando Pessoa [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fernando_Pessoa Wikipedia]] * Ecopoetry: a critical introduction by Scott Bryson [[https://www.librarything.com/work/129941 LibraryThing]] * Women and ecopoetics: an introduction in context by Harriet Tarlo [[https://www.asu.edu/pipercwcenter/how2journal/vol_3_no_2/ecopoetics/introstatements/tarlo_intro.html full text - HOW2]] * ecopoetics [[https://ecopoetics.wordpress.com/ full text - ecopoetics]] * Media Poetry: An International Anthology by Eduardo Kac [[https://www.librarything.com/work/5074311 LibraryThing]] * Flarf [[http://mainstreampoetry.blogspot.com/ full text - Flarf]] === Experiments with narrative and fiction === ==== Unnatural narration ==== * RCEL Chapter 26: "Unnatural voices, minds, and narration" by Jan Alber, Henrik Skov Nielsen, and Brian Richardson ===== Impossibly informed narrator ===== * Virginie: Her Two Lives by John Hawkes [[https://www.librarything.com/work/121280 LibraryThing]] * Travesties by Tom Stoppard [[https://www.librarything.com/work/27223 LibraryThing]] * Midnight's Children by Salman Rushdie [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2118 LibraryThing]] * In Search of Lost Time by Marcel Proust [[https://www.librarything.com/work/23844 LibraryThing]] * The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2964 LibraryThing]] * Moby Dick by Herman Melville [[https://www.librarything.com/work/15540 LibraryThing]] * Ulysses by James Joyce [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8520 LibraryThing]] ===== Impossibly confused narrator ===== * Molloy by Samuel Beckett [[https://www.librarything.com/work/56659 LibraryThing]] * In the Labyrinth by Alain Robbe-Grillet [[https://www.librarything.com/work/319705 LibraryThing]] * "You Are As Brave As Vincent Van Gogh," Flying to America: 45 More Stories by Donald Barthelme [[https://www.librarything.com/work/3397639 LibraryThing]] ===== Non-human narrator ===== * Kew Gardens by Virginia Woolf [[https://www.librarything.com/work/891578 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kew_Gardens_(short_story) Wikipedia]] * "The House of Asterion," The Aleph and Other Stories by Jorge Luis Borges [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1443832 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_House_of_Asterion Wikipedia]] * "Jealous Husband Returns in Form of Parrot," Tabloid Dreams: Stories by Robert Olen Butler [[https://www.librarything.com/work/150283 LibraryThing]] * Doctor Rat by William Kotzwinkle [[https://www.librarything.com/work/93750 LibraryThing]] * "My Life As a West African Gray Parrot," The Left-Handed Marriage: Stories by Leigh Buchanan Bienen [[https://www.librarything.com/work/3769284 LibraryThing]] * Shakespeare's Dog by Leon Rooke [[https://www.librarything.com/work/203121 LibraryThing]] * "The Stowaway," A History of the World in 10½ Chapters by Julian Barnes [[http://www.librarything.com/work/7133 LibraryThing]] * Sweet William: A Memoir of Old Horse by John Hawkes [[https://www.librarything.com/work/216641 LibraryThing]] * Firmin by Sam Savage [[https://www.librarything.com/work/922702 LibraryThing]] * Timbuktu by Paul Auster [[https://www.librarything.com/work/27521 LibraryThing]] ===== Dead narrator ===== * Pedro Páramo by Juan Rulfo [[https://www.librarything.com/work/84285 LibraryThing]] * Pincher Martin by William Golding [[https://www.librarything.com/work/286280 LibraryThing]] * The Third Policeman by Flann O'Brien [[https://www.librarything.com/work/7104 LibraryThing]] * "Terra Incognita," A Russian Beauty and Other Stories by Vladimir Nabokov [[https://www.librarything.com/work/224314 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terra_Incognita_(short_story) Wikipedia]] * Transparent Things by Vladimir Nabokov [[https://www.librarything.com/work/51102 LibraryThing]] * Murther and Walking Spirits by Robertson Davies [[https://www.librarything.com/work/73673 LibraryThing]] * American Desert by Percival Everett [[https://www.librarything.com/work/238787 LibraryThing]] * My Name is Red by Orhan Pamuk [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2744 LibraryThing]] * Hotel World by Ali Smith [[https://www.librarything.com/work/19451 LibraryThing]] * Destiny and Desire by Carlos Fuentes [[https://www.librarything.com/work/6516575 LibraryThing]] * The Book Thief by Markus Zusak [[https://www.librarything.com/work/393681 LibraryThing]] * "The Calmative," Stories and Texts for Nothing by Samuel Beckett [[https://www.librarything.com/work/3398 LibraryThing]] * The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4931 LibraryThing]] ===== Focalization technology ===== * "The Aleph," The Aleph and Other Stories by Jorge Luis Borges [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1443832 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Aleph_(short_story) Wikipedia]] * Neuromancer by William Gibson [[https://www.librarything.com/work/609 LibraryThing]] ===== First-person plural ===== * "A Rose for Emily" by William Faulkner, American Gothic Tales by Joyce Carol Oates [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8038219 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Rose_for_Emily Wikipedia]] * 12 Million Black Voices by Richard Wright [[https://www.librarything.com/work/666218 LibraryThing]] * Two Thousand Seasons by Ayi Kwei Armah [[https://www.librarything.com/work/77062 LibraryThing]] * You Don't Love Yourself by Nathalie Sarraute [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2374617 LibraryThing]] ===== Second-person ===== * A Pagan Place by Edna O'Brien [[https://www.librarything.com/work/218163 LibraryThing]] * "How," Self-help by Lorrie Moore [[http://www.librarything.com/work/35303 LibraryThing]] * If on a Winter's Night a Traveler by Italo Calvino [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4091153 LibraryThing]] ===== Third-person singular impersonal ===== * The Radetzky March by Joseph Roth [[https://www.librarything.com/work/10159 LibraryThing]] * The opoponax by Monique Wittig [[https://www.librarything.com/work/257236 LibraryThing]] ===== Third-person plural ===== * Things: A Story of the Sixties by Georges Perec [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1197807 LibraryThing]] * Flower Children by Maxine Swann [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2375201 LibraryThing]] ===== Gender-neutral pronouns ===== * The Cook and The Carpenter by June Arnold [[https://www.librarything.com/work/736228 LibraryThing]] ===== Pronouns omitted ===== * "Dead Doll Humility" by Kathy Acker, The Making of the American Essay (A New History of the Essay) by John D'Agata [[https://www.librarything.com/work/17216549 LibraryThing]] ===== Multiple points of view ===== * "The Cubs," The Cubs and Other Stories by Mario Vargas Llosa [[https://www.librarything.com/work/17905949 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Los_Cachorros Wikipedia]] * The Death of Artemio Cruz by Carlos Fuentes [[https://www.librarything.com/work/18213 LibraryThing]] * Maps by Nuruddin Farah [[https://www.librarything.com/work/70403 LibraryThing]] * Compact by Maurice Roche [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1287065 LibraryThing]] ===== Merged narrators ===== * Monsieur Levert by Robert Pinget [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1170050 LibraryThing]] * "13," Stories and Texts for Nothing by Samuel Beckett [[https://www.librarything.com/work/3398 LibraryThing]] * The Unnamable by Samuel Beckett [[https://www.librarything.com/work/276374 LibraryThing]] * Glamorama by Bret Easton Ellis [[https://www.librarything.com/work/7545 LibraryThing]] ===== Anachronism ===== * Flight to Canada by Ishmael Reed [[https://www.librarything.com/work/35987 LibraryThing]] ===== Mid-narrative editing ===== * Worstward Ho by Samuel Beckett [[https://www.librarything.com/work/782565 LibraryThing]] ==== Impossible worlds ==== * RCEL Chapter 27: "Impossible worlds" by Marie-Laure Ryan ==== Experimental life writing ==== * RCEL Chapter 28: "Experimental life writing" by Irene Kacandes ==== Experimental genre fiction ==== * RCEL Chapter 29: "'Rotting time': Genre fiction and the avant-garde" by Elana Gomel ===== Fantasy ===== * Iron Council by China Miéville [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4813 LibraryThing]] * Vellum: The Book of All Hours by Hal Duncan [[https://www.librarything.com/work/47894 LibraryThing]] * Ink: The Book of All Hours by Hal Duncan [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1162726 LibraryThing]] ===== Science fiction ===== * Iain Banks [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iain_Banks Wikipedia]] * Stephen Baxter (author) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephen_Baxter_(author) Wikipedia]] * Paul Park [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Park Wikipedia]] * Century Rain by Alastair Reynolds [[https://www.librarything.com/work/48231 LibraryThing]] * Blindsight by Peter Watts [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1333265 LibraryThing]] ===== Horror ===== * Books of Blood | Series [[https://www.librarything.com/series/Books+of+Blood LibraryThing]] * Neverwhere: The Author's Preferred Text by Neil Gaiman [[https://www.librarything.com/work/14623622 LibraryThing]] * Mark Z. Danielewski's House of leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1488 LibraryThing]] * The Everlasting by Tim Lebbon [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2811046 LibraryThing]] === Experiments with form and design === ==== Graphic narrative ==== * RCEL Chapter 30: "Graphic narrative" by Hillary Chute * Alternative comics [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alternative_comics Wikipedia]] ==== Multimodal literature ==== * RCEL Chapter 31: "Multimodal literature and experimentation" by Alison Gibbons * Liberature [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberature Wikipedia]] ==== Information design ==== * RCEL Chapter 32: "Information design, emergent culture and experimental form in the novel" by Steve Tomasula * Exercises in Style by Raymond Queneau [[https://www.librarything.com/work/39048 LibraryThing]] * Double or Nothing by Raymond Federman [[https://www.librarything.com/work/151208 LibraryThing]] * The Gettysburg Powerpoint Presentation by Peter Norvig [[https://norvig.com/Gettysburg/ full text]] * Europeana: A Brief History of the Twentieth Century by Patrik Ouředník [[https://www.librarything.com/work/179330 LibraryThing]] * 2666 by Roberto Bolaño [[https://www.librarything.com/work/996213 LibraryThing]] ==== Interactive fiction ==== * RCEL Chapter 33: "Interactive fiction" by N. Katherine Hayles And Nick Montfort * Interactive fiction [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interactive_fiction Wikipedia]] == Experiment now: beyond the page == === The digital age === ==== Digital fiction ==== * RCEL Chapter 34: "Digital fiction: Networked narratives" by David Ciccoricco ==== Code poetry and new-media literature ==== * RCEL Chapter 35: "Code poetry and new-media literature" by Steve Tomasula * Code poetry [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Code_poetry Wikipedia]] ==== Computer gaming ==== * RCEL Chapter 36: "Computer gaming" by Astrid Ensslin * Art game [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Art_game Wikipedia]] ==== Virtual autobiography ==== * RCEL Chapter 37: "Virtual autobiography: Autographies, interfaces, and avatars" by Amy J. Elias == Planned updates == * Add links to the empty categories. * Add a description for each category. * Add authors and works for the categories that only have general links. * Add links from other sites. * Normalize the reference formatting. [[Category:Developing]] [[Category:Lists]] [[Category:Experimental Literature]] dec0035a835929d53ebc2637fc91dcf6ac32d7a4 432 431 2019-04-28T00:56:24Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added links to "Experimental life writing." wikitext text/x-wiki == Introduction == This article is a list of links to authors, works, and categories in experimental literature. Its purpose is to give you a starting point for exploring works in this set of genres. I've based the list's organization on ''The Routledge Companion to Experimental Literature'' (RCEL), a collection of scholarly essays on the subject. This project is a work in progress. == How to use this list == If a category is well established in the field, I've linked to its Wikipedia article. If the author of the RCEL article was conducting their own survey of the category, I've listed the authors and works they cover with links to Wikipedia and LibraryThing wherever corresponding pages are available. I've also included links to a work's full text when that's available and links to background information from other sources. === Wikipedia === Wikipedia articles will give you background information on their subject, and they'll usually contain bibliographies that will point you to works related to that subject, such as works in the category or works by the author. === LibraryThing === LibraryThing is a social library catalog website that lets you catalog your collection. Here I'm using it for its recommendation features and its links to other sites. When you visit a work's LibraryThing page, you can find related works in the "LibraryThing Recommendations" section and the "Member recommendations" section. You can also click on the tags users have assigned to it. Each tag link takes you to a page for that tag, which lists other works that have been assigned it, as well as related tags, subjects, and tagmashes, which are combinations of tags. You can [https://wiki.librarything.com/index.php/HelpThing:Tagmash create your own tagmashes]. In the upper right sidebar of a work's LibraryThing page, you'll find links to its corresponding page on other catalog websites, such as Amazon, Google Books, and WorldCat, a shared catalog of physical libraries worldwide. These sites will often let you look through a preview of the book. They'll also give you ways to find other related works, usually by recommendations or subject links on the work's page. If you're logged in, you can edit this section to show links from a long list of other sites. == General == * Experimental literature [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Experimental_literature Wikipedia]] * Bray, Joe, Alison Gibbons, and Brian McHale, eds. ''The Routledge Companion to Experimental Literature''. Routledge Companions. London: Routledge, 2015. [[https://www.librarything.com/work/18336113 LibraryThing]] == The historical avant-gardes == === Modernist-era experimentalism === ==== Futurism ==== * RCEL Chapter 2: "Italian Futurism and Russian Cubo-Futurism" by John White * Futurism (literature) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Futurism_(literature) Wikipedia]] ==== Expressionism ==== * RCEL Chapter 3: "The poetics of animism: Realism and the fantastic in expressionist literature and film" by Richard Murphy * Expressionism [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Expressionism Wikipedia]] ==== Surrealism ==== * RCEL Chapter 4: "The surrealist experiments with language" by Peter Stockwell * Surrealism [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surrealism Wikipedia]] ==== Absurdism ==== * RCEL Chapter 5: "The literary absurd" by Joanna Gavins * Absurdist fiction [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Absurdist_fiction Wikipedia]] === Postmodernist experimentalism === ==== Postwar experimental poetry ==== * RCEL Chapter 6: "Spontaneity and improvisation in postwar experimental poetry" by Benjamin Lee * The New American Poetry 1945–1960 [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_New_American_Poetry_1945%E2%80%931960 Wikipedia]] ==== The ''nouveau roman'' and ''Tel Quel'' ==== * RCEL Chapter 7: "The ''nouveau roman'' and ''Tel Quel''" by Danielle Marx-Scouras * Nouveau roman [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nouveau_roman Wikipedia]] * Tel Quel [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tel_Quel Wikipedia]] ==== Lettrism and situationism ==== * RCEL Chapter 8: "Lettrism and situationism" by Tyrus Miller * Lettrism [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lettrism Wikipedia]] * Situationist International [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Situationist_International Wikipedia]] ==== OuLiPo and proceduralism ==== * RCEL Chapter 9: "OuLiPo and proceduralism" by Jan Baetens * Constrained writing [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constrained_writing Wikipedia]] * Oulipo [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oulipo Wikipedia]] ==== Metafiction ==== * RCEL Chapter 10: "Metafiction" by R. M. Berry * Metafiction [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metafiction Wikipedia]] ==== Postmodern literature ==== * RCEL Chapter 11: "Postmodernism and experiment" by Brian McHale * Postmodern literature [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Postmodern_literature Wikipedia]] === Experiments with identity === ==== Twentieth-century avant-garde women writers ==== * RCEL Chapter 12: "Sexing the text: Women’s avant-garde writing in the twentieth century" by Ellen G. Friedman * Kathy Acker [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kathy_Acker Wikipedia]] * Djuna Barnes [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Djuna_Barnes Wikipedia]] * Jane Bowles [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jane_Bowles Wikipedia]] * H.D. [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H.D. Wikipedia]] * Toni Morrison [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toni_Morrison Wikipedia]] * Bharati Mukherjee [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bharati_Mukherjee Wikipedia]] * Anaïs Nin [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ana%C3%AFs_Nin Wikipedia]] * Joyce Carol Oates [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joyce_Carol_Oates Wikipedia]] * Jean Rhys [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_Rhys Wikipedia]] * Dorothy Richardson [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dorothy_Richardson Wikipedia]] * Gertrude Stein [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gertrude_Stein Wikipedia]] * Virginia Woolf [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virginia_Woolf Wikipedia]] ==== Twentieth-century avant-garde African-American poets ==== * RCEL Chapter 13: "Experiments in black: African-American avant-garde poetics" by Aldon Lynn Nielsen * Russell Atkins [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russell_Atkins Wikipedia]] * Amiri Baraka [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amiri_Baraka Wikipedia]] * Jayne Cortez [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jayne_Cortez Wikipedia]] * Negro Digest [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Negro_Digest Wikipedia]] * Langston Hughes [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Langston_Hughes Wikipedia]] * Ted Joans [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ted_Joans Wikipedia]] * Percy Johnston [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Percy_Johnston Wikipedia]] * Bob Kaufman [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bob_Kaufman Wikipedia]] * Stephen Jonas [[https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems-and-poets/poets/detail/stephen-jonas Poetry Foundation]] * William Melvin Kelley [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Melvin_Kelley Wikipedia]] * Nathaniel Mackey [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nathaniel_Mackey Wikipedia]] * Clarence Major [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clarence_Major Wikipedia]] * Tracie Morris [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tracie_Morris Wikipedia]] * Harryette Mullen [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harryette_Mullen Wikipedia]] * Claudia Rankine [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Claudia_Rankine Wikipedia]] * Gil Scott-Heron [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gil_Scott-Heron Wikipedia]] * Lorenzo Thomas (poet) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lorenzo_Thomas_(poet) Wikipedia]] * Melvin B. Tolson [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Melvin_B._Tolson Wikipedia]] * Jean Toomer [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_Toomer Wikipedia]] * Umbra (poets) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Umbra_(poets) Wikipedia]] ==== Anglophone postcolonial poetry ==== * RCEL Chapter 14: "The limits of hybridity: Language and innovation in Anglophone postcolonial poetry" by Priyamvada Gopal * Postcolonial literature [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Postcolonial_literature Wikipedia]] * G. V. Desani [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G._V._Desani Wikipedia]] * Wilson Harris [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wilson_Harris Wikipedia]] * Dambudzo Marechera [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dambudzo_Marechera Wikipedia]] * Mudrooroo [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mudrooroo Wikipedia]] * Ben Okri [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ben_Okri Wikipedia]] * Salman Rushdie [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salman_Rushdie Wikipedia]] * Vikram Seth [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vikram_Seth Wikipedia]] * Wole Soyinka [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wole_Soyinka Wikipedia]] * Amos Tutuola [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amos_Tutuola Wikipedia]] * Derek Walcott [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Derek_Walcott Wikipedia]] === The new experimentalism === ==== Avant-Pop ==== * RCEL Chapter 15: "Avant-Pop" by Lance Olsen * Avant-Pop: Fiction for a Daydream Nation (Black Ice Books) by Larry McCaffery [[https://www.librarything.com/work/512144 LibraryThing]] * After Yesterday's Crash: The Avant-Pop Anthology by Larry McCaffery [[https://www.librarything.com/work/771064 LibraryThing]] * Tomas Alfredson [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tomas_Alfredson Wikipedia]] * Italo Calvino [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Italo_Calvino Wikipedia]] * David Clark [[https://elmcip.net/node/622 ELMCIP]] * Umberto Eco [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Umberto_Eco Wikipedia]] * Betrayed by Rita Hayworth by Manuel Puig [[https://www.librarything.com/work/128453 LibraryThing]] * Naked Lunch by William S. Burroughs [[https://www.librarything.com/work/5852 LibraryThing]] * Lost in the Funhouse by John Barth [[https://www.librarything.com/work/29286 LibraryThing]] * Industrial Poetics: Demo Tracks for a Mobile Culture (Contemp North American Poetry) by Joe Amato [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2881291 LibraryThing]] * Kenneth Goldsmith [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kenneth_Goldsmith Wikipedia]] * Robert Coover [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Coover Wikipedia]] * Angela Carter [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angela_Carter Wikipedia]] * Aimee Bender [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aimee_Bender Wikipedia]] * White Noise by Don DeLillo [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4953 LibraryThing]] * Gravity's Rainbow by Thomas Pynchon [[https://www.librarything.com/work/10088 LibraryThing]] * Mark Z. Danielewski's House of leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1488 LibraryThing]] * Europeana: A Brief History of the Twentieth Century by Patrik Ouředník [[https://www.librarything.com/work/179330 LibraryThing]] * Mark Leyner [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mark_Leyner Wikipedia]] * Traveling to Utopia: With a Brief History of the Technology by Young-Hae Chang Heavy Industries [[https://www.librarything.com/work/11864011 LibraryThing]] ==== Post-postmodernism ==== * RCEL Chapter 16: "Post-postmodernism" by Robert L. McLaughlin * Post-postmodernism [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Post-postmodernism Wikipedia]] ==== Globalization and transnationalism ==== * RCEL Chapter 17: "Globalization and transnationalism" by Liam Connell * Count Zero by William Gibson [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2445 LibraryThing]] * The Fountain at the Centre of the World by Robert Newman [[https://www.librarything.com/work/18226 LibraryThing]] * Tropic of Orange by Karen Tei Yamashita [[https://www.librarything.com/work/509798 LibraryThing]] * Mark Lombardi: Global Networks by Robert Hobbs [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1066 LibraryThing]] * JPod by Douglas Coupland [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1115072 LibraryThing]] * Looking for Headless by K. D. [[https://www.librarything.com/work/10578723 LibraryThing]] ==== Altermodernist fiction ==== * RCEL Chapter 18: "Altermodernist fiction" by Alison Gibbons * The Rings of Saturn by W. G. Sebald [[https://www.librarything.com/work/28135 LibraryThing]] * Erasmus is Late by Liam Gillick [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1319708 LibraryThing]] * Shanghai Dancing by Brian Castro [[https://www.librarything.com/work/581326 LibraryThing]] * The Islanders: An Introduction by Charles Avery [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8086723 LibraryThing]] * The One Facing Us: A Novel by Ronit Matalon [[https://www.librarything.com/work/643371 LibraryThing]] * Istanbul: Memories and the City by Orhan Pamuk [[https://www.librarything.com/work/100731 LibraryThing]] * Only Revolutions by Mark Z. Danielewski [[https://www.librarything.com/work/798583 LibraryThing]] * Headless by Goldin+Senneby [[https://web.archive.org/web/20180506182844/http://www.goldinsenneby.com/gs/?p=116 Goldin+Senneby]] [[http://rhizome.org/editorial/2009/feb/04/interview-with-goldinsenneby/ Interview with Goldin+Senneby - Rhizome]] [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tOGttCSUecM Angus Cameron lecture on Headless - YouTube]] * A Visit from the Goon Squad by Jennifer Egan [[https://www.librarything.com/work/9530166 LibraryThing]] * Open City by Teju Cole [[https://www.librarything.com/work/10577676 LibraryThing]] * Rana Dasgupta [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rana_Dasgupta Wikipedia]] ==== Manifestos and ''Ars Poetica'' ==== * RCEL Chapter 19: "Manifestos and ''Ars Poetica''" by Laura Winkiel * Manifesto [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manifesto Wikipedia]] * Ars Poetica (Horace) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ars_Poetica_(Horace) Wikipedia]] * Ars Poetica by Archibald MacLeish [[https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poetrymagazine/poems/17168/ars-poetica full text]] ==== Post-criticism ==== * RCEL Chapter 20: "Post-criticism: Conceptual takes" by Gregory L. Ulmer * Heuretics: The Logic of Invention by Gregory L. Ulmer [[https://www.librarything.com/work/173585 LibraryThing]] == Experiment now: printed matter == === Experiments with language === ==== Language poetry ==== * RCEL Chapter 21: "The expanded field of ''L=A=N=G=U=A=G=E''" by Charles Bernstein * Language poets [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Language_poets Wikipedia]] ==== Concrete poetry and prose ==== * RCEL Chapter 22: "Concrete poetry and prose" by Joe Bray * Concrete poetry [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Concrete_poetry Wikipedia]] ==== Found poetry and "uncreative writing" ==== * RCEL Chapter 23: "Found poetry, 'uncreative writing,' and the art of appropriation" by Andrew Epstein * Found poetry [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Found_poetry Wikipedia]] ==== Words in visual art ==== * RCEL Chapter 24: "Words in visual art" by Jessica Prinz ==== Literary inauthenticity ==== * RCEL Chapter 25: "Hoax-poetry and inauthenticity" by Philip Mead ===== Classical ===== * The Rowley Poems by Thomas Chatterton [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2002159 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Chatterton Thomas Chatterton - Wikipedia]] * The poems of Ossian by James MacPherson [[https://www.librarything.com/work/422650 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Macpherson James Macpherson - Wikipedia]] * Kalevala by Elias Lönnrot [[https://www.librarything.com/work/158724 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kalevala Wikipedia]] * The Tablets by Armand Schwerner [[https://www.librarything.com/work/335430 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Armand_Schwerner Armand Schwerner - Wikipedia]] ===== Modern ===== * A Million Little Pieces by James Frey [[https://www.librarything.com/work/444 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Million_Little_Pieces Wikipedia]] * Angel at the Fence: The True Story of a Love that Survived by Herman Rosenblat [[https://www.librarything.com/work/6304567 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angel_at_the_Fence Wikipedia]] * Fragments: Memories of a Wartime Childhood by Binjamin Wilkomirski [[https://www.librarything.com/work/188668 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Binjamin_Wilkomirski Binjamin Wilkomirski - Wikipedia]] * Down the Road, Worlds Away by Rahila Khan [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1737627 LibraryThing]] [[https://www.lrb.co.uk/v10/n03/toby-forward/diary Diary - Toby Forward - London Review of Books]] * The Hand That Signed The Paper by Helen Darville [[https://www.librarything.com/work/336438 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helen_Dale Helen Dale - Wikipedia]] * B. Wongar [[https://www.librarything.com/author/wongarb LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/B._Wongar Wikipedia]] [[http://sf-encyclopedia.com/entry/wongar_b Science Fiction Encyclopedia]] * My own sweet time by Wanda Koolmatrie [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1908840 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leon_Carmen Leon Carmen - Wikipedia]] * Honor Lost: Love and Death in Modern-Day Jordan by Norma Khouri [[https://www.librarything.com/work/245918 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Forbidden_Love_(novel) Wikipedia]] * The darkening ecliptic by Ern Malley [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4591077 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ern_Malley Ern Malley - Wikipedia]] * Araki Yasusada [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Araki_Yasusada Wikipedia]] [[https://hereshebe.wordpress.com/2008/09/29/on-the-araki-yasusada-hoax/ On the Araki Yasusada Hoax - Here She Be — The Battlements]] ** Doubled Flowering: From the Notebooks of Araki Yasusada by Araki Yasusada [[https://www.librarything.com/work/515083 LibraryThing]] ** Also, With My Throat, I Shall Swallow Ten Thousand Swords: Araki Yasusada's Letters in English by Tosa Motokiyu [[https://www.librarything.com/work/515079 LibraryThing]] ===== Post-hoax ===== * Fernando Pessoa [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fernando_Pessoa Wikipedia]] * Ecopoetry: a critical introduction by Scott Bryson [[https://www.librarything.com/work/129941 LibraryThing]] * Women and ecopoetics: an introduction in context by Harriet Tarlo [[https://www.asu.edu/pipercwcenter/how2journal/vol_3_no_2/ecopoetics/introstatements/tarlo_intro.html full text - HOW2]] * ecopoetics [[https://ecopoetics.wordpress.com/ full text - ecopoetics]] * Media Poetry: An International Anthology by Eduardo Kac [[https://www.librarything.com/work/5074311 LibraryThing]] * Flarf [[http://mainstreampoetry.blogspot.com/ full text - Flarf]] === Experiments with narrative and fiction === ==== Unnatural narration ==== * RCEL Chapter 26: "Unnatural voices, minds, and narration" by Jan Alber, Henrik Skov Nielsen, and Brian Richardson ===== Impossibly informed narrator ===== * Virginie: Her Two Lives by John Hawkes [[https://www.librarything.com/work/121280 LibraryThing]] * Travesties by Tom Stoppard [[https://www.librarything.com/work/27223 LibraryThing]] * Midnight's Children by Salman Rushdie [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2118 LibraryThing]] * In Search of Lost Time by Marcel Proust [[https://www.librarything.com/work/23844 LibraryThing]] * The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2964 LibraryThing]] * Moby Dick by Herman Melville [[https://www.librarything.com/work/15540 LibraryThing]] * Ulysses by James Joyce [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8520 LibraryThing]] ===== Impossibly confused narrator ===== * Molloy by Samuel Beckett [[https://www.librarything.com/work/56659 LibraryThing]] * In the Labyrinth by Alain Robbe-Grillet [[https://www.librarything.com/work/319705 LibraryThing]] * "You Are As Brave As Vincent Van Gogh," Flying to America: 45 More Stories by Donald Barthelme [[https://www.librarything.com/work/3397639 LibraryThing]] ===== Non-human narrator ===== * Kew Gardens by Virginia Woolf [[https://www.librarything.com/work/891578 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kew_Gardens_(short_story) Wikipedia]] * "The House of Asterion," The Aleph and Other Stories by Jorge Luis Borges [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1443832 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_House_of_Asterion Wikipedia]] * "Jealous Husband Returns in Form of Parrot," Tabloid Dreams: Stories by Robert Olen Butler [[https://www.librarything.com/work/150283 LibraryThing]] * Doctor Rat by William Kotzwinkle [[https://www.librarything.com/work/93750 LibraryThing]] * "My Life As a West African Gray Parrot," The Left-Handed Marriage: Stories by Leigh Buchanan Bienen [[https://www.librarything.com/work/3769284 LibraryThing]] * Shakespeare's Dog by Leon Rooke [[https://www.librarything.com/work/203121 LibraryThing]] * "The Stowaway," A History of the World in 10½ Chapters by Julian Barnes [[http://www.librarything.com/work/7133 LibraryThing]] * Sweet William: A Memoir of Old Horse by John Hawkes [[https://www.librarything.com/work/216641 LibraryThing]] * Firmin by Sam Savage [[https://www.librarything.com/work/922702 LibraryThing]] * Timbuktu by Paul Auster [[https://www.librarything.com/work/27521 LibraryThing]] ===== Dead narrator ===== * Pedro Páramo by Juan Rulfo [[https://www.librarything.com/work/84285 LibraryThing]] * Pincher Martin by William Golding [[https://www.librarything.com/work/286280 LibraryThing]] * The Third Policeman by Flann O'Brien [[https://www.librarything.com/work/7104 LibraryThing]] * "Terra Incognita," A Russian Beauty and Other Stories by Vladimir Nabokov [[https://www.librarything.com/work/224314 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terra_Incognita_(short_story) Wikipedia]] * Transparent Things by Vladimir Nabokov [[https://www.librarything.com/work/51102 LibraryThing]] * Murther and Walking Spirits by Robertson Davies [[https://www.librarything.com/work/73673 LibraryThing]] * American Desert by Percival Everett [[https://www.librarything.com/work/238787 LibraryThing]] * My Name is Red by Orhan Pamuk [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2744 LibraryThing]] * Hotel World by Ali Smith [[https://www.librarything.com/work/19451 LibraryThing]] * Destiny and Desire by Carlos Fuentes [[https://www.librarything.com/work/6516575 LibraryThing]] * The Book Thief by Markus Zusak [[https://www.librarything.com/work/393681 LibraryThing]] * "The Calmative," Stories and Texts for Nothing by Samuel Beckett [[https://www.librarything.com/work/3398 LibraryThing]] * The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4931 LibraryThing]] ===== Focalization technology ===== * "The Aleph," The Aleph and Other Stories by Jorge Luis Borges [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1443832 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Aleph_(short_story) Wikipedia]] * Neuromancer by William Gibson [[https://www.librarything.com/work/609 LibraryThing]] ===== First-person plural ===== * "A Rose for Emily" by William Faulkner, American Gothic Tales by Joyce Carol Oates [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8038219 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Rose_for_Emily Wikipedia]] * 12 Million Black Voices by Richard Wright [[https://www.librarything.com/work/666218 LibraryThing]] * Two Thousand Seasons by Ayi Kwei Armah [[https://www.librarything.com/work/77062 LibraryThing]] * You Don't Love Yourself by Nathalie Sarraute [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2374617 LibraryThing]] ===== Second-person ===== * A Pagan Place by Edna O'Brien [[https://www.librarything.com/work/218163 LibraryThing]] * "How," Self-help by Lorrie Moore [[http://www.librarything.com/work/35303 LibraryThing]] * If on a Winter's Night a Traveler by Italo Calvino [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4091153 LibraryThing]] ===== Third-person singular impersonal ===== * The Radetzky March by Joseph Roth [[https://www.librarything.com/work/10159 LibraryThing]] * The opoponax by Monique Wittig [[https://www.librarything.com/work/257236 LibraryThing]] ===== Third-person plural ===== * Things: A Story of the Sixties by Georges Perec [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1197807 LibraryThing]] * Flower Children by Maxine Swann [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2375201 LibraryThing]] ===== Gender-neutral pronouns ===== * The Cook and The Carpenter by June Arnold [[https://www.librarything.com/work/736228 LibraryThing]] ===== Pronouns omitted ===== * "Dead Doll Humility" by Kathy Acker, The Making of the American Essay (A New History of the Essay) by John D'Agata [[https://www.librarything.com/work/17216549 LibraryThing]] ===== Multiple points of view ===== * "The Cubs," The Cubs and Other Stories by Mario Vargas Llosa [[https://www.librarything.com/work/17905949 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Los_Cachorros Wikipedia]] * The Death of Artemio Cruz by Carlos Fuentes [[https://www.librarything.com/work/18213 LibraryThing]] * Maps by Nuruddin Farah [[https://www.librarything.com/work/70403 LibraryThing]] * Compact by Maurice Roche [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1287065 LibraryThing]] ===== Merged narrators ===== * Monsieur Levert by Robert Pinget [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1170050 LibraryThing]] * "13," Stories and Texts for Nothing by Samuel Beckett [[https://www.librarything.com/work/3398 LibraryThing]] * The Unnamable by Samuel Beckett [[https://www.librarything.com/work/276374 LibraryThing]] * Glamorama by Bret Easton Ellis [[https://www.librarything.com/work/7545 LibraryThing]] ===== Anachronism ===== * Flight to Canada by Ishmael Reed [[https://www.librarything.com/work/35987 LibraryThing]] ===== Mid-narrative editing ===== * Worstward Ho by Samuel Beckett [[https://www.librarything.com/work/782565 LibraryThing]] ==== Impossible worlds ==== * RCEL Chapter 27: "Impossible worlds" by Marie-Laure Ryan ==== Experimental life writing ==== * RCEL Chapter 28: "Experimental life writing" by Irene Kacandes ===== Time ===== * Stuart: A Life Backwards by Alexander Masters [[https://www.librarything.com/work/93508 LibraryThing]] * One Day a Year: 1960 - 2000 by Christa Wolf [[https://www.librarything.com/work/466217 LibraryThing]] ===== Medium ===== * The Complete Maus by Art Spiegelman [[https://www.librarything.com/work/6046618 LibraryThing]] * The Complete Persepolis by Marjane Satrapi [[https://www.librarything.com/work/6392056 LibraryThing]] * Fun Home: A Family Tragicomic by Alison Bechdel [[https://www.librarything.com/work/627079 LibraryThing]] * 1941-45: a teenager's war: Crete, captivity, liberation by Frederick V. Carabott [[https://www.worldcat.org/title/1941-45-ho-polemos-henos-ephebou-krete-aichmalosia-apeleutherosis-1941-45-a-teenagers-war-crete-captivity-liberation-1941-45-der-krieg-eines-jugendlichen-kreta-gefangenschaft-befreiung/oclc/48228994 WorldCat.org]] * Running in the Family by Michael Ondaatje [[https://www.librarything.com/work/27962 LibraryThing]] * Zami: a New Spelling of My Name by Audre Lorde [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8116 LibraryThing]] * A heartbreaking work of staggering genius by Dave Eggers [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2294 LibraryThing]] * Encyclopedia of an Ordinary Life by Amy Krouse Rosenthal [[https://www.librarything.com/work/35433 LibraryThing]] * The Suicide Index: Putting My Father's Death in Order by Joan Wickersham [[https://www.librarything.com/work/5248942 LibraryThing]] ===== The relational ===== * The Search Warrant by Patrick Modiano [[https://www.librarything.com/work/331076 LibraryThing]] * Ein Kapitel aus meinem Leben by Barbara Honigmann [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4500497 LibraryThing]] * After Long Silence by Helen Fremont [[https://www.librarything.com/work/13147 LibraryThing]] ===== The work's focus ===== * Patterns of Childhood by Christa Wolf [[https://www.librarything.com/work/700778 LibraryThing]] * Boyhood: Scenes from Provincial Life by J. M. Coetzee [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8660368 LibraryThing]] * Youth by J. M. Coetzee [[https://www.librarything.com/work/105432 LibraryThing]] * Summertime: Scenes from Provincial Life by J. M. Coetzee [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8494635 LibraryThing]] * Roland Barthes by Roland Barthes [[https://www.librarything.com/work/592881 LibraryThing]] * W, or The Memory of Childhood by Georges Perec [[https://www.librarything.com/work/39076 LibraryThing]] ===== Multiple techniques ===== * Daddy's War: Greek American Stories by Irene Kacandes [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8797694 LibraryThing]] ==== Experimental genre fiction ==== * RCEL Chapter 29: "'Rotting time': Genre fiction and the avant-garde" by Elana Gomel ===== Fantasy ===== * Iron Council by China Miéville [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4813 LibraryThing]] * Vellum: The Book of All Hours by Hal Duncan [[https://www.librarything.com/work/47894 LibraryThing]] * Ink: The Book of All Hours by Hal Duncan [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1162726 LibraryThing]] ===== Science fiction ===== * Iain Banks [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iain_Banks Wikipedia]] * Stephen Baxter (author) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephen_Baxter_(author) Wikipedia]] * Paul Park [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Park Wikipedia]] * Century Rain by Alastair Reynolds [[https://www.librarything.com/work/48231 LibraryThing]] * Blindsight by Peter Watts [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1333265 LibraryThing]] ===== Horror ===== * Books of Blood | Series [[https://www.librarything.com/series/Books+of+Blood LibraryThing]] * Neverwhere: The Author's Preferred Text by Neil Gaiman [[https://www.librarything.com/work/14623622 LibraryThing]] * Mark Z. Danielewski's House of leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1488 LibraryThing]] * The Everlasting by Tim Lebbon [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2811046 LibraryThing]] === Experiments with form and design === ==== Graphic narrative ==== * RCEL Chapter 30: "Graphic narrative" by Hillary Chute * Alternative comics [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alternative_comics Wikipedia]] ==== Multimodal literature ==== * RCEL Chapter 31: "Multimodal literature and experimentation" by Alison Gibbons * Liberature [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberature Wikipedia]] ==== Information design ==== * RCEL Chapter 32: "Information design, emergent culture and experimental form in the novel" by Steve Tomasula * Exercises in Style by Raymond Queneau [[https://www.librarything.com/work/39048 LibraryThing]] * Double or Nothing by Raymond Federman [[https://www.librarything.com/work/151208 LibraryThing]] * The Gettysburg Powerpoint Presentation by Peter Norvig [[https://norvig.com/Gettysburg/ full text]] * Europeana: A Brief History of the Twentieth Century by Patrik Ouředník [[https://www.librarything.com/work/179330 LibraryThing]] * 2666 by Roberto Bolaño [[https://www.librarything.com/work/996213 LibraryThing]] ==== Interactive fiction ==== * RCEL Chapter 33: "Interactive fiction" by N. Katherine Hayles And Nick Montfort * Interactive fiction [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interactive_fiction Wikipedia]] == Experiment now: beyond the page == === The digital age === ==== Digital fiction ==== * RCEL Chapter 34: "Digital fiction: Networked narratives" by David Ciccoricco ==== Code poetry and new-media literature ==== * RCEL Chapter 35: "Code poetry and new-media literature" by Steve Tomasula * Code poetry [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Code_poetry Wikipedia]] ==== Computer gaming ==== * RCEL Chapter 36: "Computer gaming" by Astrid Ensslin * Art game [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Art_game Wikipedia]] ==== Virtual autobiography ==== * RCEL Chapter 37: "Virtual autobiography: Autographies, interfaces, and avatars" by Amy J. Elias == Planned updates == * Add links to the empty categories. * Add a description for each category. * Add authors and works for the categories that only have general links. * Add links from other sites. * Normalize the reference formatting. [[Category:Developing]] [[Category:Lists]] [[Category:Experimental Literature]] 14590b6daad809111502a85b0950952b33f175ad 433 432 2019-04-28T01:48:39Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added links to "Digital fiction." wikitext text/x-wiki == Introduction == This article is a list of links to authors, works, and categories in experimental literature. Its purpose is to give you a starting point for exploring works in this set of genres. I've based the list's organization on ''The Routledge Companion to Experimental Literature'' (RCEL), a collection of scholarly essays on the subject. This project is a work in progress. == How to use this list == If a category is well established in the field, I've linked to its Wikipedia article. If the author of the RCEL article was conducting their own survey of the category, I've listed the authors and works they cover with links to Wikipedia and LibraryThing wherever corresponding pages are available. I've also included links to a work's full text when that's available and links to background information from other sources. === Wikipedia === Wikipedia articles will give you background information on their subject, and they'll usually contain bibliographies that will point you to works related to that subject, such as works in the category or works by the author. === LibraryThing === LibraryThing is a social library catalog website that lets you catalog your collection. Here I'm using it for its recommendation features and its links to other sites. When you visit a work's LibraryThing page, you can find related works in the "LibraryThing Recommendations" section and the "Member recommendations" section. You can also click on the tags users have assigned to it. Each tag link takes you to a page for that tag, which lists other works that have been assigned it, as well as related tags, subjects, and tagmashes, which are combinations of tags. You can [https://wiki.librarything.com/index.php/HelpThing:Tagmash create your own tagmashes]. In the upper right sidebar of a work's LibraryThing page, you'll find links to its corresponding page on other catalog websites, such as Amazon, Google Books, and WorldCat, a shared catalog of physical libraries worldwide. These sites will often let you look through a preview of the book. They'll also give you ways to find other related works, usually by recommendations or subject links on the work's page. If you're logged in, you can edit this section to show links from a long list of other sites. == General == * Experimental literature [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Experimental_literature Wikipedia]] * Bray, Joe, Alison Gibbons, and Brian McHale, eds. ''The Routledge Companion to Experimental Literature''. Routledge Companions. London: Routledge, 2015. [[https://www.librarything.com/work/18336113 LibraryThing]] == The historical avant-gardes == === Modernist-era experimentalism === ==== Futurism ==== * RCEL Chapter 2: "Italian Futurism and Russian Cubo-Futurism" by John White * Futurism (literature) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Futurism_(literature) Wikipedia]] ==== Expressionism ==== * RCEL Chapter 3: "The poetics of animism: Realism and the fantastic in expressionist literature and film" by Richard Murphy * Expressionism [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Expressionism Wikipedia]] ==== Surrealism ==== * RCEL Chapter 4: "The surrealist experiments with language" by Peter Stockwell * Surrealism [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surrealism Wikipedia]] ==== Absurdism ==== * RCEL Chapter 5: "The literary absurd" by Joanna Gavins * Absurdist fiction [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Absurdist_fiction Wikipedia]] === Postmodernist experimentalism === ==== Postwar experimental poetry ==== * RCEL Chapter 6: "Spontaneity and improvisation in postwar experimental poetry" by Benjamin Lee * The New American Poetry 1945–1960 [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_New_American_Poetry_1945%E2%80%931960 Wikipedia]] ==== The ''nouveau roman'' and ''Tel Quel'' ==== * RCEL Chapter 7: "The ''nouveau roman'' and ''Tel Quel''" by Danielle Marx-Scouras * Nouveau roman [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nouveau_roman Wikipedia]] * Tel Quel [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tel_Quel Wikipedia]] ==== Lettrism and situationism ==== * RCEL Chapter 8: "Lettrism and situationism" by Tyrus Miller * Lettrism [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lettrism Wikipedia]] * Situationist International [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Situationist_International Wikipedia]] ==== OuLiPo and proceduralism ==== * RCEL Chapter 9: "OuLiPo and proceduralism" by Jan Baetens * Constrained writing [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constrained_writing Wikipedia]] * Oulipo [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oulipo Wikipedia]] ==== Metafiction ==== * RCEL Chapter 10: "Metafiction" by R. M. Berry * Metafiction [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metafiction Wikipedia]] ==== Postmodern literature ==== * RCEL Chapter 11: "Postmodernism and experiment" by Brian McHale * Postmodern literature [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Postmodern_literature Wikipedia]] === Experiments with identity === ==== Twentieth-century avant-garde women writers ==== * RCEL Chapter 12: "Sexing the text: Women’s avant-garde writing in the twentieth century" by Ellen G. Friedman * Kathy Acker [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kathy_Acker Wikipedia]] * Djuna Barnes [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Djuna_Barnes Wikipedia]] * Jane Bowles [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jane_Bowles Wikipedia]] * H.D. [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H.D. Wikipedia]] * Toni Morrison [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toni_Morrison Wikipedia]] * Bharati Mukherjee [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bharati_Mukherjee Wikipedia]] * Anaïs Nin [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ana%C3%AFs_Nin Wikipedia]] * Joyce Carol Oates [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joyce_Carol_Oates Wikipedia]] * Jean Rhys [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_Rhys Wikipedia]] * Dorothy Richardson [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dorothy_Richardson Wikipedia]] * Gertrude Stein [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gertrude_Stein Wikipedia]] * Virginia Woolf [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virginia_Woolf Wikipedia]] ==== Twentieth-century avant-garde African-American poets ==== * RCEL Chapter 13: "Experiments in black: African-American avant-garde poetics" by Aldon Lynn Nielsen * Russell Atkins [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russell_Atkins Wikipedia]] * Amiri Baraka [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amiri_Baraka Wikipedia]] * Jayne Cortez [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jayne_Cortez Wikipedia]] * Negro Digest [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Negro_Digest Wikipedia]] * Langston Hughes [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Langston_Hughes Wikipedia]] * Ted Joans [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ted_Joans Wikipedia]] * Percy Johnston [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Percy_Johnston Wikipedia]] * Bob Kaufman [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bob_Kaufman Wikipedia]] * Stephen Jonas [[https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems-and-poets/poets/detail/stephen-jonas Poetry Foundation]] * William Melvin Kelley [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Melvin_Kelley Wikipedia]] * Nathaniel Mackey [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nathaniel_Mackey Wikipedia]] * Clarence Major [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clarence_Major Wikipedia]] * Tracie Morris [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tracie_Morris Wikipedia]] * Harryette Mullen [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harryette_Mullen Wikipedia]] * Claudia Rankine [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Claudia_Rankine Wikipedia]] * Gil Scott-Heron [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gil_Scott-Heron Wikipedia]] * Lorenzo Thomas (poet) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lorenzo_Thomas_(poet) Wikipedia]] * Melvin B. Tolson [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Melvin_B._Tolson Wikipedia]] * Jean Toomer [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_Toomer Wikipedia]] * Umbra (poets) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Umbra_(poets) Wikipedia]] ==== Anglophone postcolonial poetry ==== * RCEL Chapter 14: "The limits of hybridity: Language and innovation in Anglophone postcolonial poetry" by Priyamvada Gopal * Postcolonial literature [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Postcolonial_literature Wikipedia]] * G. V. Desani [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G._V._Desani Wikipedia]] * Wilson Harris [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wilson_Harris Wikipedia]] * Dambudzo Marechera [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dambudzo_Marechera Wikipedia]] * Mudrooroo [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mudrooroo Wikipedia]] * Ben Okri [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ben_Okri Wikipedia]] * Salman Rushdie [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salman_Rushdie Wikipedia]] * Vikram Seth [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vikram_Seth Wikipedia]] * Wole Soyinka [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wole_Soyinka Wikipedia]] * Amos Tutuola [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amos_Tutuola Wikipedia]] * Derek Walcott [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Derek_Walcott Wikipedia]] === The new experimentalism === ==== Avant-Pop ==== * RCEL Chapter 15: "Avant-Pop" by Lance Olsen * Avant-Pop: Fiction for a Daydream Nation (Black Ice Books) by Larry McCaffery [[https://www.librarything.com/work/512144 LibraryThing]] * After Yesterday's Crash: The Avant-Pop Anthology by Larry McCaffery [[https://www.librarything.com/work/771064 LibraryThing]] * Tomas Alfredson [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tomas_Alfredson Wikipedia]] * Italo Calvino [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Italo_Calvino Wikipedia]] * David Clark [[https://elmcip.net/node/622 ELMCIP]] * Umberto Eco [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Umberto_Eco Wikipedia]] * Betrayed by Rita Hayworth by Manuel Puig [[https://www.librarything.com/work/128453 LibraryThing]] * Naked Lunch by William S. Burroughs [[https://www.librarything.com/work/5852 LibraryThing]] * Lost in the Funhouse by John Barth [[https://www.librarything.com/work/29286 LibraryThing]] * Industrial Poetics: Demo Tracks for a Mobile Culture (Contemp North American Poetry) by Joe Amato [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2881291 LibraryThing]] * Kenneth Goldsmith [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kenneth_Goldsmith Wikipedia]] * Robert Coover [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Coover Wikipedia]] * Angela Carter [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angela_Carter Wikipedia]] * Aimee Bender [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aimee_Bender Wikipedia]] * White Noise by Don DeLillo [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4953 LibraryThing]] * Gravity's Rainbow by Thomas Pynchon [[https://www.librarything.com/work/10088 LibraryThing]] * Mark Z. Danielewski's House of leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1488 LibraryThing]] * Europeana: A Brief History of the Twentieth Century by Patrik Ouředník [[https://www.librarything.com/work/179330 LibraryThing]] * Mark Leyner [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mark_Leyner Wikipedia]] * Traveling to Utopia: With a Brief History of the Technology by Young-Hae Chang Heavy Industries [[https://www.librarything.com/work/11864011 LibraryThing]] ==== Post-postmodernism ==== * RCEL Chapter 16: "Post-postmodernism" by Robert L. McLaughlin * Post-postmodernism [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Post-postmodernism Wikipedia]] ==== Globalization and transnationalism ==== * RCEL Chapter 17: "Globalization and transnationalism" by Liam Connell * Count Zero by William Gibson [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2445 LibraryThing]] * The Fountain at the Centre of the World by Robert Newman [[https://www.librarything.com/work/18226 LibraryThing]] * Tropic of Orange by Karen Tei Yamashita [[https://www.librarything.com/work/509798 LibraryThing]] * Mark Lombardi: Global Networks by Robert Hobbs [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1066 LibraryThing]] * JPod by Douglas Coupland [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1115072 LibraryThing]] * Looking for Headless by K. D. [[https://www.librarything.com/work/10578723 LibraryThing]] ==== Altermodernist fiction ==== * RCEL Chapter 18: "Altermodernist fiction" by Alison Gibbons * The Rings of Saturn by W. G. Sebald [[https://www.librarything.com/work/28135 LibraryThing]] * Erasmus is Late by Liam Gillick [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1319708 LibraryThing]] * Shanghai Dancing by Brian Castro [[https://www.librarything.com/work/581326 LibraryThing]] * The Islanders: An Introduction by Charles Avery [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8086723 LibraryThing]] * The One Facing Us: A Novel by Ronit Matalon [[https://www.librarything.com/work/643371 LibraryThing]] * Istanbul: Memories and the City by Orhan Pamuk [[https://www.librarything.com/work/100731 LibraryThing]] * Only Revolutions by Mark Z. Danielewski [[https://www.librarything.com/work/798583 LibraryThing]] * Headless by Goldin+Senneby [[https://web.archive.org/web/20180506182844/http://www.goldinsenneby.com/gs/?p=116 Goldin+Senneby]] [[http://rhizome.org/editorial/2009/feb/04/interview-with-goldinsenneby/ Interview with Goldin+Senneby - Rhizome]] [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tOGttCSUecM Angus Cameron lecture on Headless - YouTube]] * A Visit from the Goon Squad by Jennifer Egan [[https://www.librarything.com/work/9530166 LibraryThing]] * Open City by Teju Cole [[https://www.librarything.com/work/10577676 LibraryThing]] * Rana Dasgupta [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rana_Dasgupta Wikipedia]] ==== Manifestos and ''Ars Poetica'' ==== * RCEL Chapter 19: "Manifestos and ''Ars Poetica''" by Laura Winkiel * Manifesto [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manifesto Wikipedia]] * Ars Poetica (Horace) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ars_Poetica_(Horace) Wikipedia]] * Ars Poetica by Archibald MacLeish [[https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poetrymagazine/poems/17168/ars-poetica full text]] ==== Post-criticism ==== * RCEL Chapter 20: "Post-criticism: Conceptual takes" by Gregory L. Ulmer * Heuretics: The Logic of Invention by Gregory L. Ulmer [[https://www.librarything.com/work/173585 LibraryThing]] == Experiment now: printed matter == === Experiments with language === ==== Language poetry ==== * RCEL Chapter 21: "The expanded field of ''L=A=N=G=U=A=G=E''" by Charles Bernstein * Language poets [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Language_poets Wikipedia]] ==== Concrete poetry and prose ==== * RCEL Chapter 22: "Concrete poetry and prose" by Joe Bray * Concrete poetry [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Concrete_poetry Wikipedia]] ==== Found poetry and "uncreative writing" ==== * RCEL Chapter 23: "Found poetry, 'uncreative writing,' and the art of appropriation" by Andrew Epstein * Found poetry [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Found_poetry Wikipedia]] ==== Words in visual art ==== * RCEL Chapter 24: "Words in visual art" by Jessica Prinz ==== Literary inauthenticity ==== * RCEL Chapter 25: "Hoax-poetry and inauthenticity" by Philip Mead ===== Classical ===== * The Rowley Poems by Thomas Chatterton [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2002159 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Chatterton Thomas Chatterton - Wikipedia]] * The poems of Ossian by James MacPherson [[https://www.librarything.com/work/422650 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Macpherson James Macpherson - Wikipedia]] * Kalevala by Elias Lönnrot [[https://www.librarything.com/work/158724 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kalevala Wikipedia]] * The Tablets by Armand Schwerner [[https://www.librarything.com/work/335430 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Armand_Schwerner Armand Schwerner - Wikipedia]] ===== Modern ===== * A Million Little Pieces by James Frey [[https://www.librarything.com/work/444 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Million_Little_Pieces Wikipedia]] * Angel at the Fence: The True Story of a Love that Survived by Herman Rosenblat [[https://www.librarything.com/work/6304567 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angel_at_the_Fence Wikipedia]] * Fragments: Memories of a Wartime Childhood by Binjamin Wilkomirski [[https://www.librarything.com/work/188668 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Binjamin_Wilkomirski Binjamin Wilkomirski - Wikipedia]] * Down the Road, Worlds Away by Rahila Khan [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1737627 LibraryThing]] [[https://www.lrb.co.uk/v10/n03/toby-forward/diary Diary - Toby Forward - London Review of Books]] * The Hand That Signed The Paper by Helen Darville [[https://www.librarything.com/work/336438 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helen_Dale Helen Dale - Wikipedia]] * B. Wongar [[https://www.librarything.com/author/wongarb LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/B._Wongar Wikipedia]] [[http://sf-encyclopedia.com/entry/wongar_b Science Fiction Encyclopedia]] * My own sweet time by Wanda Koolmatrie [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1908840 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leon_Carmen Leon Carmen - Wikipedia]] * Honor Lost: Love and Death in Modern-Day Jordan by Norma Khouri [[https://www.librarything.com/work/245918 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Forbidden_Love_(novel) Wikipedia]] * The darkening ecliptic by Ern Malley [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4591077 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ern_Malley Ern Malley - Wikipedia]] * Araki Yasusada [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Araki_Yasusada Wikipedia]] [[https://hereshebe.wordpress.com/2008/09/29/on-the-araki-yasusada-hoax/ On the Araki Yasusada Hoax - Here She Be — The Battlements]] ** Doubled Flowering: From the Notebooks of Araki Yasusada by Araki Yasusada [[https://www.librarything.com/work/515083 LibraryThing]] ** Also, With My Throat, I Shall Swallow Ten Thousand Swords: Araki Yasusada's Letters in English by Tosa Motokiyu [[https://www.librarything.com/work/515079 LibraryThing]] ===== Post-hoax ===== * Fernando Pessoa [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fernando_Pessoa Wikipedia]] * Ecopoetry: a critical introduction by Scott Bryson [[https://www.librarything.com/work/129941 LibraryThing]] * Women and ecopoetics: an introduction in context by Harriet Tarlo [[https://www.asu.edu/pipercwcenter/how2journal/vol_3_no_2/ecopoetics/introstatements/tarlo_intro.html full text - HOW2]] * ecopoetics [[https://ecopoetics.wordpress.com/ full text - ecopoetics]] * Media Poetry: An International Anthology by Eduardo Kac [[https://www.librarything.com/work/5074311 LibraryThing]] * Flarf [[http://mainstreampoetry.blogspot.com/ full text - Flarf]] === Experiments with narrative and fiction === ==== Unnatural narration ==== * RCEL Chapter 26: "Unnatural voices, minds, and narration" by Jan Alber, Henrik Skov Nielsen, and Brian Richardson ===== Impossibly informed narrator ===== * Virginie: Her Two Lives by John Hawkes [[https://www.librarything.com/work/121280 LibraryThing]] * Travesties by Tom Stoppard [[https://www.librarything.com/work/27223 LibraryThing]] * Midnight's Children by Salman Rushdie [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2118 LibraryThing]] * In Search of Lost Time by Marcel Proust [[https://www.librarything.com/work/23844 LibraryThing]] * The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2964 LibraryThing]] * Moby Dick by Herman Melville [[https://www.librarything.com/work/15540 LibraryThing]] * Ulysses by James Joyce [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8520 LibraryThing]] ===== Impossibly confused narrator ===== * Molloy by Samuel Beckett [[https://www.librarything.com/work/56659 LibraryThing]] * In the Labyrinth by Alain Robbe-Grillet [[https://www.librarything.com/work/319705 LibraryThing]] * "You Are As Brave As Vincent Van Gogh," Flying to America: 45 More Stories by Donald Barthelme [[https://www.librarything.com/work/3397639 LibraryThing]] ===== Non-human narrator ===== * Kew Gardens by Virginia Woolf [[https://www.librarything.com/work/891578 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kew_Gardens_(short_story) Wikipedia]] * "The House of Asterion," The Aleph and Other Stories by Jorge Luis Borges [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1443832 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_House_of_Asterion Wikipedia]] * "Jealous Husband Returns in Form of Parrot," Tabloid Dreams: Stories by Robert Olen Butler [[https://www.librarything.com/work/150283 LibraryThing]] * Doctor Rat by William Kotzwinkle [[https://www.librarything.com/work/93750 LibraryThing]] * "My Life As a West African Gray Parrot," The Left-Handed Marriage: Stories by Leigh Buchanan Bienen [[https://www.librarything.com/work/3769284 LibraryThing]] * Shakespeare's Dog by Leon Rooke [[https://www.librarything.com/work/203121 LibraryThing]] * "The Stowaway," A History of the World in 10½ Chapters by Julian Barnes [[http://www.librarything.com/work/7133 LibraryThing]] * Sweet William: A Memoir of Old Horse by John Hawkes [[https://www.librarything.com/work/216641 LibraryThing]] * Firmin by Sam Savage [[https://www.librarything.com/work/922702 LibraryThing]] * Timbuktu by Paul Auster [[https://www.librarything.com/work/27521 LibraryThing]] ===== Dead narrator ===== * Pedro Páramo by Juan Rulfo [[https://www.librarything.com/work/84285 LibraryThing]] * Pincher Martin by William Golding [[https://www.librarything.com/work/286280 LibraryThing]] * The Third Policeman by Flann O'Brien [[https://www.librarything.com/work/7104 LibraryThing]] * "Terra Incognita," A Russian Beauty and Other Stories by Vladimir Nabokov [[https://www.librarything.com/work/224314 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terra_Incognita_(short_story) Wikipedia]] * Transparent Things by Vladimir Nabokov [[https://www.librarything.com/work/51102 LibraryThing]] * Murther and Walking Spirits by Robertson Davies [[https://www.librarything.com/work/73673 LibraryThing]] * American Desert by Percival Everett [[https://www.librarything.com/work/238787 LibraryThing]] * My Name is Red by Orhan Pamuk [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2744 LibraryThing]] * Hotel World by Ali Smith [[https://www.librarything.com/work/19451 LibraryThing]] * Destiny and Desire by Carlos Fuentes [[https://www.librarything.com/work/6516575 LibraryThing]] * The Book Thief by Markus Zusak [[https://www.librarything.com/work/393681 LibraryThing]] * "The Calmative," Stories and Texts for Nothing by Samuel Beckett [[https://www.librarything.com/work/3398 LibraryThing]] * The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4931 LibraryThing]] ===== Focalization technology ===== * "The Aleph," The Aleph and Other Stories by Jorge Luis Borges [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1443832 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Aleph_(short_story) Wikipedia]] * Neuromancer by William Gibson [[https://www.librarything.com/work/609 LibraryThing]] ===== First-person plural ===== * "A Rose for Emily" by William Faulkner, American Gothic Tales by Joyce Carol Oates [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8038219 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Rose_for_Emily Wikipedia]] * 12 Million Black Voices by Richard Wright [[https://www.librarything.com/work/666218 LibraryThing]] * Two Thousand Seasons by Ayi Kwei Armah [[https://www.librarything.com/work/77062 LibraryThing]] * You Don't Love Yourself by Nathalie Sarraute [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2374617 LibraryThing]] ===== Second-person ===== * A Pagan Place by Edna O'Brien [[https://www.librarything.com/work/218163 LibraryThing]] * "How," Self-help by Lorrie Moore [[http://www.librarything.com/work/35303 LibraryThing]] * If on a Winter's Night a Traveler by Italo Calvino [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4091153 LibraryThing]] ===== Third-person singular impersonal ===== * The Radetzky March by Joseph Roth [[https://www.librarything.com/work/10159 LibraryThing]] * The opoponax by Monique Wittig [[https://www.librarything.com/work/257236 LibraryThing]] ===== Third-person plural ===== * Things: A Story of the Sixties by Georges Perec [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1197807 LibraryThing]] * Flower Children by Maxine Swann [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2375201 LibraryThing]] ===== Gender-neutral pronouns ===== * The Cook and The Carpenter by June Arnold [[https://www.librarything.com/work/736228 LibraryThing]] ===== Pronouns omitted ===== * "Dead Doll Humility" by Kathy Acker, The Making of the American Essay (A New History of the Essay) by John D'Agata [[https://www.librarything.com/work/17216549 LibraryThing]] ===== Multiple points of view ===== * "The Cubs," The Cubs and Other Stories by Mario Vargas Llosa [[https://www.librarything.com/work/17905949 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Los_Cachorros Wikipedia]] * The Death of Artemio Cruz by Carlos Fuentes [[https://www.librarything.com/work/18213 LibraryThing]] * Maps by Nuruddin Farah [[https://www.librarything.com/work/70403 LibraryThing]] * Compact by Maurice Roche [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1287065 LibraryThing]] ===== Merged narrators ===== * Monsieur Levert by Robert Pinget [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1170050 LibraryThing]] * "13," Stories and Texts for Nothing by Samuel Beckett [[https://www.librarything.com/work/3398 LibraryThing]] * The Unnamable by Samuel Beckett [[https://www.librarything.com/work/276374 LibraryThing]] * Glamorama by Bret Easton Ellis [[https://www.librarything.com/work/7545 LibraryThing]] ===== Anachronism ===== * Flight to Canada by Ishmael Reed [[https://www.librarything.com/work/35987 LibraryThing]] ===== Mid-narrative editing ===== * Worstward Ho by Samuel Beckett [[https://www.librarything.com/work/782565 LibraryThing]] ==== Impossible worlds ==== * RCEL Chapter 27: "Impossible worlds" by Marie-Laure Ryan ==== Experimental life writing ==== * RCEL Chapter 28: "Experimental life writing" by Irene Kacandes ===== Time ===== * Stuart: A Life Backwards by Alexander Masters [[https://www.librarything.com/work/93508 LibraryThing]] * One Day a Year: 1960 - 2000 by Christa Wolf [[https://www.librarything.com/work/466217 LibraryThing]] ===== Medium ===== * The Complete Maus by Art Spiegelman [[https://www.librarything.com/work/6046618 LibraryThing]] * The Complete Persepolis by Marjane Satrapi [[https://www.librarything.com/work/6392056 LibraryThing]] * Fun Home: A Family Tragicomic by Alison Bechdel [[https://www.librarything.com/work/627079 LibraryThing]] * 1941-45: a teenager's war: Crete, captivity, liberation by Frederick V. Carabott [[https://www.worldcat.org/title/1941-45-ho-polemos-henos-ephebou-krete-aichmalosia-apeleutherosis-1941-45-a-teenagers-war-crete-captivity-liberation-1941-45-der-krieg-eines-jugendlichen-kreta-gefangenschaft-befreiung/oclc/48228994 WorldCat.org]] * Running in the Family by Michael Ondaatje [[https://www.librarything.com/work/27962 LibraryThing]] * Zami: a New Spelling of My Name by Audre Lorde [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8116 LibraryThing]] * A heartbreaking work of staggering genius by Dave Eggers [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2294 LibraryThing]] * Encyclopedia of an Ordinary Life by Amy Krouse Rosenthal [[https://www.librarything.com/work/35433 LibraryThing]] * The Suicide Index: Putting My Father's Death in Order by Joan Wickersham [[https://www.librarything.com/work/5248942 LibraryThing]] ===== The relational ===== * The Search Warrant by Patrick Modiano [[https://www.librarything.com/work/331076 LibraryThing]] * Ein Kapitel aus meinem Leben by Barbara Honigmann [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4500497 LibraryThing]] * After Long Silence by Helen Fremont [[https://www.librarything.com/work/13147 LibraryThing]] ===== The work's focus ===== * Patterns of Childhood by Christa Wolf [[https://www.librarything.com/work/700778 LibraryThing]] * Boyhood: Scenes from Provincial Life by J. M. Coetzee [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8660368 LibraryThing]] * Youth by J. M. Coetzee [[https://www.librarything.com/work/105432 LibraryThing]] * Summertime: Scenes from Provincial Life by J. M. Coetzee [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8494635 LibraryThing]] * Roland Barthes by Roland Barthes [[https://www.librarything.com/work/592881 LibraryThing]] * W, or The Memory of Childhood by Georges Perec [[https://www.librarything.com/work/39076 LibraryThing]] ===== Multiple techniques ===== * Daddy's War: Greek American Stories by Irene Kacandes [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8797694 LibraryThing]] ==== Experimental genre fiction ==== * RCEL Chapter 29: "'Rotting time': Genre fiction and the avant-garde" by Elana Gomel ===== Fantasy ===== * Iron Council by China Miéville [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4813 LibraryThing]] * Vellum: The Book of All Hours by Hal Duncan [[https://www.librarything.com/work/47894 LibraryThing]] * Ink: The Book of All Hours by Hal Duncan [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1162726 LibraryThing]] ===== Science fiction ===== * Iain Banks [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iain_Banks Wikipedia]] * Stephen Baxter (author) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephen_Baxter_(author) Wikipedia]] * Paul Park [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Park Wikipedia]] * Century Rain by Alastair Reynolds [[https://www.librarything.com/work/48231 LibraryThing]] * Blindsight by Peter Watts [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1333265 LibraryThing]] ===== Horror ===== * Books of Blood | Series [[https://www.librarything.com/series/Books+of+Blood LibraryThing]] * Neverwhere: The Author's Preferred Text by Neil Gaiman [[https://www.librarything.com/work/14623622 LibraryThing]] * Mark Z. Danielewski's House of leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1488 LibraryThing]] * The Everlasting by Tim Lebbon [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2811046 LibraryThing]] === Experiments with form and design === ==== Graphic narrative ==== * RCEL Chapter 30: "Graphic narrative" by Hillary Chute * Alternative comics [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alternative_comics Wikipedia]] ==== Multimodal literature ==== * RCEL Chapter 31: "Multimodal literature and experimentation" by Alison Gibbons * Liberature [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberature Wikipedia]] ==== Information design ==== * RCEL Chapter 32: "Information design, emergent culture and experimental form in the novel" by Steve Tomasula * Exercises in Style by Raymond Queneau [[https://www.librarything.com/work/39048 LibraryThing]] * Double or Nothing by Raymond Federman [[https://www.librarything.com/work/151208 LibraryThing]] * The Gettysburg Powerpoint Presentation by Peter Norvig [[https://norvig.com/Gettysburg/ full text]] * Europeana: A Brief History of the Twentieth Century by Patrik Ouředník [[https://www.librarything.com/work/179330 LibraryThing]] * 2666 by Roberto Bolaño [[https://www.librarything.com/work/996213 LibraryThing]] ==== Interactive fiction ==== * RCEL Chapter 33: "Interactive fiction" by N. Katherine Hayles And Nick Montfort * Interactive fiction [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interactive_fiction Wikipedia]] == Experiment now: beyond the page == === The digital age === ==== Digital fiction ==== * RCEL Chapter 34: "Digital fiction: Networked narratives" by David Ciccoricco * Storyspace [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Storyspace Wikipedia]] [[http://www.digitalhumanities.org/dhq/vol/6/2/000128/000128.html Machine Enhanced (Re)minding: the Development of Storyspace - Digital Humanities Quarterly]] [[http://dtc-wsuv.org/wp/ell/2017/10/28/untangling-threads-in-the-maze/ Untangling Threads in the Labyrinth – Electronic Literature Lab]] * Click by John Barth [[https://elmcip.net/node/1991 ELMCIP]] * The Glass Snail: a Pre-Christmas Tale by Milorad Pavić [[https://elmcip.net/node/1080 ELMCIP]] * 10:01 by Lance Olsen [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1139235 LibraryThing]] [[https://elmcip.net/node/1356 ELMCIP]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/10:01 Wikipedia]] * TOC: A New Media Novel by Steve Tomasula [[https://www.librarything.com/work/9462724 LibraryThing]] [[https://elmcip.net/node/835 ELMCIP]] * The LiveJournal of Zachary Marsh by Matthew Baldwin [[https://elmcip.net/node/13635 ELMCIP]] [[https://themorningnews.org/article/the-livejournal-of-zachary-marsh full text - The Morning News]] * A Million Penguins [[https://elmcip.net/node/6215 ELMCIP]] [[https://web.archive.org/web/20090803141129/http://www.amillionpenguins.com/wiki/index.php/Welcome full text - PenguinWiki]] [[https://www.researchgate.net/publication/228465833_A_million_penguins_research_report (PDF) A million penguins research report - ResearchGate]] [[https://www.theguardian.com/books/booksblog/2007/mar/12/livingwithamillionpenguins Living with A Million Penguins: inside the wiki-novel - The Guardian]] * Blue Company by Rob Wittig [[https://elmcip.net/node/368 ELMCIP]] [[http://robwit.net/?project=blue-company robwit.net]] * Deena Larsen [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deena_Larsen Wikipedia]] ** Marble Springs 1.0 by Deena Larsen [[https://elmcip.net/node/3231 ELMCIP]] ** Marble Springs 3.0 by Deena Larsen [[https://elmcip.net/node/4417 ELMCIP]] ** Disappearing Rain by Deena Larsen [[https://elmcip.net/node/759 ELMCIP]] * Judy Malloy [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Judy_Malloy Wikipedia]] * Uncle Buddy's Phantom Funhouse by John McDaid [[https://elmcip.net/node/519 ELMCIP]] [[http://dtc-wsuv.org/wp/pathfinders/authors-works/john-mcdaid-uncle-buddys-phantom-funhouse/ Pathfinders]] [[http://scalar.usc.edu/works/pathfinders/mcdaids-traversal John McDaid's Traversal - Pathfinders]] * Michael Joyce (writer) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Joyce_(writer) Wikipedia]] ** afternoon, a story by Michael Joyce [[https://elmcip.net/node/236 ELMCIP]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Afternoon,_a_story Wikipedia]] ** Twelve Blue by Michael Joyce [[https://elmcip.net/node/237 ELMCIP]] * I Have Said Nothing by J. Yellowlees Douglas [[https://elmcip.net/node/2063 ELMCIP]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I_Have_Said_Nothing Wikipedia]] * We Descend by Bill Bly [[http://scalar.usc.edu/works/pathfinders/bill-bly Pathfinders]] ** We Descend: Archives Pertaining to Edgerus Scriptor, Volume One [[https://elmcip.net/node/1101 ELMCIP]] ** We Descend: Archives Pertaining to Egderus Scriptor, Volume Two [[https://elmcip.net/node/4269 ELMCIP]] * Patchwork Girl by Shelley Jackson [[https://elmcip.net/node/239 ELMCIP]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patchwork_Girl_(hypertext) Wikipedia]] * Califia by M. D. Coverley [[https://elmcip.net/node/723 ELMCIP]] * Victory Garden by Stuart Moulthrop [[https://elmcip.net/node/352 ELMCIP]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Victory_Garden_(novel) Wikipedia]] * The Unknown by William Gillespie, Scott Rettberg, Dirk Stratton, and Frank Marquardt [[https://elmcip.net/node/662 ELMCIP]] * GRAMMATRON by Mark Amerika [[https://elmcip.net/node/581 ELMCIP]] * 253 by Geoff Ryman [[https://elmcip.net/node/7513 ELMCIP]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/253_(novel) Wikipedia]] * The Jew's Daughter by Judd Morrissey [[https://elmcip.net/node/78 ELMCIP]] * Erik Loyer [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erik_Loyer Wikipedia]] ** Chroma by Erik Loyer [[https://elmcip.net/node/1289 ELMCIP]] ** Lair of the Marrow Monkey by Erik Loyer [[https://elmcip.net/node/5067 ELMCIP]] * Shelley Jackson [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shelley_Jackson Wikipedia]] ** my body — a Wunderkammer by Shelley Jackson [[https://elmcip.net/node/793 ELMCIP]] * About Time by Rob Swigart [[https://elmcip.net/node/4112 ELMCIP]] * The Virtual Disappearance of Miriam by Andy Campbell and Martyn Bedford [[https://elmcip.net/node/1600 ELMCIP]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Virtual_Disappearance_of_Miriam Wikipedia]] * Varicella by Adam Cadre [[https://elmcip.net/node/7775 ELMCIP]] [[http://www.ifwiki.org/index.php/Varicella IFWiki]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Varicella_(video_game) Wikipedia]] * Ruth Nestvold [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ruth_Nestvold Wikipedia]] ** Joe's Heartbeat in Budapest by Ruth Nestvold [[http://www.lit-arts.net/JHIB/begin.htm full text - Lit-Arts.Net]] * 2002: A Palindrome Story in 2002 Words by Nick Montfort and William Gillespie [[https://elmcip.net/node/7962 ELMCIP]] ==== Code poetry and new-media literature ==== * RCEL Chapter 35: "Code poetry and new-media literature" by Steve Tomasula * Code poetry [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Code_poetry Wikipedia]] ==== Computer gaming ==== * RCEL Chapter 36: "Computer gaming" by Astrid Ensslin * Art game [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Art_game Wikipedia]] ==== Virtual autobiography ==== * RCEL Chapter 37: "Virtual autobiography: Autographies, interfaces, and avatars" by Amy J. Elias == Planned updates == * Add links to the empty categories. * Add a description for each category. * Add authors and works for the categories that only have general links. * Add links from other sites. * Normalize the reference formatting. [[Category:Developing]] [[Category:Lists]] [[Category:Experimental Literature]] 7533371a49e811644404e1280d049814cc357e9c 434 433 2019-04-28T04:58:14Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added links to "Graphic Narrative." wikitext text/x-wiki == Introduction == This article is a list of links to authors, works, and categories in experimental literature. Its purpose is to give you a starting point for exploring works in this set of genres. I've based the list's organization on ''The Routledge Companion to Experimental Literature'' (RCEL), a collection of scholarly essays on the subject. This project is a work in progress. == How to use this list == If a category is well established in the field, I've linked to its Wikipedia article. If the author of the RCEL article was conducting their own survey of the category, I've listed the authors and works they cover with links to Wikipedia and LibraryThing wherever corresponding pages are available. I've also included links to a work's full text when that's available and links to background information from other sources. === Wikipedia === Wikipedia articles will give you background information on their subject, and they'll usually contain bibliographies that will point you to works related to that subject, such as works in the category or works by the author. === LibraryThing === LibraryThing is a social library catalog website that lets you catalog your collection. Here I'm using it for its recommendation features and its links to other sites. When you visit a work's LibraryThing page, you can find related works in the "LibraryThing Recommendations" section and the "Member recommendations" section. You can also click on the tags users have assigned to it. Each tag link takes you to a page for that tag, which lists other works that have been assigned it, as well as related tags, subjects, and tagmashes, which are combinations of tags. You can [https://wiki.librarything.com/index.php/HelpThing:Tagmash create your own tagmashes]. In the upper right sidebar of a work's LibraryThing page, you'll find links to its corresponding page on other catalog websites, such as Amazon, Google Books, and WorldCat, a shared catalog of physical libraries worldwide. These sites will often let you look through a preview of the book. They'll also give you ways to find other related works, usually by recommendations or subject links on the work's page. If you're logged in, you can edit this section to show links from a long list of other sites. == General == * Experimental literature [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Experimental_literature Wikipedia]] * Bray, Joe, Alison Gibbons, and Brian McHale, eds. ''The Routledge Companion to Experimental Literature''. Routledge Companions. London: Routledge, 2015. [[https://www.librarything.com/work/18336113 LibraryThing]] == The historical avant-gardes == === Modernist-era experimentalism === ==== Futurism ==== * RCEL Chapter 2: "Italian Futurism and Russian Cubo-Futurism" by John White * Futurism (literature) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Futurism_(literature) Wikipedia]] ==== Expressionism ==== * RCEL Chapter 3: "The poetics of animism: Realism and the fantastic in expressionist literature and film" by Richard Murphy * Expressionism [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Expressionism Wikipedia]] ==== Surrealism ==== * RCEL Chapter 4: "The surrealist experiments with language" by Peter Stockwell * Surrealism [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surrealism Wikipedia]] ==== Absurdism ==== * RCEL Chapter 5: "The literary absurd" by Joanna Gavins * Absurdist fiction [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Absurdist_fiction Wikipedia]] === Postmodernist experimentalism === ==== Postwar experimental poetry ==== * RCEL Chapter 6: "Spontaneity and improvisation in postwar experimental poetry" by Benjamin Lee * The New American Poetry 1945–1960 [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_New_American_Poetry_1945%E2%80%931960 Wikipedia]] ==== The ''nouveau roman'' and ''Tel Quel'' ==== * RCEL Chapter 7: "The ''nouveau roman'' and ''Tel Quel''" by Danielle Marx-Scouras * Nouveau roman [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nouveau_roman Wikipedia]] * Tel Quel [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tel_Quel Wikipedia]] ==== Lettrism and situationism ==== * RCEL Chapter 8: "Lettrism and situationism" by Tyrus Miller * Lettrism [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lettrism Wikipedia]] * Situationist International [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Situationist_International Wikipedia]] ==== OuLiPo and proceduralism ==== * RCEL Chapter 9: "OuLiPo and proceduralism" by Jan Baetens * Constrained writing [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constrained_writing Wikipedia]] * Oulipo [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oulipo Wikipedia]] ==== Metafiction ==== * RCEL Chapter 10: "Metafiction" by R. M. Berry * Metafiction [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metafiction Wikipedia]] ==== Postmodern literature ==== * RCEL Chapter 11: "Postmodernism and experiment" by Brian McHale * Postmodern literature [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Postmodern_literature Wikipedia]] === Experiments with identity === ==== Twentieth-century avant-garde women writers ==== * RCEL Chapter 12: "Sexing the text: Women’s avant-garde writing in the twentieth century" by Ellen G. Friedman * Kathy Acker [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kathy_Acker Wikipedia]] * Djuna Barnes [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Djuna_Barnes Wikipedia]] * Jane Bowles [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jane_Bowles Wikipedia]] * H.D. [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H.D. Wikipedia]] * Toni Morrison [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toni_Morrison Wikipedia]] * Bharati Mukherjee [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bharati_Mukherjee Wikipedia]] * Anaïs Nin [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ana%C3%AFs_Nin Wikipedia]] * Joyce Carol Oates [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joyce_Carol_Oates Wikipedia]] * Jean Rhys [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_Rhys Wikipedia]] * Dorothy Richardson [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dorothy_Richardson Wikipedia]] * Gertrude Stein [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gertrude_Stein Wikipedia]] * Virginia Woolf [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virginia_Woolf Wikipedia]] ==== Twentieth-century avant-garde African-American poets ==== * RCEL Chapter 13: "Experiments in black: African-American avant-garde poetics" by Aldon Lynn Nielsen * Russell Atkins [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russell_Atkins Wikipedia]] * Amiri Baraka [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amiri_Baraka Wikipedia]] * Jayne Cortez [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jayne_Cortez Wikipedia]] * Negro Digest [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Negro_Digest Wikipedia]] * Langston Hughes [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Langston_Hughes Wikipedia]] * Ted Joans [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ted_Joans Wikipedia]] * Percy Johnston [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Percy_Johnston Wikipedia]] * Bob Kaufman [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bob_Kaufman Wikipedia]] * Stephen Jonas [[https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems-and-poets/poets/detail/stephen-jonas Poetry Foundation]] * William Melvin Kelley [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Melvin_Kelley Wikipedia]] * Nathaniel Mackey [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nathaniel_Mackey Wikipedia]] * Clarence Major [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clarence_Major Wikipedia]] * Tracie Morris [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tracie_Morris Wikipedia]] * Harryette Mullen [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harryette_Mullen Wikipedia]] * Claudia Rankine [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Claudia_Rankine Wikipedia]] * Gil Scott-Heron [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gil_Scott-Heron Wikipedia]] * Lorenzo Thomas (poet) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lorenzo_Thomas_(poet) Wikipedia]] * Melvin B. Tolson [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Melvin_B._Tolson Wikipedia]] * Jean Toomer [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_Toomer Wikipedia]] * Umbra (poets) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Umbra_(poets) Wikipedia]] ==== Anglophone postcolonial poetry ==== * RCEL Chapter 14: "The limits of hybridity: Language and innovation in Anglophone postcolonial poetry" by Priyamvada Gopal * Postcolonial literature [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Postcolonial_literature Wikipedia]] * G. V. Desani [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G._V._Desani Wikipedia]] * Wilson Harris [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wilson_Harris Wikipedia]] * Dambudzo Marechera [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dambudzo_Marechera Wikipedia]] * Mudrooroo [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mudrooroo Wikipedia]] * Ben Okri [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ben_Okri Wikipedia]] * Salman Rushdie [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salman_Rushdie Wikipedia]] * Vikram Seth [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vikram_Seth Wikipedia]] * Wole Soyinka [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wole_Soyinka Wikipedia]] * Amos Tutuola [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amos_Tutuola Wikipedia]] * Derek Walcott [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Derek_Walcott Wikipedia]] === The new experimentalism === ==== Avant-Pop ==== * RCEL Chapter 15: "Avant-Pop" by Lance Olsen * Avant-Pop: Fiction for a Daydream Nation (Black Ice Books) by Larry McCaffery [[https://www.librarything.com/work/512144 LibraryThing]] * After Yesterday's Crash: The Avant-Pop Anthology by Larry McCaffery [[https://www.librarything.com/work/771064 LibraryThing]] * Tomas Alfredson [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tomas_Alfredson Wikipedia]] * Italo Calvino [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Italo_Calvino Wikipedia]] * David Clark [[https://elmcip.net/node/622 ELMCIP]] * Umberto Eco [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Umberto_Eco Wikipedia]] * Betrayed by Rita Hayworth by Manuel Puig [[https://www.librarything.com/work/128453 LibraryThing]] * Naked Lunch by William S. Burroughs [[https://www.librarything.com/work/5852 LibraryThing]] * Lost in the Funhouse by John Barth [[https://www.librarything.com/work/29286 LibraryThing]] * Industrial Poetics: Demo Tracks for a Mobile Culture (Contemp North American Poetry) by Joe Amato [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2881291 LibraryThing]] * Kenneth Goldsmith [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kenneth_Goldsmith Wikipedia]] * Robert Coover [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Coover Wikipedia]] * Angela Carter [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angela_Carter Wikipedia]] * Aimee Bender [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aimee_Bender Wikipedia]] * White Noise by Don DeLillo [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4953 LibraryThing]] * Gravity's Rainbow by Thomas Pynchon [[https://www.librarything.com/work/10088 LibraryThing]] * Mark Z. Danielewski's House of leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1488 LibraryThing]] * Europeana: A Brief History of the Twentieth Century by Patrik Ouředník [[https://www.librarything.com/work/179330 LibraryThing]] * Mark Leyner [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mark_Leyner Wikipedia]] * Traveling to Utopia: With a Brief History of the Technology by Young-Hae Chang Heavy Industries [[https://www.librarything.com/work/11864011 LibraryThing]] ==== Post-postmodernism ==== * RCEL Chapter 16: "Post-postmodernism" by Robert L. McLaughlin * Post-postmodernism [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Post-postmodernism Wikipedia]] ==== Globalization and transnationalism ==== * RCEL Chapter 17: "Globalization and transnationalism" by Liam Connell * Count Zero by William Gibson [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2445 LibraryThing]] * The Fountain at the Centre of the World by Robert Newman [[https://www.librarything.com/work/18226 LibraryThing]] * Tropic of Orange by Karen Tei Yamashita [[https://www.librarything.com/work/509798 LibraryThing]] * Mark Lombardi: Global Networks by Robert Hobbs [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1066 LibraryThing]] * JPod by Douglas Coupland [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1115072 LibraryThing]] * Looking for Headless by K. D. [[https://www.librarything.com/work/10578723 LibraryThing]] ==== Altermodernist fiction ==== * RCEL Chapter 18: "Altermodernist fiction" by Alison Gibbons * The Rings of Saturn by W. G. Sebald [[https://www.librarything.com/work/28135 LibraryThing]] * Erasmus is Late by Liam Gillick [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1319708 LibraryThing]] * Shanghai Dancing by Brian Castro [[https://www.librarything.com/work/581326 LibraryThing]] * The Islanders: An Introduction by Charles Avery [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8086723 LibraryThing]] * The One Facing Us: A Novel by Ronit Matalon [[https://www.librarything.com/work/643371 LibraryThing]] * Istanbul: Memories and the City by Orhan Pamuk [[https://www.librarything.com/work/100731 LibraryThing]] * Only Revolutions by Mark Z. Danielewski [[https://www.librarything.com/work/798583 LibraryThing]] * Headless by Goldin+Senneby [[https://web.archive.org/web/20180506182844/http://www.goldinsenneby.com/gs/?p=116 Goldin+Senneby]] [[http://rhizome.org/editorial/2009/feb/04/interview-with-goldinsenneby/ Interview with Goldin+Senneby - Rhizome]] [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tOGttCSUecM Angus Cameron lecture on Headless - YouTube]] * A Visit from the Goon Squad by Jennifer Egan [[https://www.librarything.com/work/9530166 LibraryThing]] * Open City by Teju Cole [[https://www.librarything.com/work/10577676 LibraryThing]] * Rana Dasgupta [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rana_Dasgupta Wikipedia]] ==== Manifestos and ''Ars Poetica'' ==== * RCEL Chapter 19: "Manifestos and ''Ars Poetica''" by Laura Winkiel * Manifesto [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manifesto Wikipedia]] * Ars Poetica (Horace) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ars_Poetica_(Horace) Wikipedia]] * Ars Poetica by Archibald MacLeish [[https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poetrymagazine/poems/17168/ars-poetica full text]] ==== Post-criticism ==== * RCEL Chapter 20: "Post-criticism: Conceptual takes" by Gregory L. Ulmer * Heuretics: The Logic of Invention by Gregory L. Ulmer [[https://www.librarything.com/work/173585 LibraryThing]] == Experiment now: printed matter == === Experiments with language === ==== Language poetry ==== * RCEL Chapter 21: "The expanded field of ''L=A=N=G=U=A=G=E''" by Charles Bernstein * Language poets [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Language_poets Wikipedia]] ==== Concrete poetry and prose ==== * RCEL Chapter 22: "Concrete poetry and prose" by Joe Bray * Concrete poetry [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Concrete_poetry Wikipedia]] ==== Found poetry and "uncreative writing" ==== * RCEL Chapter 23: "Found poetry, 'uncreative writing,' and the art of appropriation" by Andrew Epstein * Found poetry [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Found_poetry Wikipedia]] ==== Words in visual art ==== * RCEL Chapter 24: "Words in visual art" by Jessica Prinz ==== Literary inauthenticity ==== * RCEL Chapter 25: "Hoax-poetry and inauthenticity" by Philip Mead ===== Classical ===== * The Rowley Poems by Thomas Chatterton [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2002159 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Chatterton Thomas Chatterton - Wikipedia]] * The poems of Ossian by James MacPherson [[https://www.librarything.com/work/422650 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Macpherson James Macpherson - Wikipedia]] * Kalevala by Elias Lönnrot [[https://www.librarything.com/work/158724 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kalevala Wikipedia]] * The Tablets by Armand Schwerner [[https://www.librarything.com/work/335430 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Armand_Schwerner Armand Schwerner - Wikipedia]] ===== Modern ===== * A Million Little Pieces by James Frey [[https://www.librarything.com/work/444 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Million_Little_Pieces Wikipedia]] * Angel at the Fence: The True Story of a Love that Survived by Herman Rosenblat [[https://www.librarything.com/work/6304567 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angel_at_the_Fence Wikipedia]] * Fragments: Memories of a Wartime Childhood by Binjamin Wilkomirski [[https://www.librarything.com/work/188668 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Binjamin_Wilkomirski Binjamin Wilkomirski - Wikipedia]] * Down the Road, Worlds Away by Rahila Khan [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1737627 LibraryThing]] [[https://www.lrb.co.uk/v10/n03/toby-forward/diary Diary - Toby Forward - London Review of Books]] * The Hand That Signed The Paper by Helen Darville [[https://www.librarything.com/work/336438 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helen_Dale Helen Dale - Wikipedia]] * B. Wongar [[https://www.librarything.com/author/wongarb LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/B._Wongar Wikipedia]] [[http://sf-encyclopedia.com/entry/wongar_b Science Fiction Encyclopedia]] * My own sweet time by Wanda Koolmatrie [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1908840 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leon_Carmen Leon Carmen - Wikipedia]] * Honor Lost: Love and Death in Modern-Day Jordan by Norma Khouri [[https://www.librarything.com/work/245918 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Forbidden_Love_(novel) Wikipedia]] * The darkening ecliptic by Ern Malley [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4591077 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ern_Malley Ern Malley - Wikipedia]] * Araki Yasusada [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Araki_Yasusada Wikipedia]] [[https://hereshebe.wordpress.com/2008/09/29/on-the-araki-yasusada-hoax/ On the Araki Yasusada Hoax - Here She Be — The Battlements]] ** Doubled Flowering: From the Notebooks of Araki Yasusada by Araki Yasusada [[https://www.librarything.com/work/515083 LibraryThing]] ** Also, With My Throat, I Shall Swallow Ten Thousand Swords: Araki Yasusada's Letters in English by Tosa Motokiyu [[https://www.librarything.com/work/515079 LibraryThing]] ===== Post-hoax ===== * Fernando Pessoa [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fernando_Pessoa Wikipedia]] * Ecopoetry: a critical introduction by Scott Bryson [[https://www.librarything.com/work/129941 LibraryThing]] * Women and ecopoetics: an introduction in context by Harriet Tarlo [[https://www.asu.edu/pipercwcenter/how2journal/vol_3_no_2/ecopoetics/introstatements/tarlo_intro.html full text - HOW2]] * ecopoetics [[https://ecopoetics.wordpress.com/ full text - ecopoetics]] * Media Poetry: An International Anthology by Eduardo Kac [[https://www.librarything.com/work/5074311 LibraryThing]] * Flarf [[http://mainstreampoetry.blogspot.com/ full text - Flarf]] === Experiments with narrative and fiction === ==== Unnatural narration ==== * RCEL Chapter 26: "Unnatural voices, minds, and narration" by Jan Alber, Henrik Skov Nielsen, and Brian Richardson ===== Impossibly informed narrator ===== * Virginie: Her Two Lives by John Hawkes [[https://www.librarything.com/work/121280 LibraryThing]] * Travesties by Tom Stoppard [[https://www.librarything.com/work/27223 LibraryThing]] * Midnight's Children by Salman Rushdie [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2118 LibraryThing]] * In Search of Lost Time by Marcel Proust [[https://www.librarything.com/work/23844 LibraryThing]] * The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2964 LibraryThing]] * Moby Dick by Herman Melville [[https://www.librarything.com/work/15540 LibraryThing]] * Ulysses by James Joyce [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8520 LibraryThing]] ===== Impossibly confused narrator ===== * Molloy by Samuel Beckett [[https://www.librarything.com/work/56659 LibraryThing]] * In the Labyrinth by Alain Robbe-Grillet [[https://www.librarything.com/work/319705 LibraryThing]] * "You Are As Brave As Vincent Van Gogh," Flying to America: 45 More Stories by Donald Barthelme [[https://www.librarything.com/work/3397639 LibraryThing]] ===== Non-human narrator ===== * Kew Gardens by Virginia Woolf [[https://www.librarything.com/work/891578 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kew_Gardens_(short_story) Wikipedia]] * "The House of Asterion," The Aleph and Other Stories by Jorge Luis Borges [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1443832 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_House_of_Asterion Wikipedia]] * "Jealous Husband Returns in Form of Parrot," Tabloid Dreams: Stories by Robert Olen Butler [[https://www.librarything.com/work/150283 LibraryThing]] * Doctor Rat by William Kotzwinkle [[https://www.librarything.com/work/93750 LibraryThing]] * "My Life As a West African Gray Parrot," The Left-Handed Marriage: Stories by Leigh Buchanan Bienen [[https://www.librarything.com/work/3769284 LibraryThing]] * Shakespeare's Dog by Leon Rooke [[https://www.librarything.com/work/203121 LibraryThing]] * "The Stowaway," A History of the World in 10½ Chapters by Julian Barnes [[http://www.librarything.com/work/7133 LibraryThing]] * Sweet William: A Memoir of Old Horse by John Hawkes [[https://www.librarything.com/work/216641 LibraryThing]] * Firmin by Sam Savage [[https://www.librarything.com/work/922702 LibraryThing]] * Timbuktu by Paul Auster [[https://www.librarything.com/work/27521 LibraryThing]] ===== Dead narrator ===== * Pedro Páramo by Juan Rulfo [[https://www.librarything.com/work/84285 LibraryThing]] * Pincher Martin by William Golding [[https://www.librarything.com/work/286280 LibraryThing]] * The Third Policeman by Flann O'Brien [[https://www.librarything.com/work/7104 LibraryThing]] * "Terra Incognita," A Russian Beauty and Other Stories by Vladimir Nabokov [[https://www.librarything.com/work/224314 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terra_Incognita_(short_story) Wikipedia]] * Transparent Things by Vladimir Nabokov [[https://www.librarything.com/work/51102 LibraryThing]] * Murther and Walking Spirits by Robertson Davies [[https://www.librarything.com/work/73673 LibraryThing]] * American Desert by Percival Everett [[https://www.librarything.com/work/238787 LibraryThing]] * My Name is Red by Orhan Pamuk [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2744 LibraryThing]] * Hotel World by Ali Smith [[https://www.librarything.com/work/19451 LibraryThing]] * Destiny and Desire by Carlos Fuentes [[https://www.librarything.com/work/6516575 LibraryThing]] * The Book Thief by Markus Zusak [[https://www.librarything.com/work/393681 LibraryThing]] * "The Calmative," Stories and Texts for Nothing by Samuel Beckett [[https://www.librarything.com/work/3398 LibraryThing]] * The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4931 LibraryThing]] ===== Focalization technology ===== * "The Aleph," The Aleph and Other Stories by Jorge Luis Borges [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1443832 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Aleph_(short_story) Wikipedia]] * Neuromancer by William Gibson [[https://www.librarything.com/work/609 LibraryThing]] ===== First-person plural ===== * "A Rose for Emily" by William Faulkner, American Gothic Tales by Joyce Carol Oates [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8038219 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Rose_for_Emily Wikipedia]] * 12 Million Black Voices by Richard Wright [[https://www.librarything.com/work/666218 LibraryThing]] * Two Thousand Seasons by Ayi Kwei Armah [[https://www.librarything.com/work/77062 LibraryThing]] * You Don't Love Yourself by Nathalie Sarraute [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2374617 LibraryThing]] ===== Second-person ===== * A Pagan Place by Edna O'Brien [[https://www.librarything.com/work/218163 LibraryThing]] * "How," Self-help by Lorrie Moore [[http://www.librarything.com/work/35303 LibraryThing]] * If on a Winter's Night a Traveler by Italo Calvino [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4091153 LibraryThing]] ===== Third-person singular impersonal ===== * The Radetzky March by Joseph Roth [[https://www.librarything.com/work/10159 LibraryThing]] * The opoponax by Monique Wittig [[https://www.librarything.com/work/257236 LibraryThing]] ===== Third-person plural ===== * Things: A Story of the Sixties by Georges Perec [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1197807 LibraryThing]] * Flower Children by Maxine Swann [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2375201 LibraryThing]] ===== Gender-neutral pronouns ===== * The Cook and The Carpenter by June Arnold [[https://www.librarything.com/work/736228 LibraryThing]] ===== Pronouns omitted ===== * "Dead Doll Humility" by Kathy Acker, The Making of the American Essay (A New History of the Essay) by John D'Agata [[https://www.librarything.com/work/17216549 LibraryThing]] ===== Multiple points of view ===== * "The Cubs," The Cubs and Other Stories by Mario Vargas Llosa [[https://www.librarything.com/work/17905949 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Los_Cachorros Wikipedia]] * The Death of Artemio Cruz by Carlos Fuentes [[https://www.librarything.com/work/18213 LibraryThing]] * Maps by Nuruddin Farah [[https://www.librarything.com/work/70403 LibraryThing]] * Compact by Maurice Roche [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1287065 LibraryThing]] ===== Merged narrators ===== * Monsieur Levert by Robert Pinget [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1170050 LibraryThing]] * "13," Stories and Texts for Nothing by Samuel Beckett [[https://www.librarything.com/work/3398 LibraryThing]] * The Unnamable by Samuel Beckett [[https://www.librarything.com/work/276374 LibraryThing]] * Glamorama by Bret Easton Ellis [[https://www.librarything.com/work/7545 LibraryThing]] ===== Anachronism ===== * Flight to Canada by Ishmael Reed [[https://www.librarything.com/work/35987 LibraryThing]] ===== Mid-narrative editing ===== * Worstward Ho by Samuel Beckett [[https://www.librarything.com/work/782565 LibraryThing]] ==== Impossible worlds ==== * RCEL Chapter 27: "Impossible worlds" by Marie-Laure Ryan ==== Experimental life writing ==== * RCEL Chapter 28: "Experimental life writing" by Irene Kacandes ===== Time ===== * Stuart: A Life Backwards by Alexander Masters [[https://www.librarything.com/work/93508 LibraryThing]] * One Day a Year: 1960 - 2000 by Christa Wolf [[https://www.librarything.com/work/466217 LibraryThing]] ===== Medium ===== * The Complete Maus by Art Spiegelman [[https://www.librarything.com/work/6046618 LibraryThing]] * The Complete Persepolis by Marjane Satrapi [[https://www.librarything.com/work/6392056 LibraryThing]] * Fun Home: A Family Tragicomic by Alison Bechdel [[https://www.librarything.com/work/627079 LibraryThing]] * 1941-45: a teenager's war: Crete, captivity, liberation by Frederick V. Carabott [[https://www.worldcat.org/title/1941-45-ho-polemos-henos-ephebou-krete-aichmalosia-apeleutherosis-1941-45-a-teenagers-war-crete-captivity-liberation-1941-45-der-krieg-eines-jugendlichen-kreta-gefangenschaft-befreiung/oclc/48228994 WorldCat.org]] * Running in the Family by Michael Ondaatje [[https://www.librarything.com/work/27962 LibraryThing]] * Zami: a New Spelling of My Name by Audre Lorde [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8116 LibraryThing]] * A heartbreaking work of staggering genius by Dave Eggers [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2294 LibraryThing]] * Encyclopedia of an Ordinary Life by Amy Krouse Rosenthal [[https://www.librarything.com/work/35433 LibraryThing]] * The Suicide Index: Putting My Father's Death in Order by Joan Wickersham [[https://www.librarything.com/work/5248942 LibraryThing]] ===== The relational ===== * The Search Warrant by Patrick Modiano [[https://www.librarything.com/work/331076 LibraryThing]] * Ein Kapitel aus meinem Leben by Barbara Honigmann [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4500497 LibraryThing]] * After Long Silence by Helen Fremont [[https://www.librarything.com/work/13147 LibraryThing]] ===== The work's focus ===== * Patterns of Childhood by Christa Wolf [[https://www.librarything.com/work/700778 LibraryThing]] * Boyhood: Scenes from Provincial Life by J. M. Coetzee [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8660368 LibraryThing]] * Youth by J. M. Coetzee [[https://www.librarything.com/work/105432 LibraryThing]] * Summertime: Scenes from Provincial Life by J. M. Coetzee [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8494635 LibraryThing]] * Roland Barthes by Roland Barthes [[https://www.librarything.com/work/592881 LibraryThing]] * W, or The Memory of Childhood by Georges Perec [[https://www.librarything.com/work/39076 LibraryThing]] ===== Multiple techniques ===== * Daddy's War: Greek American Stories by Irene Kacandes [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8797694 LibraryThing]] ==== Experimental genre fiction ==== * RCEL Chapter 29: "'Rotting time': Genre fiction and the avant-garde" by Elana Gomel ===== Fantasy ===== * Iron Council by China Miéville [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4813 LibraryThing]] * Vellum: The Book of All Hours by Hal Duncan [[https://www.librarything.com/work/47894 LibraryThing]] * Ink: The Book of All Hours by Hal Duncan [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1162726 LibraryThing]] ===== Science fiction ===== * Iain Banks [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iain_Banks Wikipedia]] * Stephen Baxter (author) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephen_Baxter_(author) Wikipedia]] * Paul Park [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Park Wikipedia]] * Century Rain by Alastair Reynolds [[https://www.librarything.com/work/48231 LibraryThing]] * Blindsight by Peter Watts [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1333265 LibraryThing]] ===== Horror ===== * Books of Blood | Series [[https://www.librarything.com/series/Books+of+Blood LibraryThing]] * Neverwhere: The Author's Preferred Text by Neil Gaiman [[https://www.librarything.com/work/14623622 LibraryThing]] * Mark Z. Danielewski's House of leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1488 LibraryThing]] * The Everlasting by Tim Lebbon [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2811046 LibraryThing]] === Experiments with form and design === ==== Graphic narrative ==== * RCEL Chapter 30: "Graphic narrative" by Hillary Chute * Alternative comics [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alternative_comics Wikipedia]] ===== Early twentieth century ===== * Little Nemo [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Little_Nemo Wikipedia]] * Wordless novel [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wordless_novel Wikipedia]] ** Vertigo by Lynd Ward [[https://www.librarything.com/work/334743 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vertigo_(wordless_novel) Wikipedia]] ** Frans Masereel [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frans_Masereel Wikipedia]] ** Otto Nückel [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Otto_N%C3%BCckel Wikipedia]] ** Giacomo Patri [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Giacomo_Patri Wikipedia]] ===== Late twentieth century ===== * Mad (magazine) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mad_(magazine) Wikipedia]] * Underground comix [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Underground_comix Wikipedia]] ** Robert Crumb [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Crumb Wikipedia]] *** Zap Comix [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zap_Comix Wikipedia]] *** Weirdo (comics) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weirdo_(comics) Wikipedia]] ** Art Spiegelman [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Art_Spiegelman Wikipedia]] *** Breakdowns: Portrait of the Artist as a Young %@&amp;amp;*! by Art Spiegelman [[https://www.librarything.com/work/5655445 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Breakdowns_(comics) Wikipedia]] *** Raw (magazine) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raw_(magazine) Wikipedia]] ** Here by Richard McGuire [[https://www.librarything.com/work/14952042 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Here_(comics) Wikipedia]] ** Binky Brown Meets the Holy Virgin Mary by Justin Green [[https://www.librarything.com/work/3275118 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Binky_Brown_Meets_the_Holy_Virgin_Mary Wikipedia]] ** Aline Kominsky-Crumb [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aline_Kominsky-Crumb Wikipedia]] ===== Twenty-first century ===== * PictureBox [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PictureBox Wikipedia]] * In the Shadow of No Towers by Art Spiegelman [[https://www.librarything.com/work/7016 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/In_the_Shadow_of_No_Towers Wikipedia]] * Chris Ware [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chris_Ware Wikipedia]] ** Jimmy Corrigan : the smartest kid on earth by Chris Ware [[https://www.librarything.com/work/7614 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jimmy_Corrigan,_the_Smartest_Kid_on_Earth Wikipedia]] ** Unmasked [[https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2009/11/02/unmasked-4 The New Yorker]] * Alison Bechdel [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alison_Bechdel Wikipedia]] * Joe Sacco [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joe_Sacco Wikipedia]] * Lynda Barry [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lynda_Barry Wikipedia]] ** What It Is by Lynda Barry [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4598224 LibraryThing]] ** Picture This: The Near-sighted Monkey Book by Lynda Barry [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8906129 LibraryThing]] * Jason Shiga [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jason_Shiga Wikipedia]] * 365 Days: A Diary by Julie Doucet by Julie Doucet [[https://www.librarything.com/work/3471751 LibraryThing]] * Abstract comics [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abstract_comics Wikipedia]] ** Abstract Comics: The Anthology by Andrei Molotiu [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8785206 LibraryThing]] [[http://abstractcomics.blogspot.com/ Abstract Comics: The Blog]] ==== Multimodal literature ==== * RCEL Chapter 31: "Multimodal literature and experimentation" by Alison Gibbons * Liberature [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberature Wikipedia]] ==== Information design ==== * RCEL Chapter 32: "Information design, emergent culture and experimental form in the novel" by Steve Tomasula * Exercises in Style by Raymond Queneau [[https://www.librarything.com/work/39048 LibraryThing]] * Double or Nothing by Raymond Federman [[https://www.librarything.com/work/151208 LibraryThing]] * The Gettysburg Powerpoint Presentation by Peter Norvig [[https://norvig.com/Gettysburg/ full text]] * Europeana: A Brief History of the Twentieth Century by Patrik Ouředník [[https://www.librarything.com/work/179330 LibraryThing]] * 2666 by Roberto Bolaño [[https://www.librarything.com/work/996213 LibraryThing]] ==== Interactive fiction ==== * RCEL Chapter 33: "Interactive fiction" by N. Katherine Hayles And Nick Montfort * Interactive fiction [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interactive_fiction Wikipedia]] == Experiment now: beyond the page == === The digital age === ==== Digital fiction ==== * RCEL Chapter 34: "Digital fiction: Networked narratives" by David Ciccoricco * Storyspace [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Storyspace Wikipedia]] [[http://www.digitalhumanities.org/dhq/vol/6/2/000128/000128.html Machine Enhanced (Re)minding: the Development of Storyspace - Digital Humanities Quarterly]] [[http://dtc-wsuv.org/wp/ell/2017/10/28/untangling-threads-in-the-maze/ Untangling Threads in the Labyrinth – Electronic Literature Lab]] * Click by John Barth [[https://elmcip.net/node/1991 ELMCIP]] * The Glass Snail: a Pre-Christmas Tale by Milorad Pavić [[https://elmcip.net/node/1080 ELMCIP]] * 10:01 by Lance Olsen [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1139235 LibraryThing]] [[https://elmcip.net/node/1356 ELMCIP]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/10:01 Wikipedia]] * TOC: A New Media Novel by Steve Tomasula [[https://www.librarything.com/work/9462724 LibraryThing]] [[https://elmcip.net/node/835 ELMCIP]] * The LiveJournal of Zachary Marsh by Matthew Baldwin [[https://elmcip.net/node/13635 ELMCIP]] [[https://themorningnews.org/article/the-livejournal-of-zachary-marsh full text - The Morning News]] * A Million Penguins [[https://elmcip.net/node/6215 ELMCIP]] [[https://web.archive.org/web/20090803141129/http://www.amillionpenguins.com/wiki/index.php/Welcome full text - PenguinWiki]] [[https://www.researchgate.net/publication/228465833_A_million_penguins_research_report (PDF) A million penguins research report - ResearchGate]] [[https://www.theguardian.com/books/booksblog/2007/mar/12/livingwithamillionpenguins Living with A Million Penguins: inside the wiki-novel - The Guardian]] * Blue Company by Rob Wittig [[https://elmcip.net/node/368 ELMCIP]] [[http://robwit.net/?project=blue-company robwit.net]] * Deena Larsen [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deena_Larsen Wikipedia]] ** Marble Springs 1.0 by Deena Larsen [[https://elmcip.net/node/3231 ELMCIP]] ** Marble Springs 3.0 by Deena Larsen [[https://elmcip.net/node/4417 ELMCIP]] ** Disappearing Rain by Deena Larsen [[https://elmcip.net/node/759 ELMCIP]] * Judy Malloy [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Judy_Malloy Wikipedia]] * Uncle Buddy's Phantom Funhouse by John McDaid [[https://elmcip.net/node/519 ELMCIP]] [[http://dtc-wsuv.org/wp/pathfinders/authors-works/john-mcdaid-uncle-buddys-phantom-funhouse/ Pathfinders]] [[http://scalar.usc.edu/works/pathfinders/mcdaids-traversal John McDaid's Traversal - Pathfinders]] * Michael Joyce (writer) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Joyce_(writer) Wikipedia]] ** afternoon, a story by Michael Joyce [[https://elmcip.net/node/236 ELMCIP]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Afternoon,_a_story Wikipedia]] ** Twelve Blue by Michael Joyce [[https://elmcip.net/node/237 ELMCIP]] * I Have Said Nothing by J. Yellowlees Douglas [[https://elmcip.net/node/2063 ELMCIP]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I_Have_Said_Nothing Wikipedia]] * We Descend by Bill Bly [[http://scalar.usc.edu/works/pathfinders/bill-bly Pathfinders]] ** We Descend: Archives Pertaining to Edgerus Scriptor, Volume One [[https://elmcip.net/node/1101 ELMCIP]] ** We Descend: Archives Pertaining to Egderus Scriptor, Volume Two [[https://elmcip.net/node/4269 ELMCIP]] * Patchwork Girl by Shelley Jackson [[https://elmcip.net/node/239 ELMCIP]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patchwork_Girl_(hypertext) Wikipedia]] * Califia by M. D. Coverley [[https://elmcip.net/node/723 ELMCIP]] * Victory Garden by Stuart Moulthrop [[https://elmcip.net/node/352 ELMCIP]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Victory_Garden_(novel) Wikipedia]] * The Unknown by William Gillespie, Scott Rettberg, Dirk Stratton, and Frank Marquardt [[https://elmcip.net/node/662 ELMCIP]] * GRAMMATRON by Mark Amerika [[https://elmcip.net/node/581 ELMCIP]] * 253 by Geoff Ryman [[https://elmcip.net/node/7513 ELMCIP]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/253_(novel) Wikipedia]] * The Jew's Daughter by Judd Morrissey [[https://elmcip.net/node/78 ELMCIP]] * Erik Loyer [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erik_Loyer Wikipedia]] ** Chroma by Erik Loyer [[https://elmcip.net/node/1289 ELMCIP]] ** Lair of the Marrow Monkey by Erik Loyer [[https://elmcip.net/node/5067 ELMCIP]] * Shelley Jackson [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shelley_Jackson Wikipedia]] ** my body — a Wunderkammer by Shelley Jackson [[https://elmcip.net/node/793 ELMCIP]] * About Time by Rob Swigart [[https://elmcip.net/node/4112 ELMCIP]] * The Virtual Disappearance of Miriam by Andy Campbell and Martyn Bedford [[https://elmcip.net/node/1600 ELMCIP]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Virtual_Disappearance_of_Miriam Wikipedia]] * Varicella by Adam Cadre [[https://elmcip.net/node/7775 ELMCIP]] [[http://www.ifwiki.org/index.php/Varicella IFWiki]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Varicella_(video_game) Wikipedia]] * Ruth Nestvold [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ruth_Nestvold Wikipedia]] ** Joe's Heartbeat in Budapest by Ruth Nestvold [[http://www.lit-arts.net/JHIB/begin.htm full text - Lit-Arts.Net]] * 2002: A Palindrome Story in 2002 Words by Nick Montfort and William Gillespie [[https://elmcip.net/node/7962 ELMCIP]] ==== Code poetry and new-media literature ==== * RCEL Chapter 35: "Code poetry and new-media literature" by Steve Tomasula * Code poetry [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Code_poetry Wikipedia]] ==== Computer gaming ==== * RCEL Chapter 36: "Computer gaming" by Astrid Ensslin * Art game [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Art_game Wikipedia]] ==== Virtual autobiography ==== * RCEL Chapter 37: "Virtual autobiography: Autographies, interfaces, and avatars" by Amy J. Elias == Planned updates == * Add links to the empty categories. * Add a description for each category. * Add authors and works for the categories that only have general links. * Add links from other sites. * Normalize the reference formatting. [[Category:Developing]] [[Category:Lists]] [[Category:Experimental Literature]] 717c9bc4d9dad33c09be39e43f97883d39837c4f 435 434 2019-04-28T06:01:17Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added links to "Virtual autobiography." wikitext text/x-wiki == Introduction == This article is a list of links to authors, works, and categories in experimental literature. Its purpose is to give you a starting point for exploring works in this set of genres. I've based the list's organization on ''The Routledge Companion to Experimental Literature'' (RCEL), a collection of scholarly essays on the subject. This project is a work in progress. == How to use this list == If a category is well established in the field, I've linked to its Wikipedia article. If the author of the RCEL article was conducting their own survey of the category, I've listed the authors and works they cover with links to Wikipedia and LibraryThing wherever corresponding pages are available. I've also included links to a work's full text when that's available and links to background information from other sources. === Wikipedia === Wikipedia articles will give you background information on their subject, and they'll usually contain bibliographies that will point you to works related to that subject, such as works in the category or works by the author. === LibraryThing === LibraryThing is a social library catalog website that lets you catalog your collection. Here I'm using it for its recommendation features and its links to other sites. When you visit a work's LibraryThing page, you can find related works in the "LibraryThing Recommendations" section and the "Member recommendations" section. You can also click on the tags users have assigned to it. Each tag link takes you to a page for that tag, which lists other works that have been assigned it, as well as related tags, subjects, and tagmashes, which are combinations of tags. You can [https://wiki.librarything.com/index.php/HelpThing:Tagmash create your own tagmashes]. In the upper right sidebar of a work's LibraryThing page, you'll find links to its corresponding page on other catalog websites, such as Amazon, Google Books, and WorldCat, a shared catalog of physical libraries worldwide. These sites will often let you look through a preview of the book. They'll also give you ways to find other related works, usually by recommendations or subject links on the work's page. If you're logged in, you can edit this section to show links from a long list of other sites. == General == * Experimental literature [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Experimental_literature Wikipedia]] * Bray, Joe, Alison Gibbons, and Brian McHale, eds. ''The Routledge Companion to Experimental Literature''. Routledge Companions. London: Routledge, 2015. [[https://www.librarything.com/work/18336113 LibraryThing]] == The historical avant-gardes == === Modernist-era experimentalism === ==== Futurism ==== * RCEL Chapter 2: "Italian Futurism and Russian Cubo-Futurism" by John White * Futurism (literature) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Futurism_(literature) Wikipedia]] ==== Expressionism ==== * RCEL Chapter 3: "The poetics of animism: Realism and the fantastic in expressionist literature and film" by Richard Murphy * Expressionism [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Expressionism Wikipedia]] ==== Surrealism ==== * RCEL Chapter 4: "The surrealist experiments with language" by Peter Stockwell * Surrealism [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surrealism Wikipedia]] ==== Absurdism ==== * RCEL Chapter 5: "The literary absurd" by Joanna Gavins * Absurdist fiction [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Absurdist_fiction Wikipedia]] === Postmodernist experimentalism === ==== Postwar experimental poetry ==== * RCEL Chapter 6: "Spontaneity and improvisation in postwar experimental poetry" by Benjamin Lee * The New American Poetry 1945–1960 [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_New_American_Poetry_1945%E2%80%931960 Wikipedia]] ==== The ''nouveau roman'' and ''Tel Quel'' ==== * RCEL Chapter 7: "The ''nouveau roman'' and ''Tel Quel''" by Danielle Marx-Scouras * Nouveau roman [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nouveau_roman Wikipedia]] * Tel Quel [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tel_Quel Wikipedia]] ==== Lettrism and situationism ==== * RCEL Chapter 8: "Lettrism and situationism" by Tyrus Miller * Lettrism [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lettrism Wikipedia]] * Situationist International [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Situationist_International Wikipedia]] ==== OuLiPo and proceduralism ==== * RCEL Chapter 9: "OuLiPo and proceduralism" by Jan Baetens * Constrained writing [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constrained_writing Wikipedia]] * Oulipo [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oulipo Wikipedia]] ==== Metafiction ==== * RCEL Chapter 10: "Metafiction" by R. M. Berry * Metafiction [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metafiction Wikipedia]] ==== Postmodern literature ==== * RCEL Chapter 11: "Postmodernism and experiment" by Brian McHale * Postmodern literature [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Postmodern_literature Wikipedia]] === Experiments with identity === ==== Twentieth-century avant-garde women writers ==== * RCEL Chapter 12: "Sexing the text: Women’s avant-garde writing in the twentieth century" by Ellen G. Friedman * Kathy Acker [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kathy_Acker Wikipedia]] * Djuna Barnes [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Djuna_Barnes Wikipedia]] * Jane Bowles [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jane_Bowles Wikipedia]] * H.D. [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H.D. Wikipedia]] * Toni Morrison [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toni_Morrison Wikipedia]] * Bharati Mukherjee [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bharati_Mukherjee Wikipedia]] * Anaïs Nin [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ana%C3%AFs_Nin Wikipedia]] * Joyce Carol Oates [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joyce_Carol_Oates Wikipedia]] * Jean Rhys [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_Rhys Wikipedia]] * Dorothy Richardson [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dorothy_Richardson Wikipedia]] * Gertrude Stein [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gertrude_Stein Wikipedia]] * Virginia Woolf [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virginia_Woolf Wikipedia]] ==== Twentieth-century avant-garde African-American poets ==== * RCEL Chapter 13: "Experiments in black: African-American avant-garde poetics" by Aldon Lynn Nielsen * Russell Atkins [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russell_Atkins Wikipedia]] * Amiri Baraka [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amiri_Baraka Wikipedia]] * Jayne Cortez [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jayne_Cortez Wikipedia]] * Negro Digest [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Negro_Digest Wikipedia]] * Langston Hughes [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Langston_Hughes Wikipedia]] * Ted Joans [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ted_Joans Wikipedia]] * Percy Johnston [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Percy_Johnston Wikipedia]] * Bob Kaufman [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bob_Kaufman Wikipedia]] * Stephen Jonas [[https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems-and-poets/poets/detail/stephen-jonas Poetry Foundation]] * William Melvin Kelley [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Melvin_Kelley Wikipedia]] * Nathaniel Mackey [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nathaniel_Mackey Wikipedia]] * Clarence Major [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clarence_Major Wikipedia]] * Tracie Morris [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tracie_Morris Wikipedia]] * Harryette Mullen [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harryette_Mullen Wikipedia]] * Claudia Rankine [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Claudia_Rankine Wikipedia]] * Gil Scott-Heron [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gil_Scott-Heron Wikipedia]] * Lorenzo Thomas (poet) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lorenzo_Thomas_(poet) Wikipedia]] * Melvin B. Tolson [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Melvin_B._Tolson Wikipedia]] * Jean Toomer [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_Toomer Wikipedia]] * Umbra (poets) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Umbra_(poets) Wikipedia]] ==== Anglophone postcolonial poetry ==== * RCEL Chapter 14: "The limits of hybridity: Language and innovation in Anglophone postcolonial poetry" by Priyamvada Gopal * Postcolonial literature [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Postcolonial_literature Wikipedia]] * G. V. Desani [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G._V._Desani Wikipedia]] * Wilson Harris [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wilson_Harris Wikipedia]] * Dambudzo Marechera [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dambudzo_Marechera Wikipedia]] * Mudrooroo [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mudrooroo Wikipedia]] * Ben Okri [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ben_Okri Wikipedia]] * Salman Rushdie [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salman_Rushdie Wikipedia]] * Vikram Seth [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vikram_Seth Wikipedia]] * Wole Soyinka [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wole_Soyinka Wikipedia]] * Amos Tutuola [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amos_Tutuola Wikipedia]] * Derek Walcott [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Derek_Walcott Wikipedia]] === The new experimentalism === ==== Avant-Pop ==== * RCEL Chapter 15: "Avant-Pop" by Lance Olsen * Avant-Pop: Fiction for a Daydream Nation (Black Ice Books) by Larry McCaffery [[https://www.librarything.com/work/512144 LibraryThing]] * After Yesterday's Crash: The Avant-Pop Anthology by Larry McCaffery [[https://www.librarything.com/work/771064 LibraryThing]] * Tomas Alfredson [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tomas_Alfredson Wikipedia]] * Italo Calvino [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Italo_Calvino Wikipedia]] * David Clark [[https://elmcip.net/node/622 ELMCIP]] * Umberto Eco [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Umberto_Eco Wikipedia]] * Betrayed by Rita Hayworth by Manuel Puig [[https://www.librarything.com/work/128453 LibraryThing]] * Naked Lunch by William S. Burroughs [[https://www.librarything.com/work/5852 LibraryThing]] * Lost in the Funhouse by John Barth [[https://www.librarything.com/work/29286 LibraryThing]] * Industrial Poetics: Demo Tracks for a Mobile Culture (Contemp North American Poetry) by Joe Amato [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2881291 LibraryThing]] * Kenneth Goldsmith [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kenneth_Goldsmith Wikipedia]] * Robert Coover [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Coover Wikipedia]] * Angela Carter [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angela_Carter Wikipedia]] * Aimee Bender [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aimee_Bender Wikipedia]] * White Noise by Don DeLillo [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4953 LibraryThing]] * Gravity's Rainbow by Thomas Pynchon [[https://www.librarything.com/work/10088 LibraryThing]] * Mark Z. Danielewski's House of leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1488 LibraryThing]] * Europeana: A Brief History of the Twentieth Century by Patrik Ouředník [[https://www.librarything.com/work/179330 LibraryThing]] * Mark Leyner [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mark_Leyner Wikipedia]] * Traveling to Utopia: With a Brief History of the Technology by Young-Hae Chang Heavy Industries [[https://www.librarything.com/work/11864011 LibraryThing]] ==== Post-postmodernism ==== * RCEL Chapter 16: "Post-postmodernism" by Robert L. McLaughlin * Post-postmodernism [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Post-postmodernism Wikipedia]] ==== Globalization and transnationalism ==== * RCEL Chapter 17: "Globalization and transnationalism" by Liam Connell * Count Zero by William Gibson [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2445 LibraryThing]] * The Fountain at the Centre of the World by Robert Newman [[https://www.librarything.com/work/18226 LibraryThing]] * Tropic of Orange by Karen Tei Yamashita [[https://www.librarything.com/work/509798 LibraryThing]] * Mark Lombardi: Global Networks by Robert Hobbs [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1066 LibraryThing]] * JPod by Douglas Coupland [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1115072 LibraryThing]] * Looking for Headless by K. D. [[https://www.librarything.com/work/10578723 LibraryThing]] ==== Altermodernist fiction ==== * RCEL Chapter 18: "Altermodernist fiction" by Alison Gibbons * The Rings of Saturn by W. G. Sebald [[https://www.librarything.com/work/28135 LibraryThing]] * Erasmus is Late by Liam Gillick [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1319708 LibraryThing]] * Shanghai Dancing by Brian Castro [[https://www.librarything.com/work/581326 LibraryThing]] * The Islanders: An Introduction by Charles Avery [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8086723 LibraryThing]] * The One Facing Us: A Novel by Ronit Matalon [[https://www.librarything.com/work/643371 LibraryThing]] * Istanbul: Memories and the City by Orhan Pamuk [[https://www.librarything.com/work/100731 LibraryThing]] * Only Revolutions by Mark Z. Danielewski [[https://www.librarything.com/work/798583 LibraryThing]] * Headless by Goldin+Senneby [[https://web.archive.org/web/20180506182844/http://www.goldinsenneby.com/gs/?p=116 Goldin+Senneby]] [[http://rhizome.org/editorial/2009/feb/04/interview-with-goldinsenneby/ Interview with Goldin+Senneby - Rhizome]] [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tOGttCSUecM Angus Cameron lecture on Headless - YouTube]] * A Visit from the Goon Squad by Jennifer Egan [[https://www.librarything.com/work/9530166 LibraryThing]] * Open City by Teju Cole [[https://www.librarything.com/work/10577676 LibraryThing]] * Rana Dasgupta [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rana_Dasgupta Wikipedia]] ==== Manifestos and ''Ars Poetica'' ==== * RCEL Chapter 19: "Manifestos and ''Ars Poetica''" by Laura Winkiel * Manifesto [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manifesto Wikipedia]] * Ars Poetica (Horace) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ars_Poetica_(Horace) Wikipedia]] * Ars Poetica by Archibald MacLeish [[https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poetrymagazine/poems/17168/ars-poetica full text]] ==== Post-criticism ==== * RCEL Chapter 20: "Post-criticism: Conceptual takes" by Gregory L. Ulmer * Heuretics: The Logic of Invention by Gregory L. Ulmer [[https://www.librarything.com/work/173585 LibraryThing]] == Experiment now: printed matter == === Experiments with language === ==== Language poetry ==== * RCEL Chapter 21: "The expanded field of ''L=A=N=G=U=A=G=E''" by Charles Bernstein * Language poets [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Language_poets Wikipedia]] ==== Concrete poetry and prose ==== * RCEL Chapter 22: "Concrete poetry and prose" by Joe Bray * Concrete poetry [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Concrete_poetry Wikipedia]] ==== Found poetry and "uncreative writing" ==== * RCEL Chapter 23: "Found poetry, 'uncreative writing,' and the art of appropriation" by Andrew Epstein * Found poetry [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Found_poetry Wikipedia]] ==== Words in visual art ==== * RCEL Chapter 24: "Words in visual art" by Jessica Prinz ==== Literary inauthenticity ==== * RCEL Chapter 25: "Hoax-poetry and inauthenticity" by Philip Mead ===== Classical ===== * The Rowley Poems by Thomas Chatterton [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2002159 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Chatterton Thomas Chatterton - Wikipedia]] * The poems of Ossian by James MacPherson [[https://www.librarything.com/work/422650 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Macpherson James Macpherson - Wikipedia]] * Kalevala by Elias Lönnrot [[https://www.librarything.com/work/158724 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kalevala Wikipedia]] * The Tablets by Armand Schwerner [[https://www.librarything.com/work/335430 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Armand_Schwerner Armand Schwerner - Wikipedia]] ===== Modern ===== * A Million Little Pieces by James Frey [[https://www.librarything.com/work/444 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Million_Little_Pieces Wikipedia]] * Angel at the Fence: The True Story of a Love that Survived by Herman Rosenblat [[https://www.librarything.com/work/6304567 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angel_at_the_Fence Wikipedia]] * Fragments: Memories of a Wartime Childhood by Binjamin Wilkomirski [[https://www.librarything.com/work/188668 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Binjamin_Wilkomirski Binjamin Wilkomirski - Wikipedia]] * Down the Road, Worlds Away by Rahila Khan [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1737627 LibraryThing]] [[https://www.lrb.co.uk/v10/n03/toby-forward/diary Diary - Toby Forward - London Review of Books]] * The Hand That Signed The Paper by Helen Darville [[https://www.librarything.com/work/336438 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helen_Dale Helen Dale - Wikipedia]] * B. Wongar [[https://www.librarything.com/author/wongarb LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/B._Wongar Wikipedia]] [[http://sf-encyclopedia.com/entry/wongar_b Science Fiction Encyclopedia]] * My own sweet time by Wanda Koolmatrie [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1908840 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leon_Carmen Leon Carmen - Wikipedia]] * Honor Lost: Love and Death in Modern-Day Jordan by Norma Khouri [[https://www.librarything.com/work/245918 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Forbidden_Love_(novel) Wikipedia]] * The darkening ecliptic by Ern Malley [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4591077 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ern_Malley Ern Malley - Wikipedia]] * Araki Yasusada [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Araki_Yasusada Wikipedia]] [[https://hereshebe.wordpress.com/2008/09/29/on-the-araki-yasusada-hoax/ On the Araki Yasusada Hoax - Here She Be — The Battlements]] ** Doubled Flowering: From the Notebooks of Araki Yasusada by Araki Yasusada [[https://www.librarything.com/work/515083 LibraryThing]] ** Also, With My Throat, I Shall Swallow Ten Thousand Swords: Araki Yasusada's Letters in English by Tosa Motokiyu [[https://www.librarything.com/work/515079 LibraryThing]] ===== Post-hoax ===== * Fernando Pessoa [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fernando_Pessoa Wikipedia]] * Ecopoetry: a critical introduction by Scott Bryson [[https://www.librarything.com/work/129941 LibraryThing]] * Women and ecopoetics: an introduction in context by Harriet Tarlo [[https://www.asu.edu/pipercwcenter/how2journal/vol_3_no_2/ecopoetics/introstatements/tarlo_intro.html full text - HOW2]] * ecopoetics [[https://ecopoetics.wordpress.com/ full text - ecopoetics]] * Media Poetry: An International Anthology by Eduardo Kac [[https://www.librarything.com/work/5074311 LibraryThing]] * Flarf [[http://mainstreampoetry.blogspot.com/ full text - Flarf]] === Experiments with narrative and fiction === ==== Unnatural narration ==== * RCEL Chapter 26: "Unnatural voices, minds, and narration" by Jan Alber, Henrik Skov Nielsen, and Brian Richardson ===== Impossibly informed narrator ===== * Virginie: Her Two Lives by John Hawkes [[https://www.librarything.com/work/121280 LibraryThing]] * Travesties by Tom Stoppard [[https://www.librarything.com/work/27223 LibraryThing]] * Midnight's Children by Salman Rushdie [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2118 LibraryThing]] * In Search of Lost Time by Marcel Proust [[https://www.librarything.com/work/23844 LibraryThing]] * The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2964 LibraryThing]] * Moby Dick by Herman Melville [[https://www.librarything.com/work/15540 LibraryThing]] * Ulysses by James Joyce [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8520 LibraryThing]] ===== Impossibly confused narrator ===== * Molloy by Samuel Beckett [[https://www.librarything.com/work/56659 LibraryThing]] * In the Labyrinth by Alain Robbe-Grillet [[https://www.librarything.com/work/319705 LibraryThing]] * "You Are As Brave As Vincent Van Gogh," Flying to America: 45 More Stories by Donald Barthelme [[https://www.librarything.com/work/3397639 LibraryThing]] ===== Non-human narrator ===== * Kew Gardens by Virginia Woolf [[https://www.librarything.com/work/891578 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kew_Gardens_(short_story) Wikipedia]] * "The House of Asterion," The Aleph and Other Stories by Jorge Luis Borges [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1443832 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_House_of_Asterion Wikipedia]] * "Jealous Husband Returns in Form of Parrot," Tabloid Dreams: Stories by Robert Olen Butler [[https://www.librarything.com/work/150283 LibraryThing]] * Doctor Rat by William Kotzwinkle [[https://www.librarything.com/work/93750 LibraryThing]] * "My Life As a West African Gray Parrot," The Left-Handed Marriage: Stories by Leigh Buchanan Bienen [[https://www.librarything.com/work/3769284 LibraryThing]] * Shakespeare's Dog by Leon Rooke [[https://www.librarything.com/work/203121 LibraryThing]] * "The Stowaway," A History of the World in 10½ Chapters by Julian Barnes [[http://www.librarything.com/work/7133 LibraryThing]] * Sweet William: A Memoir of Old Horse by John Hawkes [[https://www.librarything.com/work/216641 LibraryThing]] * Firmin by Sam Savage [[https://www.librarything.com/work/922702 LibraryThing]] * Timbuktu by Paul Auster [[https://www.librarything.com/work/27521 LibraryThing]] ===== Dead narrator ===== * Pedro Páramo by Juan Rulfo [[https://www.librarything.com/work/84285 LibraryThing]] * Pincher Martin by William Golding [[https://www.librarything.com/work/286280 LibraryThing]] * The Third Policeman by Flann O'Brien [[https://www.librarything.com/work/7104 LibraryThing]] * "Terra Incognita," A Russian Beauty and Other Stories by Vladimir Nabokov [[https://www.librarything.com/work/224314 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terra_Incognita_(short_story) Wikipedia]] * Transparent Things by Vladimir Nabokov [[https://www.librarything.com/work/51102 LibraryThing]] * Murther and Walking Spirits by Robertson Davies [[https://www.librarything.com/work/73673 LibraryThing]] * American Desert by Percival Everett [[https://www.librarything.com/work/238787 LibraryThing]] * My Name is Red by Orhan Pamuk [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2744 LibraryThing]] * Hotel World by Ali Smith [[https://www.librarything.com/work/19451 LibraryThing]] * Destiny and Desire by Carlos Fuentes [[https://www.librarything.com/work/6516575 LibraryThing]] * The Book Thief by Markus Zusak [[https://www.librarything.com/work/393681 LibraryThing]] * "The Calmative," Stories and Texts for Nothing by Samuel Beckett [[https://www.librarything.com/work/3398 LibraryThing]] * The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4931 LibraryThing]] ===== Focalization technology ===== * "The Aleph," The Aleph and Other Stories by Jorge Luis Borges [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1443832 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Aleph_(short_story) Wikipedia]] * Neuromancer by William Gibson [[https://www.librarything.com/work/609 LibraryThing]] ===== First-person plural ===== * "A Rose for Emily" by William Faulkner, American Gothic Tales by Joyce Carol Oates [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8038219 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Rose_for_Emily Wikipedia]] * 12 Million Black Voices by Richard Wright [[https://www.librarything.com/work/666218 LibraryThing]] * Two Thousand Seasons by Ayi Kwei Armah [[https://www.librarything.com/work/77062 LibraryThing]] * You Don't Love Yourself by Nathalie Sarraute [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2374617 LibraryThing]] ===== Second-person ===== * A Pagan Place by Edna O'Brien [[https://www.librarything.com/work/218163 LibraryThing]] * "How," Self-help by Lorrie Moore [[http://www.librarything.com/work/35303 LibraryThing]] * If on a Winter's Night a Traveler by Italo Calvino [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4091153 LibraryThing]] ===== Third-person singular impersonal ===== * The Radetzky March by Joseph Roth [[https://www.librarything.com/work/10159 LibraryThing]] * The opoponax by Monique Wittig [[https://www.librarything.com/work/257236 LibraryThing]] ===== Third-person plural ===== * Things: A Story of the Sixties by Georges Perec [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1197807 LibraryThing]] * Flower Children by Maxine Swann [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2375201 LibraryThing]] ===== Gender-neutral pronouns ===== * The Cook and The Carpenter by June Arnold [[https://www.librarything.com/work/736228 LibraryThing]] ===== Pronouns omitted ===== * "Dead Doll Humility" by Kathy Acker, The Making of the American Essay (A New History of the Essay) by John D'Agata [[https://www.librarything.com/work/17216549 LibraryThing]] ===== Multiple points of view ===== * "The Cubs," The Cubs and Other Stories by Mario Vargas Llosa [[https://www.librarything.com/work/17905949 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Los_Cachorros Wikipedia]] * The Death of Artemio Cruz by Carlos Fuentes [[https://www.librarything.com/work/18213 LibraryThing]] * Maps by Nuruddin Farah [[https://www.librarything.com/work/70403 LibraryThing]] * Compact by Maurice Roche [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1287065 LibraryThing]] ===== Merged narrators ===== * Monsieur Levert by Robert Pinget [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1170050 LibraryThing]] * "13," Stories and Texts for Nothing by Samuel Beckett [[https://www.librarything.com/work/3398 LibraryThing]] * The Unnamable by Samuel Beckett [[https://www.librarything.com/work/276374 LibraryThing]] * Glamorama by Bret Easton Ellis [[https://www.librarything.com/work/7545 LibraryThing]] ===== Anachronism ===== * Flight to Canada by Ishmael Reed [[https://www.librarything.com/work/35987 LibraryThing]] ===== Mid-narrative editing ===== * Worstward Ho by Samuel Beckett [[https://www.librarything.com/work/782565 LibraryThing]] ==== Impossible worlds ==== * RCEL Chapter 27: "Impossible worlds" by Marie-Laure Ryan ==== Experimental life writing ==== * RCEL Chapter 28: "Experimental life writing" by Irene Kacandes ===== Time ===== * Stuart: A Life Backwards by Alexander Masters [[https://www.librarything.com/work/93508 LibraryThing]] * One Day a Year: 1960 - 2000 by Christa Wolf [[https://www.librarything.com/work/466217 LibraryThing]] ===== Medium ===== * The Complete Maus by Art Spiegelman [[https://www.librarything.com/work/6046618 LibraryThing]] * The Complete Persepolis by Marjane Satrapi [[https://www.librarything.com/work/6392056 LibraryThing]] * Fun Home: A Family Tragicomic by Alison Bechdel [[https://www.librarything.com/work/627079 LibraryThing]] * 1941-45: a teenager's war: Crete, captivity, liberation by Frederick V. Carabott [[https://www.worldcat.org/title/1941-45-ho-polemos-henos-ephebou-krete-aichmalosia-apeleutherosis-1941-45-a-teenagers-war-crete-captivity-liberation-1941-45-der-krieg-eines-jugendlichen-kreta-gefangenschaft-befreiung/oclc/48228994 WorldCat.org]] * Running in the Family by Michael Ondaatje [[https://www.librarything.com/work/27962 LibraryThing]] * Zami: a New Spelling of My Name by Audre Lorde [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8116 LibraryThing]] * A heartbreaking work of staggering genius by Dave Eggers [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2294 LibraryThing]] * Encyclopedia of an Ordinary Life by Amy Krouse Rosenthal [[https://www.librarything.com/work/35433 LibraryThing]] * The Suicide Index: Putting My Father's Death in Order by Joan Wickersham [[https://www.librarything.com/work/5248942 LibraryThing]] ===== The relational ===== * The Search Warrant by Patrick Modiano [[https://www.librarything.com/work/331076 LibraryThing]] * Ein Kapitel aus meinem Leben by Barbara Honigmann [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4500497 LibraryThing]] * After Long Silence by Helen Fremont [[https://www.librarything.com/work/13147 LibraryThing]] ===== The work's focus ===== * Patterns of Childhood by Christa Wolf [[https://www.librarything.com/work/700778 LibraryThing]] * Boyhood: Scenes from Provincial Life by J. M. Coetzee [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8660368 LibraryThing]] * Youth by J. M. Coetzee [[https://www.librarything.com/work/105432 LibraryThing]] * Summertime: Scenes from Provincial Life by J. M. Coetzee [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8494635 LibraryThing]] * Roland Barthes by Roland Barthes [[https://www.librarything.com/work/592881 LibraryThing]] * W, or The Memory of Childhood by Georges Perec [[https://www.librarything.com/work/39076 LibraryThing]] ===== Multiple techniques ===== * Daddy's War: Greek American Stories by Irene Kacandes [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8797694 LibraryThing]] ==== Experimental genre fiction ==== * RCEL Chapter 29: "'Rotting time': Genre fiction and the avant-garde" by Elana Gomel ===== Fantasy ===== * Iron Council by China Miéville [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4813 LibraryThing]] * Vellum: The Book of All Hours by Hal Duncan [[https://www.librarything.com/work/47894 LibraryThing]] * Ink: The Book of All Hours by Hal Duncan [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1162726 LibraryThing]] ===== Science fiction ===== * Iain Banks [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iain_Banks Wikipedia]] * Stephen Baxter (author) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephen_Baxter_(author) Wikipedia]] * Paul Park [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Park Wikipedia]] * Century Rain by Alastair Reynolds [[https://www.librarything.com/work/48231 LibraryThing]] * Blindsight by Peter Watts [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1333265 LibraryThing]] ===== Horror ===== * Books of Blood | Series [[https://www.librarything.com/series/Books+of+Blood LibraryThing]] * Neverwhere: The Author's Preferred Text by Neil Gaiman [[https://www.librarything.com/work/14623622 LibraryThing]] * Mark Z. Danielewski's House of leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1488 LibraryThing]] * The Everlasting by Tim Lebbon [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2811046 LibraryThing]] === Experiments with form and design === ==== Graphic narrative ==== * RCEL Chapter 30: "Graphic narrative" by Hillary Chute * Alternative comics [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alternative_comics Wikipedia]] ===== Early twentieth century ===== * Little Nemo [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Little_Nemo Wikipedia]] * Wordless novel [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wordless_novel Wikipedia]] ** Vertigo by Lynd Ward [[https://www.librarything.com/work/334743 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vertigo_(wordless_novel) Wikipedia]] ** Frans Masereel [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frans_Masereel Wikipedia]] ** Otto Nückel [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Otto_N%C3%BCckel Wikipedia]] ** Giacomo Patri [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Giacomo_Patri Wikipedia]] ===== Late twentieth century ===== * Mad (magazine) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mad_(magazine) Wikipedia]] * Underground comix [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Underground_comix Wikipedia]] ** Robert Crumb [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Crumb Wikipedia]] *** Zap Comix [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zap_Comix Wikipedia]] *** Weirdo (comics) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weirdo_(comics) Wikipedia]] ** Art Spiegelman [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Art_Spiegelman Wikipedia]] *** Breakdowns: Portrait of the Artist as a Young %@&amp;amp;*! by Art Spiegelman [[https://www.librarything.com/work/5655445 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Breakdowns_(comics) Wikipedia]] *** Raw (magazine) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raw_(magazine) Wikipedia]] ** Here by Richard McGuire [[https://www.librarything.com/work/14952042 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Here_(comics) Wikipedia]] ** Binky Brown Meets the Holy Virgin Mary by Justin Green [[https://www.librarything.com/work/3275118 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Binky_Brown_Meets_the_Holy_Virgin_Mary Wikipedia]] ** Aline Kominsky-Crumb [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aline_Kominsky-Crumb Wikipedia]] ===== Twenty-first century ===== * PictureBox [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PictureBox Wikipedia]] * In the Shadow of No Towers by Art Spiegelman [[https://www.librarything.com/work/7016 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/In_the_Shadow_of_No_Towers Wikipedia]] * Chris Ware [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chris_Ware Wikipedia]] ** Jimmy Corrigan : the smartest kid on earth by Chris Ware [[https://www.librarything.com/work/7614 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jimmy_Corrigan,_the_Smartest_Kid_on_Earth Wikipedia]] ** Unmasked [[https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2009/11/02/unmasked-4 The New Yorker]] * Alison Bechdel [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alison_Bechdel Wikipedia]] * Joe Sacco [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joe_Sacco Wikipedia]] * Lynda Barry [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lynda_Barry Wikipedia]] ** What It Is by Lynda Barry [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4598224 LibraryThing]] ** Picture This: The Near-sighted Monkey Book by Lynda Barry [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8906129 LibraryThing]] * Jason Shiga [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jason_Shiga Wikipedia]] * 365 Days: A Diary by Julie Doucet by Julie Doucet [[https://www.librarything.com/work/3471751 LibraryThing]] * Abstract comics [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abstract_comics Wikipedia]] ** Abstract Comics: The Anthology by Andrei Molotiu [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8785206 LibraryThing]] [[http://abstractcomics.blogspot.com/ Abstract Comics: The Blog]] ==== Multimodal literature ==== * RCEL Chapter 31: "Multimodal literature and experimentation" by Alison Gibbons * Liberature [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberature Wikipedia]] ==== Information design ==== * RCEL Chapter 32: "Information design, emergent culture and experimental form in the novel" by Steve Tomasula * Exercises in Style by Raymond Queneau [[https://www.librarything.com/work/39048 LibraryThing]] * Double or Nothing by Raymond Federman [[https://www.librarything.com/work/151208 LibraryThing]] * The Gettysburg Powerpoint Presentation by Peter Norvig [[https://norvig.com/Gettysburg/ full text]] * Europeana: A Brief History of the Twentieth Century by Patrik Ouředník [[https://www.librarything.com/work/179330 LibraryThing]] * 2666 by Roberto Bolaño [[https://www.librarything.com/work/996213 LibraryThing]] ==== Interactive fiction ==== * RCEL Chapter 33: "Interactive fiction" by N. Katherine Hayles And Nick Montfort * Interactive fiction [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interactive_fiction Wikipedia]] == Experiment now: beyond the page == === The digital age === ==== Digital fiction ==== * RCEL Chapter 34: "Digital fiction: Networked narratives" by David Ciccoricco * Storyspace [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Storyspace Wikipedia]] [[http://www.digitalhumanities.org/dhq/vol/6/2/000128/000128.html Machine Enhanced (Re)minding: the Development of Storyspace - Digital Humanities Quarterly]] [[http://dtc-wsuv.org/wp/ell/2017/10/28/untangling-threads-in-the-maze/ Untangling Threads in the Labyrinth – Electronic Literature Lab]] * Click by John Barth [[https://elmcip.net/node/1991 ELMCIP]] * The Glass Snail: a Pre-Christmas Tale by Milorad Pavić [[https://elmcip.net/node/1080 ELMCIP]] * 10:01 by Lance Olsen [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1139235 LibraryThing]] [[https://elmcip.net/node/1356 ELMCIP]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/10:01 Wikipedia]] * TOC: A New Media Novel by Steve Tomasula [[https://www.librarything.com/work/9462724 LibraryThing]] [[https://elmcip.net/node/835 ELMCIP]] * The LiveJournal of Zachary Marsh by Matthew Baldwin [[https://elmcip.net/node/13635 ELMCIP]] [[https://themorningnews.org/article/the-livejournal-of-zachary-marsh full text - The Morning News]] * A Million Penguins [[https://elmcip.net/node/6215 ELMCIP]] [[https://web.archive.org/web/20090803141129/http://www.amillionpenguins.com/wiki/index.php/Welcome full text - PenguinWiki]] [[https://www.researchgate.net/publication/228465833_A_million_penguins_research_report (PDF) A million penguins research report - ResearchGate]] [[https://www.theguardian.com/books/booksblog/2007/mar/12/livingwithamillionpenguins Living with A Million Penguins: inside the wiki-novel - The Guardian]] * Blue Company by Rob Wittig [[https://elmcip.net/node/368 ELMCIP]] [[http://robwit.net/?project=blue-company robwit.net]] * Deena Larsen [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deena_Larsen Wikipedia]] ** Marble Springs 1.0 by Deena Larsen [[https://elmcip.net/node/3231 ELMCIP]] ** Marble Springs 3.0 by Deena Larsen [[https://elmcip.net/node/4417 ELMCIP]] ** Disappearing Rain by Deena Larsen [[https://elmcip.net/node/759 ELMCIP]] * Judy Malloy [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Judy_Malloy Wikipedia]] * Uncle Buddy's Phantom Funhouse by John McDaid [[https://elmcip.net/node/519 ELMCIP]] [[http://dtc-wsuv.org/wp/pathfinders/authors-works/john-mcdaid-uncle-buddys-phantom-funhouse/ Pathfinders]] [[http://scalar.usc.edu/works/pathfinders/mcdaids-traversal John McDaid's Traversal - Pathfinders]] * Michael Joyce (writer) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Joyce_(writer) Wikipedia]] ** afternoon, a story by Michael Joyce [[https://elmcip.net/node/236 ELMCIP]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Afternoon,_a_story Wikipedia]] ** Twelve Blue by Michael Joyce [[https://elmcip.net/node/237 ELMCIP]] * I Have Said Nothing by J. Yellowlees Douglas [[https://elmcip.net/node/2063 ELMCIP]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I_Have_Said_Nothing Wikipedia]] * We Descend by Bill Bly [[http://scalar.usc.edu/works/pathfinders/bill-bly Pathfinders]] ** We Descend: Archives Pertaining to Edgerus Scriptor, Volume One [[https://elmcip.net/node/1101 ELMCIP]] ** We Descend: Archives Pertaining to Egderus Scriptor, Volume Two [[https://elmcip.net/node/4269 ELMCIP]] * Patchwork Girl by Shelley Jackson [[https://elmcip.net/node/239 ELMCIP]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patchwork_Girl_(hypertext) Wikipedia]] * Califia by M. D. Coverley [[https://elmcip.net/node/723 ELMCIP]] * Victory Garden by Stuart Moulthrop [[https://elmcip.net/node/352 ELMCIP]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Victory_Garden_(novel) Wikipedia]] * The Unknown by William Gillespie, Scott Rettberg, Dirk Stratton, and Frank Marquardt [[https://elmcip.net/node/662 ELMCIP]] * GRAMMATRON by Mark Amerika [[https://elmcip.net/node/581 ELMCIP]] * 253 by Geoff Ryman [[https://elmcip.net/node/7513 ELMCIP]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/253_(novel) Wikipedia]] * The Jew's Daughter by Judd Morrissey [[https://elmcip.net/node/78 ELMCIP]] * Erik Loyer [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erik_Loyer Wikipedia]] ** Chroma by Erik Loyer [[https://elmcip.net/node/1289 ELMCIP]] ** Lair of the Marrow Monkey by Erik Loyer [[https://elmcip.net/node/5067 ELMCIP]] * Shelley Jackson [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shelley_Jackson Wikipedia]] ** my body — a Wunderkammer by Shelley Jackson [[https://elmcip.net/node/793 ELMCIP]] * About Time by Rob Swigart [[https://elmcip.net/node/4112 ELMCIP]] * The Virtual Disappearance of Miriam by Andy Campbell and Martyn Bedford [[https://elmcip.net/node/1600 ELMCIP]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Virtual_Disappearance_of_Miriam Wikipedia]] * Varicella by Adam Cadre [[https://elmcip.net/node/7775 ELMCIP]] [[http://www.ifwiki.org/index.php/Varicella IFWiki]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Varicella_(video_game) Wikipedia]] * Ruth Nestvold [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ruth_Nestvold Wikipedia]] ** Joe's Heartbeat in Budapest by Ruth Nestvold [[http://www.lit-arts.net/JHIB/begin.htm full text - Lit-Arts.Net]] * 2002: A Palindrome Story in 2002 Words by Nick Montfort and William Gillespie [[https://elmcip.net/node/7962 ELMCIP]] ==== Code poetry and new-media literature ==== * RCEL Chapter 35: "Code poetry and new-media literature" by Steve Tomasula * Code poetry [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Code_poetry Wikipedia]] ==== Computer gaming ==== * RCEL Chapter 36: "Computer gaming" by Astrid Ensslin * Art game [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Art_game Wikipedia]] ==== Virtual autobiography ==== * RCEL Chapter 37: "Virtual autobiography: Autographies, interfaces, and avatars" by Amy J. Elias ===== Autographic life writing ===== * Autobiographical comics [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autobiographical_comics Wikipedia]] * How to Understand Israel in 60 Days or Less by Sarah Glidden [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8372743 LibraryThing]] * DAR: A Super Girly Top Secret Comic Diary by Erika Moen [[https://www.librarything.com/series/DAR LibraryThing]] [[https://www.darcomic.com/ DAR]] * Webcomics Nation Autobiographical/Slice-of-Life Directory [[https://web.archive.org/web/20150511003243/http://www.webcomicsnation.com/genre.php?genre=4 Webcomics Nation]] * Museum of Mistakes: The Fart Party Collection by Julia Wertz [[https://www.librarything.com/work/15401747 LibraryThing]] [[http://www.juliawertz.com/ Museum of Mistakes]] * my body — a Wunderkammer by Shelley Jackson [[http://collection.eliterature.org/1/works/jackson__my_body_a_wunderkammer.html full text - Electronic Literature Collection]] ===== Interface life writing ===== * My War: Killing Time in Iraq by Colby Buzzell [[https://www.librarything.com/work/220797 LibraryThing]] [[http://cbftw.blogspot.com/ cbftw]] * Vlog [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vlog Wikipedia]] * Life writing [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Life_writing Wikipedia]] ** Association pour l'Autobiographie et le Patrimoine Autobiographique [[http://www.qualitative-research.net/index.php/fqs/article/view/1739/3239 The Story of a French Life-Writing Archive - Forum: Qualitative Social Research]] * Oral history [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oral_history Wikipedia]] ** Mass-Observation [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mass-Observation Wikipedia]] ** American Social History Project [[https://ashp.cuny.edu/ Center for Media and Learning]] * DissemiNET [[https://web.archive.org/web/20010405012224/http://www.dissemi.net:80/ dissemi.net]] [[https://walkerart.org/collections/artists/stryker-beth-900809 Interview with Sawad Brooks + Beth Stryker - Walker Art Center]] * Recollecting Adams [[https://mariannerpetit.com/web-video-animations/2008-09-recollecting-adams/ full video - Marianne R. Petit]] ===== Avatar autonarration ===== * Cell phone novel [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cell_phone_novel Wikipedia]] [[http://itre.cis.upenn.edu/~myl/languagelog/archives/005332.html A million cellphone novels - Language Log]] * MMORPG [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Massively_multiplayer_online_role-playing_game Wikipedia]] * Virtual world [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virtual_world Wikipedia]] ** Second Life [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_Life Wikipedia]] == Planned updates == * Add links to the empty categories. * Add a description for each category. * Add authors and works for the categories that only have general links. * Add links from other sites. * Normalize the reference formatting. [[Category:Developing]] [[Category:Lists]] [[Category:Experimental Literature]] 43524c86c0abf277931b9c653d2d5afdf84c60a4 436 435 2019-04-28T07:15:29Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added links to "Impossible worlds." wikitext text/x-wiki == Introduction == This article is a list of links to authors, works, and categories in experimental literature. Its purpose is to give you a starting point for exploring works in this set of genres. I've based the list's organization on ''The Routledge Companion to Experimental Literature'' (RCEL), a collection of scholarly essays on the subject. This project is a work in progress. == How to use this list == If a category is well established in the field, I've linked to its Wikipedia article. If the author of the RCEL article was conducting their own survey of the category, I've listed the authors and works they cover with links to Wikipedia and LibraryThing wherever corresponding pages are available. I've also included links to a work's full text when that's available and links to background information from other sources. === Wikipedia === Wikipedia articles will give you background information on their subject, and they'll usually contain bibliographies that will point you to works related to that subject, such as works in the category or works by the author. === LibraryThing === LibraryThing is a social library catalog website that lets you catalog your collection. Here I'm using it for its recommendation features and its links to other sites. When you visit a work's LibraryThing page, you can find related works in the "LibraryThing Recommendations" section and the "Member recommendations" section. You can also click on the tags users have assigned to it. Each tag link takes you to a page for that tag, which lists other works that have been assigned it, as well as related tags, subjects, and tagmashes, which are combinations of tags. You can [https://wiki.librarything.com/index.php/HelpThing:Tagmash create your own tagmashes]. In the upper right sidebar of a work's LibraryThing page, you'll find links to its corresponding page on other catalog websites, such as Amazon, Google Books, and WorldCat, a shared catalog of physical libraries worldwide. These sites will often let you look through a preview of the book. They'll also give you ways to find other related works, usually by recommendations or subject links on the work's page. If you're logged in, you can edit this section to show links from a long list of other sites. == General == * Experimental literature [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Experimental_literature Wikipedia]] * Bray, Joe, Alison Gibbons, and Brian McHale, eds. ''The Routledge Companion to Experimental Literature''. Routledge Companions. London: Routledge, 2015. [[https://www.librarything.com/work/18336113 LibraryThing]] == The historical avant-gardes == === Modernist-era experimentalism === ==== Futurism ==== * RCEL Chapter 2: "Italian Futurism and Russian Cubo-Futurism" by John White * Futurism (literature) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Futurism_(literature) Wikipedia]] ==== Expressionism ==== * RCEL Chapter 3: "The poetics of animism: Realism and the fantastic in expressionist literature and film" by Richard Murphy * Expressionism [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Expressionism Wikipedia]] ==== Surrealism ==== * RCEL Chapter 4: "The surrealist experiments with language" by Peter Stockwell * Surrealism [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surrealism Wikipedia]] ==== Absurdism ==== * RCEL Chapter 5: "The literary absurd" by Joanna Gavins * Absurdist fiction [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Absurdist_fiction Wikipedia]] === Postmodernist experimentalism === ==== Postwar experimental poetry ==== * RCEL Chapter 6: "Spontaneity and improvisation in postwar experimental poetry" by Benjamin Lee * The New American Poetry 1945–1960 [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_New_American_Poetry_1945%E2%80%931960 Wikipedia]] ==== The ''nouveau roman'' and ''Tel Quel'' ==== * RCEL Chapter 7: "The ''nouveau roman'' and ''Tel Quel''" by Danielle Marx-Scouras * Nouveau roman [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nouveau_roman Wikipedia]] * Tel Quel [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tel_Quel Wikipedia]] ==== Lettrism and situationism ==== * RCEL Chapter 8: "Lettrism and situationism" by Tyrus Miller * Lettrism [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lettrism Wikipedia]] * Situationist International [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Situationist_International Wikipedia]] ==== OuLiPo and proceduralism ==== * RCEL Chapter 9: "OuLiPo and proceduralism" by Jan Baetens * Constrained writing [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constrained_writing Wikipedia]] * Oulipo [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oulipo Wikipedia]] ==== Metafiction ==== * RCEL Chapter 10: "Metafiction" by R. M. Berry * Metafiction [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metafiction Wikipedia]] ==== Postmodern literature ==== * RCEL Chapter 11: "Postmodernism and experiment" by Brian McHale * Postmodern literature [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Postmodern_literature Wikipedia]] === Experiments with identity === ==== Twentieth-century avant-garde women writers ==== * RCEL Chapter 12: "Sexing the text: Women’s avant-garde writing in the twentieth century" by Ellen G. Friedman * Kathy Acker [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kathy_Acker Wikipedia]] * Djuna Barnes [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Djuna_Barnes Wikipedia]] * Jane Bowles [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jane_Bowles Wikipedia]] * H.D. [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H.D. Wikipedia]] * Toni Morrison [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toni_Morrison Wikipedia]] * Bharati Mukherjee [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bharati_Mukherjee Wikipedia]] * Anaïs Nin [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ana%C3%AFs_Nin Wikipedia]] * Joyce Carol Oates [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joyce_Carol_Oates Wikipedia]] * Jean Rhys [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_Rhys Wikipedia]] * Dorothy Richardson [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dorothy_Richardson Wikipedia]] * Gertrude Stein [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gertrude_Stein Wikipedia]] * Virginia Woolf [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virginia_Woolf Wikipedia]] ==== Twentieth-century avant-garde African-American poets ==== * RCEL Chapter 13: "Experiments in black: African-American avant-garde poetics" by Aldon Lynn Nielsen * Russell Atkins [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russell_Atkins Wikipedia]] * Amiri Baraka [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amiri_Baraka Wikipedia]] * Jayne Cortez [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jayne_Cortez Wikipedia]] * Negro Digest [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Negro_Digest Wikipedia]] * Langston Hughes [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Langston_Hughes Wikipedia]] * Ted Joans [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ted_Joans Wikipedia]] * Percy Johnston [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Percy_Johnston Wikipedia]] * Bob Kaufman [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bob_Kaufman Wikipedia]] * Stephen Jonas [[https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems-and-poets/poets/detail/stephen-jonas Poetry Foundation]] * William Melvin Kelley [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Melvin_Kelley Wikipedia]] * Nathaniel Mackey [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nathaniel_Mackey Wikipedia]] * Clarence Major [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clarence_Major Wikipedia]] * Tracie Morris [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tracie_Morris Wikipedia]] * Harryette Mullen [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harryette_Mullen Wikipedia]] * Claudia Rankine [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Claudia_Rankine Wikipedia]] * Gil Scott-Heron [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gil_Scott-Heron Wikipedia]] * Lorenzo Thomas (poet) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lorenzo_Thomas_(poet) Wikipedia]] * Melvin B. Tolson [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Melvin_B._Tolson Wikipedia]] * Jean Toomer [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_Toomer Wikipedia]] * Umbra (poets) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Umbra_(poets) Wikipedia]] ==== Anglophone postcolonial poetry ==== * RCEL Chapter 14: "The limits of hybridity: Language and innovation in Anglophone postcolonial poetry" by Priyamvada Gopal * Postcolonial literature [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Postcolonial_literature Wikipedia]] * G. V. Desani [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G._V._Desani Wikipedia]] * Wilson Harris [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wilson_Harris Wikipedia]] * Dambudzo Marechera [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dambudzo_Marechera Wikipedia]] * Mudrooroo [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mudrooroo Wikipedia]] * Ben Okri [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ben_Okri Wikipedia]] * Salman Rushdie [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salman_Rushdie Wikipedia]] * Vikram Seth [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vikram_Seth Wikipedia]] * Wole Soyinka [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wole_Soyinka Wikipedia]] * Amos Tutuola [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amos_Tutuola Wikipedia]] * Derek Walcott [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Derek_Walcott Wikipedia]] === The new experimentalism === ==== Avant-Pop ==== * RCEL Chapter 15: "Avant-Pop" by Lance Olsen * Avant-Pop: Fiction for a Daydream Nation (Black Ice Books) by Larry McCaffery [[https://www.librarything.com/work/512144 LibraryThing]] * After Yesterday's Crash: The Avant-Pop Anthology by Larry McCaffery [[https://www.librarything.com/work/771064 LibraryThing]] * Tomas Alfredson [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tomas_Alfredson Wikipedia]] * Italo Calvino [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Italo_Calvino Wikipedia]] * David Clark [[https://elmcip.net/node/622 ELMCIP]] * Umberto Eco [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Umberto_Eco Wikipedia]] * Betrayed by Rita Hayworth by Manuel Puig [[https://www.librarything.com/work/128453 LibraryThing]] * Naked Lunch by William S. Burroughs [[https://www.librarything.com/work/5852 LibraryThing]] * Lost in the Funhouse by John Barth [[https://www.librarything.com/work/29286 LibraryThing]] * Industrial Poetics: Demo Tracks for a Mobile Culture (Contemp North American Poetry) by Joe Amato [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2881291 LibraryThing]] * Kenneth Goldsmith [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kenneth_Goldsmith Wikipedia]] * Robert Coover [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Coover Wikipedia]] * Angela Carter [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angela_Carter Wikipedia]] * Aimee Bender [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aimee_Bender Wikipedia]] * White Noise by Don DeLillo [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4953 LibraryThing]] * Gravity's Rainbow by Thomas Pynchon [[https://www.librarything.com/work/10088 LibraryThing]] * Mark Z. Danielewski's House of leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1488 LibraryThing]] * Europeana: A Brief History of the Twentieth Century by Patrik Ouředník [[https://www.librarything.com/work/179330 LibraryThing]] * Mark Leyner [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mark_Leyner Wikipedia]] * Traveling to Utopia: With a Brief History of the Technology by Young-Hae Chang Heavy Industries [[https://www.librarything.com/work/11864011 LibraryThing]] ==== Post-postmodernism ==== * RCEL Chapter 16: "Post-postmodernism" by Robert L. McLaughlin * Post-postmodernism [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Post-postmodernism Wikipedia]] ==== Globalization and transnationalism ==== * RCEL Chapter 17: "Globalization and transnationalism" by Liam Connell * Count Zero by William Gibson [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2445 LibraryThing]] * The Fountain at the Centre of the World by Robert Newman [[https://www.librarything.com/work/18226 LibraryThing]] * Tropic of Orange by Karen Tei Yamashita [[https://www.librarything.com/work/509798 LibraryThing]] * Mark Lombardi: Global Networks by Robert Hobbs [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1066 LibraryThing]] * JPod by Douglas Coupland [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1115072 LibraryThing]] * Looking for Headless by K. D. [[https://www.librarything.com/work/10578723 LibraryThing]] ==== Altermodernist fiction ==== * RCEL Chapter 18: "Altermodernist fiction" by Alison Gibbons * The Rings of Saturn by W. G. Sebald [[https://www.librarything.com/work/28135 LibraryThing]] * Erasmus is Late by Liam Gillick [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1319708 LibraryThing]] * Shanghai Dancing by Brian Castro [[https://www.librarything.com/work/581326 LibraryThing]] * The Islanders: An Introduction by Charles Avery [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8086723 LibraryThing]] * The One Facing Us: A Novel by Ronit Matalon [[https://www.librarything.com/work/643371 LibraryThing]] * Istanbul: Memories and the City by Orhan Pamuk [[https://www.librarything.com/work/100731 LibraryThing]] * Only Revolutions by Mark Z. Danielewski [[https://www.librarything.com/work/798583 LibraryThing]] * Headless by Goldin+Senneby [[https://web.archive.org/web/20180506182844/http://www.goldinsenneby.com/gs/?p=116 Goldin+Senneby]] [[http://rhizome.org/editorial/2009/feb/04/interview-with-goldinsenneby/ Interview with Goldin+Senneby - Rhizome]] [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tOGttCSUecM Angus Cameron lecture on Headless - YouTube]] * A Visit from the Goon Squad by Jennifer Egan [[https://www.librarything.com/work/9530166 LibraryThing]] * Open City by Teju Cole [[https://www.librarything.com/work/10577676 LibraryThing]] * Rana Dasgupta [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rana_Dasgupta Wikipedia]] ==== Manifestos and ''Ars Poetica'' ==== * RCEL Chapter 19: "Manifestos and ''Ars Poetica''" by Laura Winkiel * Manifesto [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manifesto Wikipedia]] * Ars Poetica (Horace) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ars_Poetica_(Horace) Wikipedia]] * Ars Poetica by Archibald MacLeish [[https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poetrymagazine/poems/17168/ars-poetica full text]] ==== Post-criticism ==== * RCEL Chapter 20: "Post-criticism: Conceptual takes" by Gregory L. Ulmer * Heuretics: The Logic of Invention by Gregory L. Ulmer [[https://www.librarything.com/work/173585 LibraryThing]] == Experiment now: printed matter == === Experiments with language === ==== Language poetry ==== * RCEL Chapter 21: "The expanded field of ''L=A=N=G=U=A=G=E''" by Charles Bernstein * Language poets [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Language_poets Wikipedia]] ==== Concrete poetry and prose ==== * RCEL Chapter 22: "Concrete poetry and prose" by Joe Bray * Concrete poetry [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Concrete_poetry Wikipedia]] ==== Found poetry and "uncreative writing" ==== * RCEL Chapter 23: "Found poetry, 'uncreative writing,' and the art of appropriation" by Andrew Epstein * Found poetry [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Found_poetry Wikipedia]] ==== Words in visual art ==== * RCEL Chapter 24: "Words in visual art" by Jessica Prinz ==== Literary inauthenticity ==== * RCEL Chapter 25: "Hoax-poetry and inauthenticity" by Philip Mead ===== Classical ===== * The Rowley Poems by Thomas Chatterton [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2002159 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Chatterton Thomas Chatterton - Wikipedia]] * The poems of Ossian by James MacPherson [[https://www.librarything.com/work/422650 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Macpherson James Macpherson - Wikipedia]] * Kalevala by Elias Lönnrot [[https://www.librarything.com/work/158724 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kalevala Wikipedia]] * The Tablets by Armand Schwerner [[https://www.librarything.com/work/335430 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Armand_Schwerner Armand Schwerner - Wikipedia]] ===== Modern ===== * A Million Little Pieces by James Frey [[https://www.librarything.com/work/444 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Million_Little_Pieces Wikipedia]] * Angel at the Fence: The True Story of a Love that Survived by Herman Rosenblat [[https://www.librarything.com/work/6304567 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angel_at_the_Fence Wikipedia]] * Fragments: Memories of a Wartime Childhood by Binjamin Wilkomirski [[https://www.librarything.com/work/188668 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Binjamin_Wilkomirski Binjamin Wilkomirski - Wikipedia]] * Down the Road, Worlds Away by Rahila Khan [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1737627 LibraryThing]] [[https://www.lrb.co.uk/v10/n03/toby-forward/diary Diary - Toby Forward - London Review of Books]] * The Hand That Signed The Paper by Helen Darville [[https://www.librarything.com/work/336438 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helen_Dale Helen Dale - Wikipedia]] * B. Wongar [[https://www.librarything.com/author/wongarb LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/B._Wongar Wikipedia]] [[http://sf-encyclopedia.com/entry/wongar_b Science Fiction Encyclopedia]] * My own sweet time by Wanda Koolmatrie [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1908840 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leon_Carmen Leon Carmen - Wikipedia]] * Honor Lost: Love and Death in Modern-Day Jordan by Norma Khouri [[https://www.librarything.com/work/245918 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Forbidden_Love_(novel) Wikipedia]] * The darkening ecliptic by Ern Malley [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4591077 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ern_Malley Ern Malley - Wikipedia]] * Araki Yasusada [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Araki_Yasusada Wikipedia]] [[https://hereshebe.wordpress.com/2008/09/29/on-the-araki-yasusada-hoax/ On the Araki Yasusada Hoax - Here She Be — The Battlements]] ** Doubled Flowering: From the Notebooks of Araki Yasusada by Araki Yasusada [[https://www.librarything.com/work/515083 LibraryThing]] ** Also, With My Throat, I Shall Swallow Ten Thousand Swords: Araki Yasusada's Letters in English by Tosa Motokiyu [[https://www.librarything.com/work/515079 LibraryThing]] ===== Post-hoax ===== * Fernando Pessoa [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fernando_Pessoa Wikipedia]] * Ecopoetry: a critical introduction by Scott Bryson [[https://www.librarything.com/work/129941 LibraryThing]] * Women and ecopoetics: an introduction in context by Harriet Tarlo [[https://www.asu.edu/pipercwcenter/how2journal/vol_3_no_2/ecopoetics/introstatements/tarlo_intro.html full text - HOW2]] * ecopoetics [[https://ecopoetics.wordpress.com/ full text - ecopoetics]] * Media Poetry: An International Anthology by Eduardo Kac [[https://www.librarything.com/work/5074311 LibraryThing]] * Flarf [[http://mainstreampoetry.blogspot.com/ full text - Flarf]] === Experiments with narrative and fiction === ==== Unnatural narration ==== * RCEL Chapter 26: "Unnatural voices, minds, and narration" by Jan Alber, Henrik Skov Nielsen, and Brian Richardson ===== Impossibly informed narrator ===== * Virginie: Her Two Lives by John Hawkes [[https://www.librarything.com/work/121280 LibraryThing]] * Travesties by Tom Stoppard [[https://www.librarything.com/work/27223 LibraryThing]] * Midnight's Children by Salman Rushdie [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2118 LibraryThing]] * In Search of Lost Time by Marcel Proust [[https://www.librarything.com/work/23844 LibraryThing]] * The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2964 LibraryThing]] * Moby Dick by Herman Melville [[https://www.librarything.com/work/15540 LibraryThing]] * Ulysses by James Joyce [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8520 LibraryThing]] ===== Impossibly confused narrator ===== * Molloy by Samuel Beckett [[https://www.librarything.com/work/56659 LibraryThing]] * In the Labyrinth by Alain Robbe-Grillet [[https://www.librarything.com/work/319705 LibraryThing]] * "You Are As Brave As Vincent Van Gogh," Flying to America: 45 More Stories by Donald Barthelme [[https://www.librarything.com/work/3397639 LibraryThing]] ===== Non-human narrator ===== * Kew Gardens by Virginia Woolf [[https://www.librarything.com/work/891578 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kew_Gardens_(short_story) Wikipedia]] * "The House of Asterion," The Aleph and Other Stories by Jorge Luis Borges [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1443832 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_House_of_Asterion Wikipedia]] * "Jealous Husband Returns in Form of Parrot," Tabloid Dreams: Stories by Robert Olen Butler [[https://www.librarything.com/work/150283 LibraryThing]] * Doctor Rat by William Kotzwinkle [[https://www.librarything.com/work/93750 LibraryThing]] * "My Life As a West African Gray Parrot," The Left-Handed Marriage: Stories by Leigh Buchanan Bienen [[https://www.librarything.com/work/3769284 LibraryThing]] * Shakespeare's Dog by Leon Rooke [[https://www.librarything.com/work/203121 LibraryThing]] * "The Stowaway," A History of the World in 10½ Chapters by Julian Barnes [[http://www.librarything.com/work/7133 LibraryThing]] * Sweet William: A Memoir of Old Horse by John Hawkes [[https://www.librarything.com/work/216641 LibraryThing]] * Firmin by Sam Savage [[https://www.librarything.com/work/922702 LibraryThing]] * Timbuktu by Paul Auster [[https://www.librarything.com/work/27521 LibraryThing]] ===== Dead narrator ===== * Pedro Páramo by Juan Rulfo [[https://www.librarything.com/work/84285 LibraryThing]] * Pincher Martin by William Golding [[https://www.librarything.com/work/286280 LibraryThing]] * The Third Policeman by Flann O'Brien [[https://www.librarything.com/work/7104 LibraryThing]] * "Terra Incognita," A Russian Beauty and Other Stories by Vladimir Nabokov [[https://www.librarything.com/work/224314 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terra_Incognita_(short_story) Wikipedia]] * Transparent Things by Vladimir Nabokov [[https://www.librarything.com/work/51102 LibraryThing]] * Murther and Walking Spirits by Robertson Davies [[https://www.librarything.com/work/73673 LibraryThing]] * American Desert by Percival Everett [[https://www.librarything.com/work/238787 LibraryThing]] * My Name is Red by Orhan Pamuk [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2744 LibraryThing]] * Hotel World by Ali Smith [[https://www.librarything.com/work/19451 LibraryThing]] * Destiny and Desire by Carlos Fuentes [[https://www.librarything.com/work/6516575 LibraryThing]] * The Book Thief by Markus Zusak [[https://www.librarything.com/work/393681 LibraryThing]] * "The Calmative," Stories and Texts for Nothing by Samuel Beckett [[https://www.librarything.com/work/3398 LibraryThing]] * The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4931 LibraryThing]] ===== Focalization technology ===== * "The Aleph," The Aleph and Other Stories by Jorge Luis Borges [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1443832 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Aleph_(short_story) Wikipedia]] * Neuromancer by William Gibson [[https://www.librarything.com/work/609 LibraryThing]] ===== First-person plural ===== * "A Rose for Emily" by William Faulkner, American Gothic Tales by Joyce Carol Oates [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8038219 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Rose_for_Emily Wikipedia]] * 12 Million Black Voices by Richard Wright [[https://www.librarything.com/work/666218 LibraryThing]] * Two Thousand Seasons by Ayi Kwei Armah [[https://www.librarything.com/work/77062 LibraryThing]] * You Don't Love Yourself by Nathalie Sarraute [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2374617 LibraryThing]] ===== Second-person ===== * A Pagan Place by Edna O'Brien [[https://www.librarything.com/work/218163 LibraryThing]] * "How," Self-help by Lorrie Moore [[http://www.librarything.com/work/35303 LibraryThing]] * If on a Winter's Night a Traveler by Italo Calvino [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4091153 LibraryThing]] ===== Third-person singular impersonal ===== * The Radetzky March by Joseph Roth [[https://www.librarything.com/work/10159 LibraryThing]] * The opoponax by Monique Wittig [[https://www.librarything.com/work/257236 LibraryThing]] ===== Third-person plural ===== * Things: A Story of the Sixties by Georges Perec [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1197807 LibraryThing]] * Flower Children by Maxine Swann [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2375201 LibraryThing]] ===== Gender-neutral pronouns ===== * The Cook and The Carpenter by June Arnold [[https://www.librarything.com/work/736228 LibraryThing]] ===== Pronouns omitted ===== * "Dead Doll Humility" by Kathy Acker, The Making of the American Essay (A New History of the Essay) by John D'Agata [[https://www.librarything.com/work/17216549 LibraryThing]] ===== Multiple points of view ===== * "The Cubs," The Cubs and Other Stories by Mario Vargas Llosa [[https://www.librarything.com/work/17905949 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Los_Cachorros Wikipedia]] * The Death of Artemio Cruz by Carlos Fuentes [[https://www.librarything.com/work/18213 LibraryThing]] * Maps by Nuruddin Farah [[https://www.librarything.com/work/70403 LibraryThing]] * Compact by Maurice Roche [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1287065 LibraryThing]] ===== Merged narrators ===== * Monsieur Levert by Robert Pinget [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1170050 LibraryThing]] * "13," Stories and Texts for Nothing by Samuel Beckett [[https://www.librarything.com/work/3398 LibraryThing]] * The Unnamable by Samuel Beckett [[https://www.librarything.com/work/276374 LibraryThing]] * Glamorama by Bret Easton Ellis [[https://www.librarything.com/work/7545 LibraryThing]] ===== Anachronism ===== * Flight to Canada by Ishmael Reed [[https://www.librarything.com/work/35987 LibraryThing]] ===== Mid-narrative editing ===== * Worstward Ho by Samuel Beckett [[https://www.librarything.com/work/782565 LibraryThing]] ==== Impossible worlds ==== * RCEL Chapter 27: "Impossible worlds" by Marie-Laure Ryan ===== Contradictions ===== * In the Labyrinth by Alain Robbe-Grillet [[https://www.librarything.com/work/319705 LibraryThing]] * The French Lieutenant's Woman by John Fowles [[https://www.librarything.com/work/6923 LibraryThing]] * "The Babysitter," Pricksongs & Descants: Fictions by Robert Coover [[https://www.librarything.com/work/271307 LibraryThing]] * The Libera Me Domine by Robert Pinget [[https://www.librarything.com/work/478922 LibraryThing]] * "Here We Aren’t, So Quickly" by Jonathan Safran Foer, 20 Under 40: Stories from The New Yorker by Deborah Treisman [[https://www.librarything.com/work/10491291 LibraryThing]] [[https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2010/06/14/here-we-arent-so-quickly full text - The New Yorker]] * "A Country Doctor," A Country Doctor: Short Stories by Franz Kafka [[https://www.librarything.com/work/195671 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Country_Doctor_(short_story) Wikipedia]] ===== Ontological impossibility ===== * Pleasantville [1998 film] by Gary Ross [[https://www.librarything.com/work/3510622 LibraryThing]] * "Continuity of Parks," Blow-up and Other Stories by Julio Cortázar [[https://www.librarything.com/work/9057461 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Continuidad_de_los_parques Wikipedia]] * Jasper Fforde [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jasper_Fforde Wikipedia]] * The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen omnibus by Alan Moore [[https://www.librarything.com/work/11388754 LibraryThing]] ===== Impossible space ===== * Mark Z. Danielewski's House of leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1488 LibraryThing]] * Alice's Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8288 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alice%27s_Adventures_in_Wonderland Wikipedia]] ===== Impossible time ===== * Counter-Clock World by Philip K. Dick [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1309466 LibraryThing]] * Time's Arrow, or The Nature of the Offence by Martin Amis [[https://www.librarything.com/work/11900 LibraryThing]] * The Mustache by Emmanuel Carrère [[https://www.librarything.com/work/529866 LibraryThing]] ===== Impossible texts ===== * "The Book of Sand," The Book of Sand by Jorge Luis Borges [[http://www.librarything.com/work/467534 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Book_of_Sand Wikipedia]] * One Thousand and One Nights [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/One_Thousand_and_One_Nights Wikipedia]] * "The Garden of Forking Paths," Labyrinths; Selected stories & other writings by Jorge Luis Borges [[https://www.librarything.com/work/607 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Garden_of_Forking_Paths Wikipedia]] ==== Experimental life writing ==== * RCEL Chapter 28: "Experimental life writing" by Irene Kacandes ===== Time ===== * Stuart: A Life Backwards by Alexander Masters [[https://www.librarything.com/work/93508 LibraryThing]] * One Day a Year: 1960 - 2000 by Christa Wolf [[https://www.librarything.com/work/466217 LibraryThing]] ===== Medium ===== * The Complete Maus by Art Spiegelman [[https://www.librarything.com/work/6046618 LibraryThing]] * The Complete Persepolis by Marjane Satrapi [[https://www.librarything.com/work/6392056 LibraryThing]] * Fun Home: A Family Tragicomic by Alison Bechdel [[https://www.librarything.com/work/627079 LibraryThing]] * 1941-45: a teenager's war: Crete, captivity, liberation by Frederick V. Carabott [[https://www.worldcat.org/title/1941-45-ho-polemos-henos-ephebou-krete-aichmalosia-apeleutherosis-1941-45-a-teenagers-war-crete-captivity-liberation-1941-45-der-krieg-eines-jugendlichen-kreta-gefangenschaft-befreiung/oclc/48228994 WorldCat.org]] * Running in the Family by Michael Ondaatje [[https://www.librarything.com/work/27962 LibraryThing]] * Zami: a New Spelling of My Name by Audre Lorde [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8116 LibraryThing]] * A heartbreaking work of staggering genius by Dave Eggers [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2294 LibraryThing]] * Encyclopedia of an Ordinary Life by Amy Krouse Rosenthal [[https://www.librarything.com/work/35433 LibraryThing]] * The Suicide Index: Putting My Father's Death in Order by Joan Wickersham [[https://www.librarything.com/work/5248942 LibraryThing]] ===== The relational ===== * The Search Warrant by Patrick Modiano [[https://www.librarything.com/work/331076 LibraryThing]] * Ein Kapitel aus meinem Leben by Barbara Honigmann [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4500497 LibraryThing]] * After Long Silence by Helen Fremont [[https://www.librarything.com/work/13147 LibraryThing]] ===== The work's focus ===== * Patterns of Childhood by Christa Wolf [[https://www.librarything.com/work/700778 LibraryThing]] * Boyhood: Scenes from Provincial Life by J. M. Coetzee [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8660368 LibraryThing]] * Youth by J. M. Coetzee [[https://www.librarything.com/work/105432 LibraryThing]] * Summertime: Scenes from Provincial Life by J. M. Coetzee [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8494635 LibraryThing]] * Roland Barthes by Roland Barthes [[https://www.librarything.com/work/592881 LibraryThing]] * W, or The Memory of Childhood by Georges Perec [[https://www.librarything.com/work/39076 LibraryThing]] ===== Multiple techniques ===== * Daddy's War: Greek American Stories by Irene Kacandes [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8797694 LibraryThing]] ==== Experimental genre fiction ==== * RCEL Chapter 29: "'Rotting time': Genre fiction and the avant-garde" by Elana Gomel ===== Fantasy ===== * Iron Council by China Miéville [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4813 LibraryThing]] * Vellum: The Book of All Hours by Hal Duncan [[https://www.librarything.com/work/47894 LibraryThing]] * Ink: The Book of All Hours by Hal Duncan [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1162726 LibraryThing]] ===== Science fiction ===== * Iain Banks [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iain_Banks Wikipedia]] * Stephen Baxter (author) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephen_Baxter_(author) Wikipedia]] * Paul Park [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Park Wikipedia]] * Century Rain by Alastair Reynolds [[https://www.librarything.com/work/48231 LibraryThing]] * Blindsight by Peter Watts [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1333265 LibraryThing]] ===== Horror ===== * Books of Blood | Series [[https://www.librarything.com/series/Books+of+Blood LibraryThing]] * Neverwhere: The Author's Preferred Text by Neil Gaiman [[https://www.librarything.com/work/14623622 LibraryThing]] * Mark Z. Danielewski's House of leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1488 LibraryThing]] * The Everlasting by Tim Lebbon [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2811046 LibraryThing]] === Experiments with form and design === ==== Graphic narrative ==== * RCEL Chapter 30: "Graphic narrative" by Hillary Chute * Alternative comics [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alternative_comics Wikipedia]] ===== Early twentieth century ===== * Little Nemo [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Little_Nemo Wikipedia]] * Wordless novel [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wordless_novel Wikipedia]] ** Vertigo by Lynd Ward [[https://www.librarything.com/work/334743 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vertigo_(wordless_novel) Wikipedia]] ** Frans Masereel [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frans_Masereel Wikipedia]] ** Otto Nückel [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Otto_N%C3%BCckel Wikipedia]] ** Giacomo Patri [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Giacomo_Patri Wikipedia]] ===== Late twentieth century ===== * Mad (magazine) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mad_(magazine) Wikipedia]] * Underground comix [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Underground_comix Wikipedia]] ** Robert Crumb [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Crumb Wikipedia]] *** Zap Comix [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zap_Comix Wikipedia]] *** Weirdo (comics) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weirdo_(comics) Wikipedia]] ** Art Spiegelman [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Art_Spiegelman Wikipedia]] *** Breakdowns: Portrait of the Artist as a Young %@&amp;amp;*! by Art Spiegelman [[https://www.librarything.com/work/5655445 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Breakdowns_(comics) Wikipedia]] *** Raw (magazine) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raw_(magazine) Wikipedia]] ** Here by Richard McGuire [[https://www.librarything.com/work/14952042 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Here_(comics) Wikipedia]] ** Binky Brown Meets the Holy Virgin Mary by Justin Green [[https://www.librarything.com/work/3275118 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Binky_Brown_Meets_the_Holy_Virgin_Mary Wikipedia]] ** Aline Kominsky-Crumb [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aline_Kominsky-Crumb Wikipedia]] ===== Twenty-first century ===== * PictureBox [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PictureBox Wikipedia]] * In the Shadow of No Towers by Art Spiegelman [[https://www.librarything.com/work/7016 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/In_the_Shadow_of_No_Towers Wikipedia]] * Chris Ware [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chris_Ware Wikipedia]] ** Jimmy Corrigan : the smartest kid on earth by Chris Ware [[https://www.librarything.com/work/7614 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jimmy_Corrigan,_the_Smartest_Kid_on_Earth Wikipedia]] ** Unmasked [[https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2009/11/02/unmasked-4 The New Yorker]] * Alison Bechdel [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alison_Bechdel Wikipedia]] * Joe Sacco [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joe_Sacco Wikipedia]] * Lynda Barry [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lynda_Barry Wikipedia]] ** What It Is by Lynda Barry [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4598224 LibraryThing]] ** Picture This: The Near-sighted Monkey Book by Lynda Barry [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8906129 LibraryThing]] * Jason Shiga [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jason_Shiga Wikipedia]] * 365 Days: A Diary by Julie Doucet by Julie Doucet [[https://www.librarything.com/work/3471751 LibraryThing]] * Abstract comics [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abstract_comics Wikipedia]] ** Abstract Comics: The Anthology by Andrei Molotiu [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8785206 LibraryThing]] [[http://abstractcomics.blogspot.com/ Abstract Comics: The Blog]] ==== Multimodal literature ==== * RCEL Chapter 31: "Multimodal literature and experimentation" by Alison Gibbons * Liberature [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberature Wikipedia]] ==== Information design ==== * RCEL Chapter 32: "Information design, emergent culture and experimental form in the novel" by Steve Tomasula * Exercises in Style by Raymond Queneau [[https://www.librarything.com/work/39048 LibraryThing]] * Double or Nothing by Raymond Federman [[https://www.librarything.com/work/151208 LibraryThing]] * The Gettysburg Powerpoint Presentation by Peter Norvig [[https://norvig.com/Gettysburg/ full text]] * Europeana: A Brief History of the Twentieth Century by Patrik Ouředník [[https://www.librarything.com/work/179330 LibraryThing]] * 2666 by Roberto Bolaño [[https://www.librarything.com/work/996213 LibraryThing]] ==== Interactive fiction ==== * RCEL Chapter 33: "Interactive fiction" by N. Katherine Hayles And Nick Montfort * Interactive fiction [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interactive_fiction Wikipedia]] == Experiment now: beyond the page == === The digital age === ==== Digital fiction ==== * RCEL Chapter 34: "Digital fiction: Networked narratives" by David Ciccoricco * Storyspace [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Storyspace Wikipedia]] [[http://www.digitalhumanities.org/dhq/vol/6/2/000128/000128.html Machine Enhanced (Re)minding: the Development of Storyspace - Digital Humanities Quarterly]] [[http://dtc-wsuv.org/wp/ell/2017/10/28/untangling-threads-in-the-maze/ Untangling Threads in the Labyrinth – Electronic Literature Lab]] * Click by John Barth [[https://elmcip.net/node/1991 ELMCIP]] * The Glass Snail: a Pre-Christmas Tale by Milorad Pavić [[https://elmcip.net/node/1080 ELMCIP]] * 10:01 by Lance Olsen [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1139235 LibraryThing]] [[https://elmcip.net/node/1356 ELMCIP]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/10:01 Wikipedia]] * TOC: A New Media Novel by Steve Tomasula [[https://www.librarything.com/work/9462724 LibraryThing]] [[https://elmcip.net/node/835 ELMCIP]] * The LiveJournal of Zachary Marsh by Matthew Baldwin [[https://elmcip.net/node/13635 ELMCIP]] [[https://themorningnews.org/article/the-livejournal-of-zachary-marsh full text - The Morning News]] * A Million Penguins [[https://elmcip.net/node/6215 ELMCIP]] [[https://web.archive.org/web/20090803141129/http://www.amillionpenguins.com/wiki/index.php/Welcome full text - PenguinWiki]] [[https://www.researchgate.net/publication/228465833_A_million_penguins_research_report (PDF) A million penguins research report - ResearchGate]] [[https://www.theguardian.com/books/booksblog/2007/mar/12/livingwithamillionpenguins Living with A Million Penguins: inside the wiki-novel - The Guardian]] * Blue Company by Rob Wittig [[https://elmcip.net/node/368 ELMCIP]] [[http://robwit.net/?project=blue-company robwit.net]] * Deena Larsen [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deena_Larsen Wikipedia]] ** Marble Springs 1.0 by Deena Larsen [[https://elmcip.net/node/3231 ELMCIP]] ** Marble Springs 3.0 by Deena Larsen [[https://elmcip.net/node/4417 ELMCIP]] ** Disappearing Rain by Deena Larsen [[https://elmcip.net/node/759 ELMCIP]] * Judy Malloy [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Judy_Malloy Wikipedia]] * Uncle Buddy's Phantom Funhouse by John McDaid [[https://elmcip.net/node/519 ELMCIP]] [[http://dtc-wsuv.org/wp/pathfinders/authors-works/john-mcdaid-uncle-buddys-phantom-funhouse/ Pathfinders]] [[http://scalar.usc.edu/works/pathfinders/mcdaids-traversal John McDaid's Traversal - Pathfinders]] * Michael Joyce (writer) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Joyce_(writer) Wikipedia]] ** afternoon, a story by Michael Joyce [[https://elmcip.net/node/236 ELMCIP]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Afternoon,_a_story Wikipedia]] ** Twelve Blue by Michael Joyce [[https://elmcip.net/node/237 ELMCIP]] * I Have Said Nothing by J. Yellowlees Douglas [[https://elmcip.net/node/2063 ELMCIP]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I_Have_Said_Nothing Wikipedia]] * We Descend by Bill Bly [[http://scalar.usc.edu/works/pathfinders/bill-bly Pathfinders]] ** We Descend: Archives Pertaining to Edgerus Scriptor, Volume One [[https://elmcip.net/node/1101 ELMCIP]] ** We Descend: Archives Pertaining to Egderus Scriptor, Volume Two [[https://elmcip.net/node/4269 ELMCIP]] * Patchwork Girl by Shelley Jackson [[https://elmcip.net/node/239 ELMCIP]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patchwork_Girl_(hypertext) Wikipedia]] * Califia by M. D. Coverley [[https://elmcip.net/node/723 ELMCIP]] * Victory Garden by Stuart Moulthrop [[https://elmcip.net/node/352 ELMCIP]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Victory_Garden_(novel) Wikipedia]] * The Unknown by William Gillespie, Scott Rettberg, Dirk Stratton, and Frank Marquardt [[https://elmcip.net/node/662 ELMCIP]] * GRAMMATRON by Mark Amerika [[https://elmcip.net/node/581 ELMCIP]] * 253 by Geoff Ryman [[https://elmcip.net/node/7513 ELMCIP]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/253_(novel) Wikipedia]] * The Jew's Daughter by Judd Morrissey [[https://elmcip.net/node/78 ELMCIP]] * Erik Loyer [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erik_Loyer Wikipedia]] ** Chroma by Erik Loyer [[https://elmcip.net/node/1289 ELMCIP]] ** Lair of the Marrow Monkey by Erik Loyer [[https://elmcip.net/node/5067 ELMCIP]] * Shelley Jackson [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shelley_Jackson Wikipedia]] ** my body — a Wunderkammer by Shelley Jackson [[https://elmcip.net/node/793 ELMCIP]] * About Time by Rob Swigart [[https://elmcip.net/node/4112 ELMCIP]] * The Virtual Disappearance of Miriam by Andy Campbell and Martyn Bedford [[https://elmcip.net/node/1600 ELMCIP]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Virtual_Disappearance_of_Miriam Wikipedia]] * Varicella by Adam Cadre [[https://elmcip.net/node/7775 ELMCIP]] [[http://www.ifwiki.org/index.php/Varicella IFWiki]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Varicella_(video_game) Wikipedia]] * Ruth Nestvold [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ruth_Nestvold Wikipedia]] ** Joe's Heartbeat in Budapest by Ruth Nestvold [[http://www.lit-arts.net/JHIB/begin.htm full text - Lit-Arts.Net]] * 2002: A Palindrome Story in 2002 Words by Nick Montfort and William Gillespie [[https://elmcip.net/node/7962 ELMCIP]] ==== Code poetry and new-media literature ==== * RCEL Chapter 35: "Code poetry and new-media literature" by Steve Tomasula * Code poetry [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Code_poetry Wikipedia]] ==== Computer gaming ==== * RCEL Chapter 36: "Computer gaming" by Astrid Ensslin * Art game [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Art_game Wikipedia]] ==== Virtual autobiography ==== * RCEL Chapter 37: "Virtual autobiography: Autographies, interfaces, and avatars" by Amy J. Elias ===== Autographic life writing ===== * Autobiographical comics [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autobiographical_comics Wikipedia]] * How to Understand Israel in 60 Days or Less by Sarah Glidden [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8372743 LibraryThing]] * DAR: A Super Girly Top Secret Comic Diary by Erika Moen [[https://www.librarything.com/series/DAR LibraryThing]] [[https://www.darcomic.com/ DAR]] * Webcomics Nation Autobiographical/Slice-of-Life Directory [[https://web.archive.org/web/20150511003243/http://www.webcomicsnation.com/genre.php?genre=4 Webcomics Nation]] * Museum of Mistakes: The Fart Party Collection by Julia Wertz [[https://www.librarything.com/work/15401747 LibraryThing]] [[http://www.juliawertz.com/ Museum of Mistakes]] * my body — a Wunderkammer by Shelley Jackson [[http://collection.eliterature.org/1/works/jackson__my_body_a_wunderkammer.html full text - Electronic Literature Collection]] ===== Interface life writing ===== * My War: Killing Time in Iraq by Colby Buzzell [[https://www.librarything.com/work/220797 LibraryThing]] [[http://cbftw.blogspot.com/ cbftw]] * Vlog [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vlog Wikipedia]] * Life writing [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Life_writing Wikipedia]] ** Association pour l'Autobiographie et le Patrimoine Autobiographique [[http://www.qualitative-research.net/index.php/fqs/article/view/1739/3239 The Story of a French Life-Writing Archive - Forum: Qualitative Social Research]] * Oral history [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oral_history Wikipedia]] ** Mass-Observation [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mass-Observation Wikipedia]] ** American Social History Project [[https://ashp.cuny.edu/ Center for Media and Learning]] * DissemiNET [[https://web.archive.org/web/20010405012224/http://www.dissemi.net:80/ dissemi.net]] [[https://walkerart.org/collections/artists/stryker-beth-900809 Interview with Sawad Brooks + Beth Stryker - Walker Art Center]] * Recollecting Adams [[https://mariannerpetit.com/web-video-animations/2008-09-recollecting-adams/ full video - Marianne R. Petit]] ===== Avatar autonarration ===== * Cell phone novel [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cell_phone_novel Wikipedia]] [[http://itre.cis.upenn.edu/~myl/languagelog/archives/005332.html A million cellphone novels - Language Log]] * MMORPG [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Massively_multiplayer_online_role-playing_game Wikipedia]] * Virtual world [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virtual_world Wikipedia]] ** Second Life [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_Life Wikipedia]] == Planned updates == * Add links to the empty categories. * Add a description for each category. * Add authors and works for the categories that only have general links. * Add links from other sites. * Normalize the reference formatting. [[Category:Developing]] [[Category:Lists]] [[Category:Experimental Literature]] 01686c4c1bc0541dc0bfd1a355efe84292dcbae8 437 436 2019-04-28T08:25:07Z Andy Culbertson 1 Renamed "Words in visual art" to "Language art" and added links to the section. wikitext text/x-wiki == Introduction == This article is a list of links to authors, works, and categories in experimental literature. Its purpose is to give you a starting point for exploring works in this set of genres. I've based the list's organization on ''The Routledge Companion to Experimental Literature'' (RCEL), a collection of scholarly essays on the subject. This project is a work in progress. == How to use this list == If a category is well established in the field, I've linked to its Wikipedia article. If the author of the RCEL article was conducting their own survey of the category, I've listed the authors and works they cover with links to Wikipedia and LibraryThing wherever corresponding pages are available. I've also included links to a work's full text when that's available and links to background information from other sources. === Wikipedia === Wikipedia articles will give you background information on their subject, and they'll usually contain bibliographies that will point you to works related to that subject, such as works in the category or works by the author. === LibraryThing === LibraryThing is a social library catalog website that lets you catalog your collection. Here I'm using it for its recommendation features and its links to other sites. When you visit a work's LibraryThing page, you can find related works in the "LibraryThing Recommendations" section and the "Member recommendations" section. You can also click on the tags users have assigned to it. Each tag link takes you to a page for that tag, which lists other works that have been assigned it, as well as related tags, subjects, and tagmashes, which are combinations of tags. You can [https://wiki.librarything.com/index.php/HelpThing:Tagmash create your own tagmashes]. In the upper right sidebar of a work's LibraryThing page, you'll find links to its corresponding page on other catalog websites, such as Amazon, Google Books, and WorldCat, a shared catalog of physical libraries worldwide. These sites will often let you look through a preview of the book. They'll also give you ways to find other related works, usually by recommendations or subject links on the work's page. If you're logged in, you can edit this section to show links from a long list of other sites. == General == * Experimental literature [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Experimental_literature Wikipedia]] * Bray, Joe, Alison Gibbons, and Brian McHale, eds. ''The Routledge Companion to Experimental Literature''. Routledge Companions. London: Routledge, 2015. [[https://www.librarything.com/work/18336113 LibraryThing]] == The historical avant-gardes == === Modernist-era experimentalism === ==== Futurism ==== * RCEL Chapter 2: "Italian Futurism and Russian Cubo-Futurism" by John White * Futurism (literature) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Futurism_(literature) Wikipedia]] ==== Expressionism ==== * RCEL Chapter 3: "The poetics of animism: Realism and the fantastic in expressionist literature and film" by Richard Murphy * Expressionism [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Expressionism Wikipedia]] ==== Surrealism ==== * RCEL Chapter 4: "The surrealist experiments with language" by Peter Stockwell * Surrealism [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surrealism Wikipedia]] ==== Absurdism ==== * RCEL Chapter 5: "The literary absurd" by Joanna Gavins * Absurdist fiction [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Absurdist_fiction Wikipedia]] === Postmodernist experimentalism === ==== Postwar experimental poetry ==== * RCEL Chapter 6: "Spontaneity and improvisation in postwar experimental poetry" by Benjamin Lee * The New American Poetry 1945–1960 [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_New_American_Poetry_1945%E2%80%931960 Wikipedia]] ==== The ''nouveau roman'' and ''Tel Quel'' ==== * RCEL Chapter 7: "The ''nouveau roman'' and ''Tel Quel''" by Danielle Marx-Scouras * Nouveau roman [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nouveau_roman Wikipedia]] * Tel Quel [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tel_Quel Wikipedia]] ==== Lettrism and situationism ==== * RCEL Chapter 8: "Lettrism and situationism" by Tyrus Miller * Lettrism [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lettrism Wikipedia]] * Situationist International [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Situationist_International Wikipedia]] ==== OuLiPo and proceduralism ==== * RCEL Chapter 9: "OuLiPo and proceduralism" by Jan Baetens * Constrained writing [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constrained_writing Wikipedia]] * Oulipo [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oulipo Wikipedia]] ==== Metafiction ==== * RCEL Chapter 10: "Metafiction" by R. M. Berry * Metafiction [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metafiction Wikipedia]] ==== Postmodern literature ==== * RCEL Chapter 11: "Postmodernism and experiment" by Brian McHale * Postmodern literature [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Postmodern_literature Wikipedia]] === Experiments with identity === ==== Twentieth-century avant-garde women writers ==== * RCEL Chapter 12: "Sexing the text: Women’s avant-garde writing in the twentieth century" by Ellen G. Friedman * Kathy Acker [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kathy_Acker Wikipedia]] * Djuna Barnes [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Djuna_Barnes Wikipedia]] * Jane Bowles [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jane_Bowles Wikipedia]] * H.D. [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H.D. Wikipedia]] * Toni Morrison [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toni_Morrison Wikipedia]] * Bharati Mukherjee [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bharati_Mukherjee Wikipedia]] * Anaïs Nin [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ana%C3%AFs_Nin Wikipedia]] * Joyce Carol Oates [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joyce_Carol_Oates Wikipedia]] * Jean Rhys [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_Rhys Wikipedia]] * Dorothy Richardson [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dorothy_Richardson Wikipedia]] * Gertrude Stein [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gertrude_Stein Wikipedia]] * Virginia Woolf [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virginia_Woolf Wikipedia]] ==== Twentieth-century avant-garde African-American poets ==== * RCEL Chapter 13: "Experiments in black: African-American avant-garde poetics" by Aldon Lynn Nielsen * Russell Atkins [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russell_Atkins Wikipedia]] * Amiri Baraka [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amiri_Baraka Wikipedia]] * Jayne Cortez [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jayne_Cortez Wikipedia]] * Negro Digest [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Negro_Digest Wikipedia]] * Langston Hughes [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Langston_Hughes Wikipedia]] * Ted Joans [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ted_Joans Wikipedia]] * Percy Johnston [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Percy_Johnston Wikipedia]] * Bob Kaufman [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bob_Kaufman Wikipedia]] * Stephen Jonas [[https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems-and-poets/poets/detail/stephen-jonas Poetry Foundation]] * William Melvin Kelley [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Melvin_Kelley Wikipedia]] * Nathaniel Mackey [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nathaniel_Mackey Wikipedia]] * Clarence Major [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clarence_Major Wikipedia]] * Tracie Morris [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tracie_Morris Wikipedia]] * Harryette Mullen [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harryette_Mullen Wikipedia]] * Claudia Rankine [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Claudia_Rankine Wikipedia]] * Gil Scott-Heron [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gil_Scott-Heron Wikipedia]] * Lorenzo Thomas (poet) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lorenzo_Thomas_(poet) Wikipedia]] * Melvin B. Tolson [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Melvin_B._Tolson Wikipedia]] * Jean Toomer [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_Toomer Wikipedia]] * Umbra (poets) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Umbra_(poets) Wikipedia]] ==== Anglophone postcolonial poetry ==== * RCEL Chapter 14: "The limits of hybridity: Language and innovation in Anglophone postcolonial poetry" by Priyamvada Gopal * Postcolonial literature [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Postcolonial_literature Wikipedia]] * G. V. Desani [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G._V._Desani Wikipedia]] * Wilson Harris [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wilson_Harris Wikipedia]] * Dambudzo Marechera [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dambudzo_Marechera Wikipedia]] * Mudrooroo [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mudrooroo Wikipedia]] * Ben Okri [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ben_Okri Wikipedia]] * Salman Rushdie [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salman_Rushdie Wikipedia]] * Vikram Seth [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vikram_Seth Wikipedia]] * Wole Soyinka [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wole_Soyinka Wikipedia]] * Amos Tutuola [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amos_Tutuola Wikipedia]] * Derek Walcott [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Derek_Walcott Wikipedia]] === The new experimentalism === ==== Avant-Pop ==== * RCEL Chapter 15: "Avant-Pop" by Lance Olsen * Avant-Pop: Fiction for a Daydream Nation (Black Ice Books) by Larry McCaffery [[https://www.librarything.com/work/512144 LibraryThing]] * After Yesterday's Crash: The Avant-Pop Anthology by Larry McCaffery [[https://www.librarything.com/work/771064 LibraryThing]] * Tomas Alfredson [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tomas_Alfredson Wikipedia]] * Italo Calvino [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Italo_Calvino Wikipedia]] * David Clark [[https://elmcip.net/node/622 ELMCIP]] * Umberto Eco [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Umberto_Eco Wikipedia]] * Betrayed by Rita Hayworth by Manuel Puig [[https://www.librarything.com/work/128453 LibraryThing]] * Naked Lunch by William S. Burroughs [[https://www.librarything.com/work/5852 LibraryThing]] * Lost in the Funhouse by John Barth [[https://www.librarything.com/work/29286 LibraryThing]] * Industrial Poetics: Demo Tracks for a Mobile Culture (Contemp North American Poetry) by Joe Amato [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2881291 LibraryThing]] * Kenneth Goldsmith [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kenneth_Goldsmith Wikipedia]] * Robert Coover [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Coover Wikipedia]] * Angela Carter [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angela_Carter Wikipedia]] * Aimee Bender [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aimee_Bender Wikipedia]] * White Noise by Don DeLillo [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4953 LibraryThing]] * Gravity's Rainbow by Thomas Pynchon [[https://www.librarything.com/work/10088 LibraryThing]] * Mark Z. Danielewski's House of leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1488 LibraryThing]] * Europeana: A Brief History of the Twentieth Century by Patrik Ouředník [[https://www.librarything.com/work/179330 LibraryThing]] * Mark Leyner [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mark_Leyner Wikipedia]] * Traveling to Utopia: With a Brief History of the Technology by Young-Hae Chang Heavy Industries [[https://www.librarything.com/work/11864011 LibraryThing]] ==== Post-postmodernism ==== * RCEL Chapter 16: "Post-postmodernism" by Robert L. McLaughlin * Post-postmodernism [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Post-postmodernism Wikipedia]] ==== Globalization and transnationalism ==== * RCEL Chapter 17: "Globalization and transnationalism" by Liam Connell * Count Zero by William Gibson [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2445 LibraryThing]] * The Fountain at the Centre of the World by Robert Newman [[https://www.librarything.com/work/18226 LibraryThing]] * Tropic of Orange by Karen Tei Yamashita [[https://www.librarything.com/work/509798 LibraryThing]] * Mark Lombardi: Global Networks by Robert Hobbs [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1066 LibraryThing]] * JPod by Douglas Coupland [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1115072 LibraryThing]] * Looking for Headless by K. D. [[https://www.librarything.com/work/10578723 LibraryThing]] ==== Altermodernist fiction ==== * RCEL Chapter 18: "Altermodernist fiction" by Alison Gibbons * The Rings of Saturn by W. G. Sebald [[https://www.librarything.com/work/28135 LibraryThing]] * Erasmus is Late by Liam Gillick [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1319708 LibraryThing]] * Shanghai Dancing by Brian Castro [[https://www.librarything.com/work/581326 LibraryThing]] * The Islanders: An Introduction by Charles Avery [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8086723 LibraryThing]] * The One Facing Us: A Novel by Ronit Matalon [[https://www.librarything.com/work/643371 LibraryThing]] * Istanbul: Memories and the City by Orhan Pamuk [[https://www.librarything.com/work/100731 LibraryThing]] * Only Revolutions by Mark Z. Danielewski [[https://www.librarything.com/work/798583 LibraryThing]] * Headless by Goldin+Senneby [[https://web.archive.org/web/20180506182844/http://www.goldinsenneby.com/gs/?p=116 Goldin+Senneby]] [[http://rhizome.org/editorial/2009/feb/04/interview-with-goldinsenneby/ Interview with Goldin+Senneby - Rhizome]] [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tOGttCSUecM Angus Cameron lecture on Headless - YouTube]] * A Visit from the Goon Squad by Jennifer Egan [[https://www.librarything.com/work/9530166 LibraryThing]] * Open City by Teju Cole [[https://www.librarything.com/work/10577676 LibraryThing]] * Rana Dasgupta [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rana_Dasgupta Wikipedia]] ==== Manifestos and ''Ars Poetica'' ==== * RCEL Chapter 19: "Manifestos and ''Ars Poetica''" by Laura Winkiel * Manifesto [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manifesto Wikipedia]] * Ars Poetica (Horace) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ars_Poetica_(Horace) Wikipedia]] * Ars Poetica by Archibald MacLeish [[https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poetrymagazine/poems/17168/ars-poetica full text]] ==== Post-criticism ==== * RCEL Chapter 20: "Post-criticism: Conceptual takes" by Gregory L. Ulmer * Heuretics: The Logic of Invention by Gregory L. Ulmer [[https://www.librarything.com/work/173585 LibraryThing]] == Experiment now: printed matter == === Experiments with language === ==== Language poetry ==== * RCEL Chapter 21: "The expanded field of ''L=A=N=G=U=A=G=E''" by Charles Bernstein * Language poets [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Language_poets Wikipedia]] ==== Concrete poetry and prose ==== * RCEL Chapter 22: "Concrete poetry and prose" by Joe Bray * Concrete poetry [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Concrete_poetry Wikipedia]] ==== Found poetry and "uncreative writing" ==== * RCEL Chapter 23: "Found poetry, 'uncreative writing,' and the art of appropriation" by Andrew Epstein * Found poetry [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Found_poetry Wikipedia]] ==== Language art ==== * RCEL Chapter 24: "Words in visual art" by Jessica Prinz * Conceptual art [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conceptual_art Wikipedia]] * Performance art [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Performance_art Wikipedia]] * Edward Ruscha [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_Ruscha Wikipedia]] ** Standard Stations by Edward Ruscha [[https://www.archeus.com/artists/piece/ruscha-i-standard-station-ii-mocha-standard-iii-cheese-mold-standard-with-o Archeus]] ** Actual Size by Edward Ruscha [[https://www.wikiart.org/en/edward-ruscha/actual-size-1962 WikiArt]] * Mel Bochner [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mel_Bochner Wikipedia]] * Jean-Michel Basquiat [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean-Michel_Basquiat Wikipedia]] * Edward Kienholz [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_Kienholz Wikipedia]] * Dan Graham [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dan_Graham Wikipedia]] * Robert Morris (artist) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Morris_(artist) Wikipedia]] * On Kawara [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_Kawara Wikipedia]] * Bruce Nauman [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bruce_Nauman Wikipedia]] * Chris Burden [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chris_Burden Wikipedia]] * Vito Acconci [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vito_Acconci Wikipedia]] * George Brecht [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Brecht Wikipedia]] * John Cage [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Cage Wikipedia]] * Marcel Broodthaers [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marcel_Broodthaers Wikipedia]] * Barbara Kruger [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barbara_Kruger Wikipedia]] * Art & Language [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Art_%26_Language Wikipedia]] ** Terry Atkinson [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terry_Atkinson Wikipedia]] ** Michael Baldwin [[https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artists/art-language-16838 Tate]] [[https://www.moma.org/artists/21325 MoMA]] ** David Bainbridge [[https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artists/art-language-17138 Tate]] ** Harold Hurrell [[https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artists/art-language-16245 Tate]] ** Charles Townsend Harrison [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Townsend_Harrison Wikipedia]] ** Joseph Kosuth [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_Kosuth Wikipedia]] *** One and Three Chairs by Joseph Kosuth [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/One_and_Three_Chairs Wikipedia]] *** Texts (Waiting for-) for Nothing by Joseph Kosuth [[https://www.skny.com/exhibitions/joseph-kosuth3 Sean Kelly Gallery]] ** Art and & language, hostages XXV - LXXVI by Christian Schlatter David Batchelor [[https://www.librarything.com/work/22244074 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:BookSources?isbn=9780947830243 Wikipedia Book Sources]] * Daniel Buren [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daniel_Buren Wikipedia]] * Joseph Beuys [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_Beuys Wikipedia]] ** How to Explain Pictures to a Dead Hare by Joseph Beuys [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/How_to_Explain_Pictures_to_a_Dead_Hare Wikipedia]] * The Bride Stripped Bare by Her Bachelors, Even by Marcel Duchamp [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Bride_Stripped_Bare_by_Her_Bachelors,_Even Wikipedia]] * Laurie Anderson [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laurie_Anderson Wikipedia]] * Jonathan Borofsky [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jonathan_Borofsky Wikipedia]] * Ann Hamilton (artist) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ann_Hamilton_(artist) Wikipedia]] ** Tropos by Ann Hamilton [[https://www.annhamiltonstudio.com/objects/tropos_books.html Ann Hamilton Studio]] ** Lineament by Ann Hamilton [[https://www.annhamiltonstudio.com/objects/lineament_bookball.html Ann Hamilton Studio]] ** Mercy by Ann Hamilton [[https://www.annhamiltonstudio.com/projects/mercy.html Ann Hamilton Studio]] ** VERSE by Ann Hamilton [[http://www.annhamiltonstudio.com/public/verse.html Ann Hamilton Studio]] * Lawrence Weiner [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lawrence_Weiner Wikipedia]] * Douglas Huebler [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Douglas_Huebler Wikipedia]] * Robert Barry (artist) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Barry_(artist) Wikipedia]] * Robert Smithson [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Smithson Wikipedia]] ** Spiral Jetty by Robert Smithson [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spiral_Jetty Wikipedia]] [[https://www.wikiart.org/en/robert-smithson/spiral-jetty-1970 WikiArt]] ** A Heap of Language by Robert Smithson [[https://www.moma.org/collection/works/149054 MoMA]] [[https://www.robertsmithson.com/essays/heap.htm Robert Smithson]] ** "Strata, a Geophotographic Fiction," Robert Smithson: The Collected Writings by Robert Smithson [[https://www.librarything.com/work/61528 LibraryThing]] ** "A Sedimentation of the Mind: Earth Proposals," Robert Smithson: The Collected Writings by Robert Smithson [[https://www.librarything.com/work/61528 LibraryThing]] * Jenny Holzer [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jenny_Holzer Wikipedia]] ** Truisms by Jenny Holzer [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Truisms_(Jenny_Holzer) Wikipedia]] ** Jenny Holzer: Laments by Jenny Holzer [[https://www.librarything.com/work/3339875 LibraryThing]] [[https://www.diaart.org/program/exhibitions-projects/jenny-holzer-laments-exhibition Dia]] ** Jenny Holzer: Lustmord by Jenny Holzer [[https://www.librarything.com/work/3338682 LibraryThing]] [[https://wellcomecollection.org/articles/WqfvayUAAKsrVreh Wellcome Collection]] ** Under a Rock: Crack the Pelvis by Jenny Holzer [[http://www.colby.edu/museum/?s=under%20a%20rock&obj=Obj220?sid=1079&x=24931 Colby College Museum of Art]] ** Jenny Holzer: Truth Before Power by Henri Cole [[https://www.librarything.com/work/3338740 LibraryThing]] ** Jenny Holzer Projections [[http://www.jennyholzer.com/Projections/list.php Jenny Holzer]] [[https://www.newyorker.com/books/page-turner/light-as-touch-jenny-holzers-nighttime-poetry-projections The New Yorker]] ** Elizabeth Bishop granite benches by Jenny Holzer [[http://info.vassar.edu/news/2005-2006/060505-jenny-holzers.html Vassar College]] ==== Literary inauthenticity ==== * RCEL Chapter 25: "Hoax-poetry and inauthenticity" by Philip Mead ===== Classical ===== * The Rowley Poems by Thomas Chatterton [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2002159 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Chatterton Thomas Chatterton - Wikipedia]] * The poems of Ossian by James MacPherson [[https://www.librarything.com/work/422650 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Macpherson James Macpherson - Wikipedia]] * Kalevala by Elias Lönnrot [[https://www.librarything.com/work/158724 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kalevala Wikipedia]] * The Tablets by Armand Schwerner [[https://www.librarything.com/work/335430 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Armand_Schwerner Armand Schwerner - Wikipedia]] ===== Modern ===== * A Million Little Pieces by James Frey [[https://www.librarything.com/work/444 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Million_Little_Pieces Wikipedia]] * Angel at the Fence: The True Story of a Love that Survived by Herman Rosenblat [[https://www.librarything.com/work/6304567 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angel_at_the_Fence Wikipedia]] * Fragments: Memories of a Wartime Childhood by Binjamin Wilkomirski [[https://www.librarything.com/work/188668 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Binjamin_Wilkomirski Binjamin Wilkomirski - Wikipedia]] * Down the Road, Worlds Away by Rahila Khan [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1737627 LibraryThing]] [[https://www.lrb.co.uk/v10/n03/toby-forward/diary Diary - Toby Forward - London Review of Books]] * The Hand That Signed The Paper by Helen Darville [[https://www.librarything.com/work/336438 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helen_Dale Helen Dale - Wikipedia]] * B. Wongar [[https://www.librarything.com/author/wongarb LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/B._Wongar Wikipedia]] [[http://sf-encyclopedia.com/entry/wongar_b Science Fiction Encyclopedia]] * My own sweet time by Wanda Koolmatrie [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1908840 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leon_Carmen Leon Carmen - Wikipedia]] * Honor Lost: Love and Death in Modern-Day Jordan by Norma Khouri [[https://www.librarything.com/work/245918 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Forbidden_Love_(novel) Wikipedia]] * The darkening ecliptic by Ern Malley [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4591077 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ern_Malley Ern Malley - Wikipedia]] * Araki Yasusada [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Araki_Yasusada Wikipedia]] [[https://hereshebe.wordpress.com/2008/09/29/on-the-araki-yasusada-hoax/ On the Araki Yasusada Hoax - Here She Be — The Battlements]] ** Doubled Flowering: From the Notebooks of Araki Yasusada by Araki Yasusada [[https://www.librarything.com/work/515083 LibraryThing]] ** Also, With My Throat, I Shall Swallow Ten Thousand Swords: Araki Yasusada's Letters in English by Tosa Motokiyu [[https://www.librarything.com/work/515079 LibraryThing]] ===== Post-hoax ===== * Fernando Pessoa [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fernando_Pessoa Wikipedia]] * Ecopoetry: a critical introduction by Scott Bryson [[https://www.librarything.com/work/129941 LibraryThing]] * Women and ecopoetics: an introduction in context by Harriet Tarlo [[https://www.asu.edu/pipercwcenter/how2journal/vol_3_no_2/ecopoetics/introstatements/tarlo_intro.html full text - HOW2]] * ecopoetics [[https://ecopoetics.wordpress.com/ full text - ecopoetics]] * Media Poetry: An International Anthology by Eduardo Kac [[https://www.librarything.com/work/5074311 LibraryThing]] * Flarf [[http://mainstreampoetry.blogspot.com/ full text - Flarf]] === Experiments with narrative and fiction === ==== Unnatural narration ==== * RCEL Chapter 26: "Unnatural voices, minds, and narration" by Jan Alber, Henrik Skov Nielsen, and Brian Richardson ===== Impossibly informed narrator ===== * Virginie: Her Two Lives by John Hawkes [[https://www.librarything.com/work/121280 LibraryThing]] * Travesties by Tom Stoppard [[https://www.librarything.com/work/27223 LibraryThing]] * Midnight's Children by Salman Rushdie [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2118 LibraryThing]] * In Search of Lost Time by Marcel Proust [[https://www.librarything.com/work/23844 LibraryThing]] * The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2964 LibraryThing]] * Moby Dick by Herman Melville [[https://www.librarything.com/work/15540 LibraryThing]] * Ulysses by James Joyce [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8520 LibraryThing]] ===== Impossibly confused narrator ===== * Molloy by Samuel Beckett [[https://www.librarything.com/work/56659 LibraryThing]] * In the Labyrinth by Alain Robbe-Grillet [[https://www.librarything.com/work/319705 LibraryThing]] * "You Are As Brave As Vincent Van Gogh," Flying to America: 45 More Stories by Donald Barthelme [[https://www.librarything.com/work/3397639 LibraryThing]] ===== Non-human narrator ===== * Kew Gardens by Virginia Woolf [[https://www.librarything.com/work/891578 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kew_Gardens_(short_story) Wikipedia]] * "The House of Asterion," The Aleph and Other Stories by Jorge Luis Borges [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1443832 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_House_of_Asterion Wikipedia]] * "Jealous Husband Returns in Form of Parrot," Tabloid Dreams: Stories by Robert Olen Butler [[https://www.librarything.com/work/150283 LibraryThing]] * Doctor Rat by William Kotzwinkle [[https://www.librarything.com/work/93750 LibraryThing]] * "My Life As a West African Gray Parrot," The Left-Handed Marriage: Stories by Leigh Buchanan Bienen [[https://www.librarything.com/work/3769284 LibraryThing]] * Shakespeare's Dog by Leon Rooke [[https://www.librarything.com/work/203121 LibraryThing]] * "The Stowaway," A History of the World in 10½ Chapters by Julian Barnes [[http://www.librarything.com/work/7133 LibraryThing]] * Sweet William: A Memoir of Old Horse by John Hawkes [[https://www.librarything.com/work/216641 LibraryThing]] * Firmin by Sam Savage [[https://www.librarything.com/work/922702 LibraryThing]] * Timbuktu by Paul Auster [[https://www.librarything.com/work/27521 LibraryThing]] ===== Dead narrator ===== * Pedro Páramo by Juan Rulfo [[https://www.librarything.com/work/84285 LibraryThing]] * Pincher Martin by William Golding [[https://www.librarything.com/work/286280 LibraryThing]] * The Third Policeman by Flann O'Brien [[https://www.librarything.com/work/7104 LibraryThing]] * "Terra Incognita," A Russian Beauty and Other Stories by Vladimir Nabokov [[https://www.librarything.com/work/224314 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terra_Incognita_(short_story) Wikipedia]] * Transparent Things by Vladimir Nabokov [[https://www.librarything.com/work/51102 LibraryThing]] * Murther and Walking Spirits by Robertson Davies [[https://www.librarything.com/work/73673 LibraryThing]] * American Desert by Percival Everett [[https://www.librarything.com/work/238787 LibraryThing]] * My Name is Red by Orhan Pamuk [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2744 LibraryThing]] * Hotel World by Ali Smith [[https://www.librarything.com/work/19451 LibraryThing]] * Destiny and Desire by Carlos Fuentes [[https://www.librarything.com/work/6516575 LibraryThing]] * The Book Thief by Markus Zusak [[https://www.librarything.com/work/393681 LibraryThing]] * "The Calmative," Stories and Texts for Nothing by Samuel Beckett [[https://www.librarything.com/work/3398 LibraryThing]] * The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4931 LibraryThing]] ===== Focalization technology ===== * "The Aleph," The Aleph and Other Stories by Jorge Luis Borges [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1443832 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Aleph_(short_story) Wikipedia]] * Neuromancer by William Gibson [[https://www.librarything.com/work/609 LibraryThing]] ===== First-person plural ===== * "A Rose for Emily" by William Faulkner, American Gothic Tales by Joyce Carol Oates [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8038219 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Rose_for_Emily Wikipedia]] * 12 Million Black Voices by Richard Wright [[https://www.librarything.com/work/666218 LibraryThing]] * Two Thousand Seasons by Ayi Kwei Armah [[https://www.librarything.com/work/77062 LibraryThing]] * You Don't Love Yourself by Nathalie Sarraute [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2374617 LibraryThing]] ===== Second-person ===== * A Pagan Place by Edna O'Brien [[https://www.librarything.com/work/218163 LibraryThing]] * "How," Self-help by Lorrie Moore [[http://www.librarything.com/work/35303 LibraryThing]] * If on a Winter's Night a Traveler by Italo Calvino [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4091153 LibraryThing]] ===== Third-person singular impersonal ===== * The Radetzky March by Joseph Roth [[https://www.librarything.com/work/10159 LibraryThing]] * The opoponax by Monique Wittig [[https://www.librarything.com/work/257236 LibraryThing]] ===== Third-person plural ===== * Things: A Story of the Sixties by Georges Perec [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1197807 LibraryThing]] * Flower Children by Maxine Swann [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2375201 LibraryThing]] ===== Gender-neutral pronouns ===== * The Cook and The Carpenter by June Arnold [[https://www.librarything.com/work/736228 LibraryThing]] ===== Pronouns omitted ===== * "Dead Doll Humility" by Kathy Acker, The Making of the American Essay (A New History of the Essay) by John D'Agata [[https://www.librarything.com/work/17216549 LibraryThing]] ===== Multiple points of view ===== * "The Cubs," The Cubs and Other Stories by Mario Vargas Llosa [[https://www.librarything.com/work/17905949 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Los_Cachorros Wikipedia]] * The Death of Artemio Cruz by Carlos Fuentes [[https://www.librarything.com/work/18213 LibraryThing]] * Maps by Nuruddin Farah [[https://www.librarything.com/work/70403 LibraryThing]] * Compact by Maurice Roche [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1287065 LibraryThing]] ===== Merged narrators ===== * Monsieur Levert by Robert Pinget [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1170050 LibraryThing]] * "13," Stories and Texts for Nothing by Samuel Beckett [[https://www.librarything.com/work/3398 LibraryThing]] * The Unnamable by Samuel Beckett [[https://www.librarything.com/work/276374 LibraryThing]] * Glamorama by Bret Easton Ellis [[https://www.librarything.com/work/7545 LibraryThing]] ===== Anachronism ===== * Flight to Canada by Ishmael Reed [[https://www.librarything.com/work/35987 LibraryThing]] ===== Mid-narrative editing ===== * Worstward Ho by Samuel Beckett [[https://www.librarything.com/work/782565 LibraryThing]] ==== Impossible worlds ==== * RCEL Chapter 27: "Impossible worlds" by Marie-Laure Ryan ===== Contradictions ===== * In the Labyrinth by Alain Robbe-Grillet [[https://www.librarything.com/work/319705 LibraryThing]] * The French Lieutenant's Woman by John Fowles [[https://www.librarything.com/work/6923 LibraryThing]] * "The Babysitter," Pricksongs & Descants: Fictions by Robert Coover [[https://www.librarything.com/work/271307 LibraryThing]] * The Libera Me Domine by Robert Pinget [[https://www.librarything.com/work/478922 LibraryThing]] * "Here We Aren’t, So Quickly" by Jonathan Safran Foer, 20 Under 40: Stories from The New Yorker by Deborah Treisman [[https://www.librarything.com/work/10491291 LibraryThing]] [[https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2010/06/14/here-we-arent-so-quickly full text - The New Yorker]] * "A Country Doctor," A Country Doctor: Short Stories by Franz Kafka [[https://www.librarything.com/work/195671 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Country_Doctor_(short_story) Wikipedia]] ===== Ontological impossibility ===== * Pleasantville [1998 film] by Gary Ross [[https://www.librarything.com/work/3510622 LibraryThing]] * "Continuity of Parks," Blow-up and Other Stories by Julio Cortázar [[https://www.librarything.com/work/9057461 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Continuidad_de_los_parques Wikipedia]] * Jasper Fforde [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jasper_Fforde Wikipedia]] * The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen omnibus by Alan Moore [[https://www.librarything.com/work/11388754 LibraryThing]] ===== Impossible space ===== * Mark Z. Danielewski's House of leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1488 LibraryThing]] * Alice's Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8288 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alice%27s_Adventures_in_Wonderland Wikipedia]] ===== Impossible time ===== * Counter-Clock World by Philip K. Dick [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1309466 LibraryThing]] * Time's Arrow, or The Nature of the Offence by Martin Amis [[https://www.librarything.com/work/11900 LibraryThing]] * The Mustache by Emmanuel Carrère [[https://www.librarything.com/work/529866 LibraryThing]] ===== Impossible texts ===== * "The Book of Sand," The Book of Sand by Jorge Luis Borges [[http://www.librarything.com/work/467534 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Book_of_Sand Wikipedia]] * One Thousand and One Nights [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/One_Thousand_and_One_Nights Wikipedia]] * "The Garden of Forking Paths," Labyrinths; Selected stories & other writings by Jorge Luis Borges [[https://www.librarything.com/work/607 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Garden_of_Forking_Paths Wikipedia]] ==== Experimental life writing ==== * RCEL Chapter 28: "Experimental life writing" by Irene Kacandes ===== Time ===== * Stuart: A Life Backwards by Alexander Masters [[https://www.librarything.com/work/93508 LibraryThing]] * One Day a Year: 1960 - 2000 by Christa Wolf [[https://www.librarything.com/work/466217 LibraryThing]] ===== Medium ===== * The Complete Maus by Art Spiegelman [[https://www.librarything.com/work/6046618 LibraryThing]] * The Complete Persepolis by Marjane Satrapi [[https://www.librarything.com/work/6392056 LibraryThing]] * Fun Home: A Family Tragicomic by Alison Bechdel [[https://www.librarything.com/work/627079 LibraryThing]] * 1941-45: a teenager's war: Crete, captivity, liberation by Frederick V. Carabott [[https://www.worldcat.org/title/1941-45-ho-polemos-henos-ephebou-krete-aichmalosia-apeleutherosis-1941-45-a-teenagers-war-crete-captivity-liberation-1941-45-der-krieg-eines-jugendlichen-kreta-gefangenschaft-befreiung/oclc/48228994 WorldCat.org]] * Running in the Family by Michael Ondaatje [[https://www.librarything.com/work/27962 LibraryThing]] * Zami: a New Spelling of My Name by Audre Lorde [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8116 LibraryThing]] * A heartbreaking work of staggering genius by Dave Eggers [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2294 LibraryThing]] * Encyclopedia of an Ordinary Life by Amy Krouse Rosenthal [[https://www.librarything.com/work/35433 LibraryThing]] * The Suicide Index: Putting My Father's Death in Order by Joan Wickersham [[https://www.librarything.com/work/5248942 LibraryThing]] ===== The relational ===== * The Search Warrant by Patrick Modiano [[https://www.librarything.com/work/331076 LibraryThing]] * Ein Kapitel aus meinem Leben by Barbara Honigmann [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4500497 LibraryThing]] * After Long Silence by Helen Fremont [[https://www.librarything.com/work/13147 LibraryThing]] ===== The work's focus ===== * Patterns of Childhood by Christa Wolf [[https://www.librarything.com/work/700778 LibraryThing]] * Boyhood: Scenes from Provincial Life by J. M. Coetzee [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8660368 LibraryThing]] * Youth by J. M. Coetzee [[https://www.librarything.com/work/105432 LibraryThing]] * Summertime: Scenes from Provincial Life by J. M. Coetzee [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8494635 LibraryThing]] * Roland Barthes by Roland Barthes [[https://www.librarything.com/work/592881 LibraryThing]] * W, or The Memory of Childhood by Georges Perec [[https://www.librarything.com/work/39076 LibraryThing]] ===== Multiple techniques ===== * Daddy's War: Greek American Stories by Irene Kacandes [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8797694 LibraryThing]] ==== Experimental genre fiction ==== * RCEL Chapter 29: "'Rotting time': Genre fiction and the avant-garde" by Elana Gomel ===== Fantasy ===== * Iron Council by China Miéville [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4813 LibraryThing]] * Vellum: The Book of All Hours by Hal Duncan [[https://www.librarything.com/work/47894 LibraryThing]] * Ink: The Book of All Hours by Hal Duncan [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1162726 LibraryThing]] ===== Science fiction ===== * Iain Banks [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iain_Banks Wikipedia]] * Stephen Baxter (author) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephen_Baxter_(author) Wikipedia]] * Paul Park [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Park Wikipedia]] * Century Rain by Alastair Reynolds [[https://www.librarything.com/work/48231 LibraryThing]] * Blindsight by Peter Watts [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1333265 LibraryThing]] ===== Horror ===== * Books of Blood | Series [[https://www.librarything.com/series/Books+of+Blood LibraryThing]] * Neverwhere: The Author's Preferred Text by Neil Gaiman [[https://www.librarything.com/work/14623622 LibraryThing]] * Mark Z. Danielewski's House of leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1488 LibraryThing]] * The Everlasting by Tim Lebbon [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2811046 LibraryThing]] === Experiments with form and design === ==== Graphic narrative ==== * RCEL Chapter 30: "Graphic narrative" by Hillary Chute * Alternative comics [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alternative_comics Wikipedia]] ===== Early twentieth century ===== * Little Nemo [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Little_Nemo Wikipedia]] * Wordless novel [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wordless_novel Wikipedia]] ** Vertigo by Lynd Ward [[https://www.librarything.com/work/334743 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vertigo_(wordless_novel) Wikipedia]] ** Frans Masereel [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frans_Masereel Wikipedia]] ** Otto Nückel [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Otto_N%C3%BCckel Wikipedia]] ** Giacomo Patri [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Giacomo_Patri Wikipedia]] ===== Late twentieth century ===== * Mad (magazine) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mad_(magazine) Wikipedia]] * Underground comix [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Underground_comix Wikipedia]] ** Robert Crumb [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Crumb Wikipedia]] *** Zap Comix [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zap_Comix Wikipedia]] *** Weirdo (comics) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weirdo_(comics) Wikipedia]] ** Art Spiegelman [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Art_Spiegelman Wikipedia]] *** Breakdowns: Portrait of the Artist as a Young %@&amp;amp;*! by Art Spiegelman [[https://www.librarything.com/work/5655445 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Breakdowns_(comics) Wikipedia]] *** Raw (magazine) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raw_(magazine) Wikipedia]] ** Here by Richard McGuire [[https://www.librarything.com/work/14952042 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Here_(comics) Wikipedia]] ** Binky Brown Meets the Holy Virgin Mary by Justin Green [[https://www.librarything.com/work/3275118 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Binky_Brown_Meets_the_Holy_Virgin_Mary Wikipedia]] ** Aline Kominsky-Crumb [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aline_Kominsky-Crumb Wikipedia]] ===== Twenty-first century ===== * PictureBox [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PictureBox Wikipedia]] * In the Shadow of No Towers by Art Spiegelman [[https://www.librarything.com/work/7016 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/In_the_Shadow_of_No_Towers Wikipedia]] * Chris Ware [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chris_Ware Wikipedia]] ** Jimmy Corrigan : the smartest kid on earth by Chris Ware [[https://www.librarything.com/work/7614 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jimmy_Corrigan,_the_Smartest_Kid_on_Earth Wikipedia]] ** Unmasked [[https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2009/11/02/unmasked-4 The New Yorker]] * Alison Bechdel [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alison_Bechdel Wikipedia]] * Joe Sacco [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joe_Sacco Wikipedia]] * Lynda Barry [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lynda_Barry Wikipedia]] ** What It Is by Lynda Barry [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4598224 LibraryThing]] ** Picture This: The Near-sighted Monkey Book by Lynda Barry [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8906129 LibraryThing]] * Jason Shiga [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jason_Shiga Wikipedia]] * 365 Days: A Diary by Julie Doucet by Julie Doucet [[https://www.librarything.com/work/3471751 LibraryThing]] * Abstract comics [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abstract_comics Wikipedia]] ** Abstract Comics: The Anthology by Andrei Molotiu [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8785206 LibraryThing]] [[http://abstractcomics.blogspot.com/ Abstract Comics: The Blog]] ==== Multimodal literature ==== * RCEL Chapter 31: "Multimodal literature and experimentation" by Alison Gibbons * Liberature [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberature Wikipedia]] ==== Information design ==== * RCEL Chapter 32: "Information design, emergent culture and experimental form in the novel" by Steve Tomasula * Exercises in Style by Raymond Queneau [[https://www.librarything.com/work/39048 LibraryThing]] * Double or Nothing by Raymond Federman [[https://www.librarything.com/work/151208 LibraryThing]] * The Gettysburg Powerpoint Presentation by Peter Norvig [[https://norvig.com/Gettysburg/ full text]] * Europeana: A Brief History of the Twentieth Century by Patrik Ouředník [[https://www.librarything.com/work/179330 LibraryThing]] * 2666 by Roberto Bolaño [[https://www.librarything.com/work/996213 LibraryThing]] ==== Interactive fiction ==== * RCEL Chapter 33: "Interactive fiction" by N. Katherine Hayles And Nick Montfort * Interactive fiction [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interactive_fiction Wikipedia]] == Experiment now: beyond the page == === The digital age === ==== Digital fiction ==== * RCEL Chapter 34: "Digital fiction: Networked narratives" by David Ciccoricco * Storyspace [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Storyspace Wikipedia]] [[http://www.digitalhumanities.org/dhq/vol/6/2/000128/000128.html Machine Enhanced (Re)minding: the Development of Storyspace - Digital Humanities Quarterly]] [[http://dtc-wsuv.org/wp/ell/2017/10/28/untangling-threads-in-the-maze/ Untangling Threads in the Labyrinth – Electronic Literature Lab]] * Click by John Barth [[https://elmcip.net/node/1991 ELMCIP]] * The Glass Snail: a Pre-Christmas Tale by Milorad Pavić [[https://elmcip.net/node/1080 ELMCIP]] * 10:01 by Lance Olsen [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1139235 LibraryThing]] [[https://elmcip.net/node/1356 ELMCIP]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/10:01 Wikipedia]] * TOC: A New Media Novel by Steve Tomasula [[https://www.librarything.com/work/9462724 LibraryThing]] [[https://elmcip.net/node/835 ELMCIP]] * The LiveJournal of Zachary Marsh by Matthew Baldwin [[https://elmcip.net/node/13635 ELMCIP]] [[https://themorningnews.org/article/the-livejournal-of-zachary-marsh full text - The Morning News]] * A Million Penguins [[https://elmcip.net/node/6215 ELMCIP]] [[https://web.archive.org/web/20090803141129/http://www.amillionpenguins.com/wiki/index.php/Welcome full text - PenguinWiki]] [[https://www.researchgate.net/publication/228465833_A_million_penguins_research_report (PDF) A million penguins research report - ResearchGate]] [[https://www.theguardian.com/books/booksblog/2007/mar/12/livingwithamillionpenguins Living with A Million Penguins: inside the wiki-novel - The Guardian]] * Blue Company by Rob Wittig [[https://elmcip.net/node/368 ELMCIP]] [[http://robwit.net/?project=blue-company robwit.net]] * Deena Larsen [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deena_Larsen Wikipedia]] ** Marble Springs 1.0 by Deena Larsen [[https://elmcip.net/node/3231 ELMCIP]] ** Marble Springs 3.0 by Deena Larsen [[https://elmcip.net/node/4417 ELMCIP]] ** Disappearing Rain by Deena Larsen [[https://elmcip.net/node/759 ELMCIP]] * Judy Malloy [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Judy_Malloy Wikipedia]] * Uncle Buddy's Phantom Funhouse by John McDaid [[https://elmcip.net/node/519 ELMCIP]] [[http://dtc-wsuv.org/wp/pathfinders/authors-works/john-mcdaid-uncle-buddys-phantom-funhouse/ Pathfinders]] [[http://scalar.usc.edu/works/pathfinders/mcdaids-traversal John McDaid's Traversal - Pathfinders]] * Michael Joyce (writer) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Joyce_(writer) Wikipedia]] ** afternoon, a story by Michael Joyce [[https://elmcip.net/node/236 ELMCIP]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Afternoon,_a_story Wikipedia]] ** Twelve Blue by Michael Joyce [[https://elmcip.net/node/237 ELMCIP]] * I Have Said Nothing by J. Yellowlees Douglas [[https://elmcip.net/node/2063 ELMCIP]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I_Have_Said_Nothing Wikipedia]] * We Descend by Bill Bly [[http://scalar.usc.edu/works/pathfinders/bill-bly Pathfinders]] ** We Descend: Archives Pertaining to Edgerus Scriptor, Volume One [[https://elmcip.net/node/1101 ELMCIP]] ** We Descend: Archives Pertaining to Egderus Scriptor, Volume Two [[https://elmcip.net/node/4269 ELMCIP]] * Patchwork Girl by Shelley Jackson [[https://elmcip.net/node/239 ELMCIP]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patchwork_Girl_(hypertext) Wikipedia]] * Califia by M. D. Coverley [[https://elmcip.net/node/723 ELMCIP]] * Victory Garden by Stuart Moulthrop [[https://elmcip.net/node/352 ELMCIP]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Victory_Garden_(novel) Wikipedia]] * The Unknown by William Gillespie, Scott Rettberg, Dirk Stratton, and Frank Marquardt [[https://elmcip.net/node/662 ELMCIP]] * GRAMMATRON by Mark Amerika [[https://elmcip.net/node/581 ELMCIP]] * 253 by Geoff Ryman [[https://elmcip.net/node/7513 ELMCIP]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/253_(novel) Wikipedia]] * The Jew's Daughter by Judd Morrissey [[https://elmcip.net/node/78 ELMCIP]] * Erik Loyer [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erik_Loyer Wikipedia]] ** Chroma by Erik Loyer [[https://elmcip.net/node/1289 ELMCIP]] ** Lair of the Marrow Monkey by Erik Loyer [[https://elmcip.net/node/5067 ELMCIP]] * Shelley Jackson [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shelley_Jackson Wikipedia]] ** my body — a Wunderkammer by Shelley Jackson [[https://elmcip.net/node/793 ELMCIP]] * About Time by Rob Swigart [[https://elmcip.net/node/4112 ELMCIP]] * The Virtual Disappearance of Miriam by Andy Campbell and Martyn Bedford [[https://elmcip.net/node/1600 ELMCIP]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Virtual_Disappearance_of_Miriam Wikipedia]] * Varicella by Adam Cadre [[https://elmcip.net/node/7775 ELMCIP]] [[http://www.ifwiki.org/index.php/Varicella IFWiki]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Varicella_(video_game) Wikipedia]] * Ruth Nestvold [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ruth_Nestvold Wikipedia]] ** Joe's Heartbeat in Budapest by Ruth Nestvold [[http://www.lit-arts.net/JHIB/begin.htm full text - Lit-Arts.Net]] * 2002: A Palindrome Story in 2002 Words by Nick Montfort and William Gillespie [[https://elmcip.net/node/7962 ELMCIP]] ==== Code poetry and new-media literature ==== * RCEL Chapter 35: "Code poetry and new-media literature" by Steve Tomasula * Code poetry [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Code_poetry Wikipedia]] ==== Computer gaming ==== * RCEL Chapter 36: "Computer gaming" by Astrid Ensslin * Art game [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Art_game Wikipedia]] ==== Virtual autobiography ==== * RCEL Chapter 37: "Virtual autobiography: Autographies, interfaces, and avatars" by Amy J. Elias ===== Autographic life writing ===== * Autobiographical comics [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autobiographical_comics Wikipedia]] * How to Understand Israel in 60 Days or Less by Sarah Glidden [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8372743 LibraryThing]] * DAR: A Super Girly Top Secret Comic Diary by Erika Moen [[https://www.librarything.com/series/DAR LibraryThing]] [[https://www.darcomic.com/ DAR]] * Webcomics Nation Autobiographical/Slice-of-Life Directory [[https://web.archive.org/web/20150511003243/http://www.webcomicsnation.com/genre.php?genre=4 Webcomics Nation]] * Museum of Mistakes: The Fart Party Collection by Julia Wertz [[https://www.librarything.com/work/15401747 LibraryThing]] [[http://www.juliawertz.com/ Museum of Mistakes]] * my body — a Wunderkammer by Shelley Jackson [[http://collection.eliterature.org/1/works/jackson__my_body_a_wunderkammer.html full text - Electronic Literature Collection]] ===== Interface life writing ===== * My War: Killing Time in Iraq by Colby Buzzell [[https://www.librarything.com/work/220797 LibraryThing]] [[http://cbftw.blogspot.com/ cbftw]] * Vlog [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vlog Wikipedia]] * Life writing [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Life_writing Wikipedia]] ** Association pour l'Autobiographie et le Patrimoine Autobiographique [[http://www.qualitative-research.net/index.php/fqs/article/view/1739/3239 The Story of a French Life-Writing Archive - Forum: Qualitative Social Research]] * Oral history [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oral_history Wikipedia]] ** Mass-Observation [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mass-Observation Wikipedia]] ** American Social History Project [[https://ashp.cuny.edu/ Center for Media and Learning]] * DissemiNET [[https://web.archive.org/web/20010405012224/http://www.dissemi.net:80/ dissemi.net]] [[https://walkerart.org/collections/artists/stryker-beth-900809 Interview with Sawad Brooks + Beth Stryker - Walker Art Center]] * Recollecting Adams [[https://mariannerpetit.com/web-video-animations/2008-09-recollecting-adams/ full video - Marianne R. Petit]] ===== Avatar autonarration ===== * Cell phone novel [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cell_phone_novel Wikipedia]] [[http://itre.cis.upenn.edu/~myl/languagelog/archives/005332.html A million cellphone novels - Language Log]] * MMORPG [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Massively_multiplayer_online_role-playing_game Wikipedia]] * Virtual world [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virtual_world Wikipedia]] ** Second Life [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_Life Wikipedia]] == Planned updates == * Add links to the empty categories. * Add a description for each category. * Add authors and works for the categories that only have general links. * Add links from other sites. * Normalize the reference formatting. [[Category:Developing]] [[Category:Lists]] [[Category:Experimental Literature]] 05b2d3daf33f677040714bd7175339e343f653a0 438 437 2019-04-28T08:40:18Z Andy Culbertson 1 Renamed "Graphic narrative" to "Experimental comics." Renamed the "Virtual autobiography" subsections. wikitext text/x-wiki == Introduction == This article is a list of links to authors, works, and categories in experimental literature. Its purpose is to give you a starting point for exploring works in this set of genres. I've based the list's organization on ''The Routledge Companion to Experimental Literature'' (RCEL), a collection of scholarly essays on the subject. This project is a work in progress. == How to use this list == If a category is well established in the field, I've linked to its Wikipedia article. If the author of the RCEL article was conducting their own survey of the category, I've listed the authors and works they cover with links to Wikipedia and LibraryThing wherever corresponding pages are available. I've also included links to a work's full text when that's available and links to background information from other sources. === Wikipedia === Wikipedia articles will give you background information on their subject, and they'll usually contain bibliographies that will point you to works related to that subject, such as works in the category or works by the author. === LibraryThing === LibraryThing is a social library catalog website that lets you catalog your collection. Here I'm using it for its recommendation features and its links to other sites. When you visit a work's LibraryThing page, you can find related works in the "LibraryThing Recommendations" section and the "Member recommendations" section. You can also click on the tags users have assigned to it. Each tag link takes you to a page for that tag, which lists other works that have been assigned it, as well as related tags, subjects, and tagmashes, which are combinations of tags. You can [https://wiki.librarything.com/index.php/HelpThing:Tagmash create your own tagmashes]. In the upper right sidebar of a work's LibraryThing page, you'll find links to its corresponding page on other catalog websites, such as Amazon, Google Books, and WorldCat, a shared catalog of physical libraries worldwide. These sites will often let you look through a preview of the book. They'll also give you ways to find other related works, usually by recommendations or subject links on the work's page. If you're logged in, you can edit this section to show links from a long list of other sites. == General == * Experimental literature [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Experimental_literature Wikipedia]] * Bray, Joe, Alison Gibbons, and Brian McHale, eds. ''The Routledge Companion to Experimental Literature''. Routledge Companions. London: Routledge, 2015. [[https://www.librarything.com/work/18336113 LibraryThing]] == The historical avant-gardes == === Modernist-era experimentalism === ==== Futurism ==== * RCEL Chapter 2: "Italian Futurism and Russian Cubo-Futurism" by John White * Futurism (literature) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Futurism_(literature) Wikipedia]] ==== Expressionism ==== * RCEL Chapter 3: "The poetics of animism: Realism and the fantastic in expressionist literature and film" by Richard Murphy * Expressionism [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Expressionism Wikipedia]] ==== Surrealism ==== * RCEL Chapter 4: "The surrealist experiments with language" by Peter Stockwell * Surrealism [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surrealism Wikipedia]] ==== Absurdism ==== * RCEL Chapter 5: "The literary absurd" by Joanna Gavins * Absurdist fiction [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Absurdist_fiction Wikipedia]] === Postmodernist experimentalism === ==== Postwar experimental poetry ==== * RCEL Chapter 6: "Spontaneity and improvisation in postwar experimental poetry" by Benjamin Lee * The New American Poetry 1945–1960 [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_New_American_Poetry_1945%E2%80%931960 Wikipedia]] ==== The ''nouveau roman'' and ''Tel Quel'' ==== * RCEL Chapter 7: "The ''nouveau roman'' and ''Tel Quel''" by Danielle Marx-Scouras * Nouveau roman [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nouveau_roman Wikipedia]] * Tel Quel [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tel_Quel Wikipedia]] ==== Lettrism and situationism ==== * RCEL Chapter 8: "Lettrism and situationism" by Tyrus Miller * Lettrism [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lettrism Wikipedia]] * Situationist International [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Situationist_International Wikipedia]] ==== OuLiPo and proceduralism ==== * RCEL Chapter 9: "OuLiPo and proceduralism" by Jan Baetens * Constrained writing [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constrained_writing Wikipedia]] * Oulipo [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oulipo Wikipedia]] ==== Metafiction ==== * RCEL Chapter 10: "Metafiction" by R. M. Berry * Metafiction [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metafiction Wikipedia]] ==== Postmodern literature ==== * RCEL Chapter 11: "Postmodernism and experiment" by Brian McHale * Postmodern literature [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Postmodern_literature Wikipedia]] === Experiments with identity === ==== Twentieth-century avant-garde women writers ==== * RCEL Chapter 12: "Sexing the text: Women’s avant-garde writing in the twentieth century" by Ellen G. Friedman * Kathy Acker [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kathy_Acker Wikipedia]] * Djuna Barnes [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Djuna_Barnes Wikipedia]] * Jane Bowles [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jane_Bowles Wikipedia]] * H.D. [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H.D. Wikipedia]] * Toni Morrison [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toni_Morrison Wikipedia]] * Bharati Mukherjee [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bharati_Mukherjee Wikipedia]] * Anaïs Nin [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ana%C3%AFs_Nin Wikipedia]] * Joyce Carol Oates [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joyce_Carol_Oates Wikipedia]] * Jean Rhys [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_Rhys Wikipedia]] * Dorothy Richardson [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dorothy_Richardson Wikipedia]] * Gertrude Stein [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gertrude_Stein Wikipedia]] * Virginia Woolf [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virginia_Woolf Wikipedia]] ==== Twentieth-century avant-garde African-American poets ==== * RCEL Chapter 13: "Experiments in black: African-American avant-garde poetics" by Aldon Lynn Nielsen * Russell Atkins [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russell_Atkins Wikipedia]] * Amiri Baraka [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amiri_Baraka Wikipedia]] * Jayne Cortez [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jayne_Cortez Wikipedia]] * Negro Digest [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Negro_Digest Wikipedia]] * Langston Hughes [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Langston_Hughes Wikipedia]] * Ted Joans [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ted_Joans Wikipedia]] * Percy Johnston [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Percy_Johnston Wikipedia]] * Bob Kaufman [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bob_Kaufman Wikipedia]] * Stephen Jonas [[https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems-and-poets/poets/detail/stephen-jonas Poetry Foundation]] * William Melvin Kelley [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Melvin_Kelley Wikipedia]] * Nathaniel Mackey [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nathaniel_Mackey Wikipedia]] * Clarence Major [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clarence_Major Wikipedia]] * Tracie Morris [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tracie_Morris Wikipedia]] * Harryette Mullen [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harryette_Mullen Wikipedia]] * Claudia Rankine [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Claudia_Rankine Wikipedia]] * Gil Scott-Heron [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gil_Scott-Heron Wikipedia]] * Lorenzo Thomas (poet) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lorenzo_Thomas_(poet) Wikipedia]] * Melvin B. Tolson [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Melvin_B._Tolson Wikipedia]] * Jean Toomer [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_Toomer Wikipedia]] * Umbra (poets) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Umbra_(poets) Wikipedia]] ==== Anglophone postcolonial poetry ==== * RCEL Chapter 14: "The limits of hybridity: Language and innovation in Anglophone postcolonial poetry" by Priyamvada Gopal * Postcolonial literature [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Postcolonial_literature Wikipedia]] * G. V. Desani [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G._V._Desani Wikipedia]] * Wilson Harris [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wilson_Harris Wikipedia]] * Dambudzo Marechera [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dambudzo_Marechera Wikipedia]] * Mudrooroo [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mudrooroo Wikipedia]] * Ben Okri [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ben_Okri Wikipedia]] * Salman Rushdie [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salman_Rushdie Wikipedia]] * Vikram Seth [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vikram_Seth Wikipedia]] * Wole Soyinka [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wole_Soyinka Wikipedia]] * Amos Tutuola [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amos_Tutuola Wikipedia]] * Derek Walcott [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Derek_Walcott Wikipedia]] === The new experimentalism === ==== Avant-Pop ==== * RCEL Chapter 15: "Avant-Pop" by Lance Olsen * Avant-Pop: Fiction for a Daydream Nation (Black Ice Books) by Larry McCaffery [[https://www.librarything.com/work/512144 LibraryThing]] * After Yesterday's Crash: The Avant-Pop Anthology by Larry McCaffery [[https://www.librarything.com/work/771064 LibraryThing]] * Tomas Alfredson [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tomas_Alfredson Wikipedia]] * Italo Calvino [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Italo_Calvino Wikipedia]] * David Clark [[https://elmcip.net/node/622 ELMCIP]] * Umberto Eco [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Umberto_Eco Wikipedia]] * Betrayed by Rita Hayworth by Manuel Puig [[https://www.librarything.com/work/128453 LibraryThing]] * Naked Lunch by William S. Burroughs [[https://www.librarything.com/work/5852 LibraryThing]] * Lost in the Funhouse by John Barth [[https://www.librarything.com/work/29286 LibraryThing]] * Industrial Poetics: Demo Tracks for a Mobile Culture (Contemp North American Poetry) by Joe Amato [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2881291 LibraryThing]] * Kenneth Goldsmith [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kenneth_Goldsmith Wikipedia]] * Robert Coover [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Coover Wikipedia]] * Angela Carter [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angela_Carter Wikipedia]] * Aimee Bender [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aimee_Bender Wikipedia]] * White Noise by Don DeLillo [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4953 LibraryThing]] * Gravity's Rainbow by Thomas Pynchon [[https://www.librarything.com/work/10088 LibraryThing]] * Mark Z. Danielewski's House of leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1488 LibraryThing]] * Europeana: A Brief History of the Twentieth Century by Patrik Ouředník [[https://www.librarything.com/work/179330 LibraryThing]] * Mark Leyner [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mark_Leyner Wikipedia]] * Traveling to Utopia: With a Brief History of the Technology by Young-Hae Chang Heavy Industries [[https://www.librarything.com/work/11864011 LibraryThing]] ==== Post-postmodernism ==== * RCEL Chapter 16: "Post-postmodernism" by Robert L. McLaughlin * Post-postmodernism [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Post-postmodernism Wikipedia]] ==== Globalization and transnationalism ==== * RCEL Chapter 17: "Globalization and transnationalism" by Liam Connell * Count Zero by William Gibson [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2445 LibraryThing]] * The Fountain at the Centre of the World by Robert Newman [[https://www.librarything.com/work/18226 LibraryThing]] * Tropic of Orange by Karen Tei Yamashita [[https://www.librarything.com/work/509798 LibraryThing]] * Mark Lombardi: Global Networks by Robert Hobbs [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1066 LibraryThing]] * JPod by Douglas Coupland [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1115072 LibraryThing]] * Looking for Headless by K. D. [[https://www.librarything.com/work/10578723 LibraryThing]] ==== Altermodernist fiction ==== * RCEL Chapter 18: "Altermodernist fiction" by Alison Gibbons * The Rings of Saturn by W. G. Sebald [[https://www.librarything.com/work/28135 LibraryThing]] * Erasmus is Late by Liam Gillick [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1319708 LibraryThing]] * Shanghai Dancing by Brian Castro [[https://www.librarything.com/work/581326 LibraryThing]] * The Islanders: An Introduction by Charles Avery [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8086723 LibraryThing]] * The One Facing Us: A Novel by Ronit Matalon [[https://www.librarything.com/work/643371 LibraryThing]] * Istanbul: Memories and the City by Orhan Pamuk [[https://www.librarything.com/work/100731 LibraryThing]] * Only Revolutions by Mark Z. Danielewski [[https://www.librarything.com/work/798583 LibraryThing]] * Headless by Goldin+Senneby [[https://web.archive.org/web/20180506182844/http://www.goldinsenneby.com/gs/?p=116 Goldin+Senneby]] [[http://rhizome.org/editorial/2009/feb/04/interview-with-goldinsenneby/ Interview with Goldin+Senneby - Rhizome]] [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tOGttCSUecM Angus Cameron lecture on Headless - YouTube]] * A Visit from the Goon Squad by Jennifer Egan [[https://www.librarything.com/work/9530166 LibraryThing]] * Open City by Teju Cole [[https://www.librarything.com/work/10577676 LibraryThing]] * Rana Dasgupta [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rana_Dasgupta Wikipedia]] ==== Manifestos and ''Ars Poetica'' ==== * RCEL Chapter 19: "Manifestos and ''Ars Poetica''" by Laura Winkiel * Manifesto [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manifesto Wikipedia]] * Ars Poetica (Horace) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ars_Poetica_(Horace) Wikipedia]] * Ars Poetica by Archibald MacLeish [[https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poetrymagazine/poems/17168/ars-poetica full text]] ==== Post-criticism ==== * RCEL Chapter 20: "Post-criticism: Conceptual takes" by Gregory L. Ulmer * Heuretics: The Logic of Invention by Gregory L. Ulmer [[https://www.librarything.com/work/173585 LibraryThing]] == Experiment now: printed matter == === Experiments with language === ==== Language poetry ==== * RCEL Chapter 21: "The expanded field of ''L=A=N=G=U=A=G=E''" by Charles Bernstein * Language poets [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Language_poets Wikipedia]] ==== Concrete poetry and prose ==== * RCEL Chapter 22: "Concrete poetry and prose" by Joe Bray * Concrete poetry [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Concrete_poetry Wikipedia]] ==== Found poetry and "uncreative writing" ==== * RCEL Chapter 23: "Found poetry, 'uncreative writing,' and the art of appropriation" by Andrew Epstein * Found poetry [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Found_poetry Wikipedia]] ==== Language art ==== * RCEL Chapter 24: "Words in visual art" by Jessica Prinz * Conceptual art [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conceptual_art Wikipedia]] * Performance art [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Performance_art Wikipedia]] * Edward Ruscha [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_Ruscha Wikipedia]] ** Standard Stations by Edward Ruscha [[https://www.archeus.com/artists/piece/ruscha-i-standard-station-ii-mocha-standard-iii-cheese-mold-standard-with-o Archeus]] ** Actual Size by Edward Ruscha [[https://www.wikiart.org/en/edward-ruscha/actual-size-1962 WikiArt]] * Mel Bochner [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mel_Bochner Wikipedia]] * Jean-Michel Basquiat [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean-Michel_Basquiat Wikipedia]] * Edward Kienholz [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_Kienholz Wikipedia]] * Dan Graham [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dan_Graham Wikipedia]] * Robert Morris (artist) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Morris_(artist) Wikipedia]] * On Kawara [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_Kawara Wikipedia]] * Bruce Nauman [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bruce_Nauman Wikipedia]] * Chris Burden [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chris_Burden Wikipedia]] * Vito Acconci [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vito_Acconci Wikipedia]] * George Brecht [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Brecht Wikipedia]] * John Cage [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Cage Wikipedia]] * Marcel Broodthaers [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marcel_Broodthaers Wikipedia]] * Barbara Kruger [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barbara_Kruger Wikipedia]] * Art & Language [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Art_%26_Language Wikipedia]] ** Terry Atkinson [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terry_Atkinson Wikipedia]] ** Michael Baldwin [[https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artists/art-language-16838 Tate]] [[https://www.moma.org/artists/21325 MoMA]] ** David Bainbridge [[https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artists/art-language-17138 Tate]] ** Harold Hurrell [[https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artists/art-language-16245 Tate]] ** Charles Townsend Harrison [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Townsend_Harrison Wikipedia]] ** Joseph Kosuth [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_Kosuth Wikipedia]] *** One and Three Chairs by Joseph Kosuth [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/One_and_Three_Chairs Wikipedia]] *** Texts (Waiting for-) for Nothing by Joseph Kosuth [[https://www.skny.com/exhibitions/joseph-kosuth3 Sean Kelly Gallery]] ** Art and & language, hostages XXV - LXXVI by Christian Schlatter David Batchelor [[https://www.librarything.com/work/22244074 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:BookSources?isbn=9780947830243 Wikipedia Book Sources]] * Daniel Buren [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daniel_Buren Wikipedia]] * Joseph Beuys [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_Beuys Wikipedia]] ** How to Explain Pictures to a Dead Hare by Joseph Beuys [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/How_to_Explain_Pictures_to_a_Dead_Hare Wikipedia]] * The Bride Stripped Bare by Her Bachelors, Even by Marcel Duchamp [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Bride_Stripped_Bare_by_Her_Bachelors,_Even Wikipedia]] * Laurie Anderson [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laurie_Anderson Wikipedia]] * Jonathan Borofsky [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jonathan_Borofsky Wikipedia]] * Ann Hamilton (artist) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ann_Hamilton_(artist) Wikipedia]] ** Tropos by Ann Hamilton [[https://www.annhamiltonstudio.com/objects/tropos_books.html Ann Hamilton Studio]] ** Lineament by Ann Hamilton [[https://www.annhamiltonstudio.com/objects/lineament_bookball.html Ann Hamilton Studio]] ** Mercy by Ann Hamilton [[https://www.annhamiltonstudio.com/projects/mercy.html Ann Hamilton Studio]] ** VERSE by Ann Hamilton [[http://www.annhamiltonstudio.com/public/verse.html Ann Hamilton Studio]] * Lawrence Weiner [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lawrence_Weiner Wikipedia]] * Douglas Huebler [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Douglas_Huebler Wikipedia]] * Robert Barry (artist) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Barry_(artist) Wikipedia]] * Robert Smithson [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Smithson Wikipedia]] ** Spiral Jetty by Robert Smithson [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spiral_Jetty Wikipedia]] [[https://www.wikiart.org/en/robert-smithson/spiral-jetty-1970 WikiArt]] ** A Heap of Language by Robert Smithson [[https://www.moma.org/collection/works/149054 MoMA]] [[https://www.robertsmithson.com/essays/heap.htm Robert Smithson]] ** "Strata, a Geophotographic Fiction," Robert Smithson: The Collected Writings by Robert Smithson [[https://www.librarything.com/work/61528 LibraryThing]] ** "A Sedimentation of the Mind: Earth Proposals," Robert Smithson: The Collected Writings by Robert Smithson [[https://www.librarything.com/work/61528 LibraryThing]] * Jenny Holzer [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jenny_Holzer Wikipedia]] ** Truisms by Jenny Holzer [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Truisms_(Jenny_Holzer) Wikipedia]] ** Jenny Holzer: Laments by Jenny Holzer [[https://www.librarything.com/work/3339875 LibraryThing]] [[https://www.diaart.org/program/exhibitions-projects/jenny-holzer-laments-exhibition Dia]] ** Jenny Holzer: Lustmord by Jenny Holzer [[https://www.librarything.com/work/3338682 LibraryThing]] [[https://wellcomecollection.org/articles/WqfvayUAAKsrVreh Wellcome Collection]] ** Under a Rock: Crack the Pelvis by Jenny Holzer [[http://www.colby.edu/museum/?s=under%20a%20rock&obj=Obj220?sid=1079&x=24931 Colby College Museum of Art]] ** Jenny Holzer: Truth Before Power by Henri Cole [[https://www.librarything.com/work/3338740 LibraryThing]] ** Jenny Holzer Projections [[http://www.jennyholzer.com/Projections/list.php Jenny Holzer]] [[https://www.newyorker.com/books/page-turner/light-as-touch-jenny-holzers-nighttime-poetry-projections The New Yorker]] ** Elizabeth Bishop granite benches by Jenny Holzer [[http://info.vassar.edu/news/2005-2006/060505-jenny-holzers.html Vassar College]] ==== Literary inauthenticity ==== * RCEL Chapter 25: "Hoax-poetry and inauthenticity" by Philip Mead ===== Classical ===== * The Rowley Poems by Thomas Chatterton [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2002159 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Chatterton Thomas Chatterton - Wikipedia]] * The poems of Ossian by James MacPherson [[https://www.librarything.com/work/422650 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Macpherson James Macpherson - Wikipedia]] * Kalevala by Elias Lönnrot [[https://www.librarything.com/work/158724 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kalevala Wikipedia]] * The Tablets by Armand Schwerner [[https://www.librarything.com/work/335430 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Armand_Schwerner Armand Schwerner - Wikipedia]] ===== Modern ===== * A Million Little Pieces by James Frey [[https://www.librarything.com/work/444 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Million_Little_Pieces Wikipedia]] * Angel at the Fence: The True Story of a Love that Survived by Herman Rosenblat [[https://www.librarything.com/work/6304567 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angel_at_the_Fence Wikipedia]] * Fragments: Memories of a Wartime Childhood by Binjamin Wilkomirski [[https://www.librarything.com/work/188668 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Binjamin_Wilkomirski Binjamin Wilkomirski - Wikipedia]] * Down the Road, Worlds Away by Rahila Khan [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1737627 LibraryThing]] [[https://www.lrb.co.uk/v10/n03/toby-forward/diary Diary - Toby Forward - London Review of Books]] * The Hand That Signed The Paper by Helen Darville [[https://www.librarything.com/work/336438 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helen_Dale Helen Dale - Wikipedia]] * B. Wongar [[https://www.librarything.com/author/wongarb LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/B._Wongar Wikipedia]] [[http://sf-encyclopedia.com/entry/wongar_b Science Fiction Encyclopedia]] * My own sweet time by Wanda Koolmatrie [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1908840 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leon_Carmen Leon Carmen - Wikipedia]] * Honor Lost: Love and Death in Modern-Day Jordan by Norma Khouri [[https://www.librarything.com/work/245918 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Forbidden_Love_(novel) Wikipedia]] * The darkening ecliptic by Ern Malley [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4591077 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ern_Malley Ern Malley - Wikipedia]] * Araki Yasusada [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Araki_Yasusada Wikipedia]] [[https://hereshebe.wordpress.com/2008/09/29/on-the-araki-yasusada-hoax/ On the Araki Yasusada Hoax - Here She Be — The Battlements]] ** Doubled Flowering: From the Notebooks of Araki Yasusada by Araki Yasusada [[https://www.librarything.com/work/515083 LibraryThing]] ** Also, With My Throat, I Shall Swallow Ten Thousand Swords: Araki Yasusada's Letters in English by Tosa Motokiyu [[https://www.librarything.com/work/515079 LibraryThing]] ===== Post-hoax ===== * Fernando Pessoa [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fernando_Pessoa Wikipedia]] * Ecopoetry: a critical introduction by Scott Bryson [[https://www.librarything.com/work/129941 LibraryThing]] * Women and ecopoetics: an introduction in context by Harriet Tarlo [[https://www.asu.edu/pipercwcenter/how2journal/vol_3_no_2/ecopoetics/introstatements/tarlo_intro.html full text - HOW2]] * ecopoetics [[https://ecopoetics.wordpress.com/ full text - ecopoetics]] * Media Poetry: An International Anthology by Eduardo Kac [[https://www.librarything.com/work/5074311 LibraryThing]] * Flarf [[http://mainstreampoetry.blogspot.com/ full text - Flarf]] === Experiments with narrative and fiction === ==== Unnatural narration ==== * RCEL Chapter 26: "Unnatural voices, minds, and narration" by Jan Alber, Henrik Skov Nielsen, and Brian Richardson ===== Impossibly informed narrator ===== * Virginie: Her Two Lives by John Hawkes [[https://www.librarything.com/work/121280 LibraryThing]] * Travesties by Tom Stoppard [[https://www.librarything.com/work/27223 LibraryThing]] * Midnight's Children by Salman Rushdie [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2118 LibraryThing]] * In Search of Lost Time by Marcel Proust [[https://www.librarything.com/work/23844 LibraryThing]] * The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2964 LibraryThing]] * Moby Dick by Herman Melville [[https://www.librarything.com/work/15540 LibraryThing]] * Ulysses by James Joyce [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8520 LibraryThing]] ===== Impossibly confused narrator ===== * Molloy by Samuel Beckett [[https://www.librarything.com/work/56659 LibraryThing]] * In the Labyrinth by Alain Robbe-Grillet [[https://www.librarything.com/work/319705 LibraryThing]] * "You Are As Brave As Vincent Van Gogh," Flying to America: 45 More Stories by Donald Barthelme [[https://www.librarything.com/work/3397639 LibraryThing]] ===== Non-human narrator ===== * Kew Gardens by Virginia Woolf [[https://www.librarything.com/work/891578 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kew_Gardens_(short_story) Wikipedia]] * "The House of Asterion," The Aleph and Other Stories by Jorge Luis Borges [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1443832 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_House_of_Asterion Wikipedia]] * "Jealous Husband Returns in Form of Parrot," Tabloid Dreams: Stories by Robert Olen Butler [[https://www.librarything.com/work/150283 LibraryThing]] * Doctor Rat by William Kotzwinkle [[https://www.librarything.com/work/93750 LibraryThing]] * "My Life As a West African Gray Parrot," The Left-Handed Marriage: Stories by Leigh Buchanan Bienen [[https://www.librarything.com/work/3769284 LibraryThing]] * Shakespeare's Dog by Leon Rooke [[https://www.librarything.com/work/203121 LibraryThing]] * "The Stowaway," A History of the World in 10½ Chapters by Julian Barnes [[http://www.librarything.com/work/7133 LibraryThing]] * Sweet William: A Memoir of Old Horse by John Hawkes [[https://www.librarything.com/work/216641 LibraryThing]] * Firmin by Sam Savage [[https://www.librarything.com/work/922702 LibraryThing]] * Timbuktu by Paul Auster [[https://www.librarything.com/work/27521 LibraryThing]] ===== Dead narrator ===== * Pedro Páramo by Juan Rulfo [[https://www.librarything.com/work/84285 LibraryThing]] * Pincher Martin by William Golding [[https://www.librarything.com/work/286280 LibraryThing]] * The Third Policeman by Flann O'Brien [[https://www.librarything.com/work/7104 LibraryThing]] * "Terra Incognita," A Russian Beauty and Other Stories by Vladimir Nabokov [[https://www.librarything.com/work/224314 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terra_Incognita_(short_story) Wikipedia]] * Transparent Things by Vladimir Nabokov [[https://www.librarything.com/work/51102 LibraryThing]] * Murther and Walking Spirits by Robertson Davies [[https://www.librarything.com/work/73673 LibraryThing]] * American Desert by Percival Everett [[https://www.librarything.com/work/238787 LibraryThing]] * My Name is Red by Orhan Pamuk [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2744 LibraryThing]] * Hotel World by Ali Smith [[https://www.librarything.com/work/19451 LibraryThing]] * Destiny and Desire by Carlos Fuentes [[https://www.librarything.com/work/6516575 LibraryThing]] * The Book Thief by Markus Zusak [[https://www.librarything.com/work/393681 LibraryThing]] * "The Calmative," Stories and Texts for Nothing by Samuel Beckett [[https://www.librarything.com/work/3398 LibraryThing]] * The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4931 LibraryThing]] ===== Focalization technology ===== * "The Aleph," The Aleph and Other Stories by Jorge Luis Borges [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1443832 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Aleph_(short_story) Wikipedia]] * Neuromancer by William Gibson [[https://www.librarything.com/work/609 LibraryThing]] ===== First-person plural ===== * "A Rose for Emily" by William Faulkner, American Gothic Tales by Joyce Carol Oates [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8038219 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Rose_for_Emily Wikipedia]] * 12 Million Black Voices by Richard Wright [[https://www.librarything.com/work/666218 LibraryThing]] * Two Thousand Seasons by Ayi Kwei Armah [[https://www.librarything.com/work/77062 LibraryThing]] * You Don't Love Yourself by Nathalie Sarraute [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2374617 LibraryThing]] ===== Second-person ===== * A Pagan Place by Edna O'Brien [[https://www.librarything.com/work/218163 LibraryThing]] * "How," Self-help by Lorrie Moore [[http://www.librarything.com/work/35303 LibraryThing]] * If on a Winter's Night a Traveler by Italo Calvino [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4091153 LibraryThing]] ===== Third-person singular impersonal ===== * The Radetzky March by Joseph Roth [[https://www.librarything.com/work/10159 LibraryThing]] * The opoponax by Monique Wittig [[https://www.librarything.com/work/257236 LibraryThing]] ===== Third-person plural ===== * Things: A Story of the Sixties by Georges Perec [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1197807 LibraryThing]] * Flower Children by Maxine Swann [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2375201 LibraryThing]] ===== Gender-neutral pronouns ===== * The Cook and The Carpenter by June Arnold [[https://www.librarything.com/work/736228 LibraryThing]] ===== Pronouns omitted ===== * "Dead Doll Humility" by Kathy Acker, The Making of the American Essay (A New History of the Essay) by John D'Agata [[https://www.librarything.com/work/17216549 LibraryThing]] ===== Multiple points of view ===== * "The Cubs," The Cubs and Other Stories by Mario Vargas Llosa [[https://www.librarything.com/work/17905949 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Los_Cachorros Wikipedia]] * The Death of Artemio Cruz by Carlos Fuentes [[https://www.librarything.com/work/18213 LibraryThing]] * Maps by Nuruddin Farah [[https://www.librarything.com/work/70403 LibraryThing]] * Compact by Maurice Roche [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1287065 LibraryThing]] ===== Merged narrators ===== * Monsieur Levert by Robert Pinget [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1170050 LibraryThing]] * "13," Stories and Texts for Nothing by Samuel Beckett [[https://www.librarything.com/work/3398 LibraryThing]] * The Unnamable by Samuel Beckett [[https://www.librarything.com/work/276374 LibraryThing]] * Glamorama by Bret Easton Ellis [[https://www.librarything.com/work/7545 LibraryThing]] ===== Anachronism ===== * Flight to Canada by Ishmael Reed [[https://www.librarything.com/work/35987 LibraryThing]] ===== Mid-narrative editing ===== * Worstward Ho by Samuel Beckett [[https://www.librarything.com/work/782565 LibraryThing]] ==== Impossible worlds ==== * RCEL Chapter 27: "Impossible worlds" by Marie-Laure Ryan ===== Contradictions ===== * In the Labyrinth by Alain Robbe-Grillet [[https://www.librarything.com/work/319705 LibraryThing]] * The French Lieutenant's Woman by John Fowles [[https://www.librarything.com/work/6923 LibraryThing]] * "The Babysitter," Pricksongs & Descants: Fictions by Robert Coover [[https://www.librarything.com/work/271307 LibraryThing]] * The Libera Me Domine by Robert Pinget [[https://www.librarything.com/work/478922 LibraryThing]] * "Here We Aren’t, So Quickly" by Jonathan Safran Foer, 20 Under 40: Stories from The New Yorker by Deborah Treisman [[https://www.librarything.com/work/10491291 LibraryThing]] [[https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2010/06/14/here-we-arent-so-quickly full text - The New Yorker]] * "A Country Doctor," A Country Doctor: Short Stories by Franz Kafka [[https://www.librarything.com/work/195671 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Country_Doctor_(short_story) Wikipedia]] ===== Ontological impossibility ===== * Pleasantville [1998 film] by Gary Ross [[https://www.librarything.com/work/3510622 LibraryThing]] * "Continuity of Parks," Blow-up and Other Stories by Julio Cortázar [[https://www.librarything.com/work/9057461 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Continuidad_de_los_parques Wikipedia]] * Jasper Fforde [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jasper_Fforde Wikipedia]] * The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen omnibus by Alan Moore [[https://www.librarything.com/work/11388754 LibraryThing]] ===== Impossible space ===== * Mark Z. Danielewski's House of leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1488 LibraryThing]] * Alice's Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8288 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alice%27s_Adventures_in_Wonderland Wikipedia]] ===== Impossible time ===== * Counter-Clock World by Philip K. Dick [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1309466 LibraryThing]] * Time's Arrow, or The Nature of the Offence by Martin Amis [[https://www.librarything.com/work/11900 LibraryThing]] * The Mustache by Emmanuel Carrère [[https://www.librarything.com/work/529866 LibraryThing]] ===== Impossible texts ===== * "The Book of Sand," The Book of Sand by Jorge Luis Borges [[http://www.librarything.com/work/467534 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Book_of_Sand Wikipedia]] * One Thousand and One Nights [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/One_Thousand_and_One_Nights Wikipedia]] * "The Garden of Forking Paths," Labyrinths; Selected stories & other writings by Jorge Luis Borges [[https://www.librarything.com/work/607 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Garden_of_Forking_Paths Wikipedia]] ==== Experimental life writing ==== * RCEL Chapter 28: "Experimental life writing" by Irene Kacandes ===== Time ===== * Stuart: A Life Backwards by Alexander Masters [[https://www.librarything.com/work/93508 LibraryThing]] * One Day a Year: 1960 - 2000 by Christa Wolf [[https://www.librarything.com/work/466217 LibraryThing]] ===== Medium ===== * The Complete Maus by Art Spiegelman [[https://www.librarything.com/work/6046618 LibraryThing]] * The Complete Persepolis by Marjane Satrapi [[https://www.librarything.com/work/6392056 LibraryThing]] * Fun Home: A Family Tragicomic by Alison Bechdel [[https://www.librarything.com/work/627079 LibraryThing]] * 1941-45: a teenager's war: Crete, captivity, liberation by Frederick V. Carabott [[https://www.worldcat.org/title/1941-45-ho-polemos-henos-ephebou-krete-aichmalosia-apeleutherosis-1941-45-a-teenagers-war-crete-captivity-liberation-1941-45-der-krieg-eines-jugendlichen-kreta-gefangenschaft-befreiung/oclc/48228994 WorldCat.org]] * Running in the Family by Michael Ondaatje [[https://www.librarything.com/work/27962 LibraryThing]] * Zami: a New Spelling of My Name by Audre Lorde [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8116 LibraryThing]] * A heartbreaking work of staggering genius by Dave Eggers [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2294 LibraryThing]] * Encyclopedia of an Ordinary Life by Amy Krouse Rosenthal [[https://www.librarything.com/work/35433 LibraryThing]] * The Suicide Index: Putting My Father's Death in Order by Joan Wickersham [[https://www.librarything.com/work/5248942 LibraryThing]] ===== The relational ===== * The Search Warrant by Patrick Modiano [[https://www.librarything.com/work/331076 LibraryThing]] * Ein Kapitel aus meinem Leben by Barbara Honigmann [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4500497 LibraryThing]] * After Long Silence by Helen Fremont [[https://www.librarything.com/work/13147 LibraryThing]] ===== The work's focus ===== * Patterns of Childhood by Christa Wolf [[https://www.librarything.com/work/700778 LibraryThing]] * Boyhood: Scenes from Provincial Life by J. M. Coetzee [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8660368 LibraryThing]] * Youth by J. M. Coetzee [[https://www.librarything.com/work/105432 LibraryThing]] * Summertime: Scenes from Provincial Life by J. M. Coetzee [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8494635 LibraryThing]] * Roland Barthes by Roland Barthes [[https://www.librarything.com/work/592881 LibraryThing]] * W, or The Memory of Childhood by Georges Perec [[https://www.librarything.com/work/39076 LibraryThing]] ===== Multiple techniques ===== * Daddy's War: Greek American Stories by Irene Kacandes [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8797694 LibraryThing]] ==== Experimental genre fiction ==== * RCEL Chapter 29: "'Rotting time': Genre fiction and the avant-garde" by Elana Gomel ===== Fantasy ===== * Iron Council by China Miéville [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4813 LibraryThing]] * Vellum: The Book of All Hours by Hal Duncan [[https://www.librarything.com/work/47894 LibraryThing]] * Ink: The Book of All Hours by Hal Duncan [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1162726 LibraryThing]] ===== Science fiction ===== * Iain Banks [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iain_Banks Wikipedia]] * Stephen Baxter (author) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephen_Baxter_(author) Wikipedia]] * Paul Park [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Park Wikipedia]] * Century Rain by Alastair Reynolds [[https://www.librarything.com/work/48231 LibraryThing]] * Blindsight by Peter Watts [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1333265 LibraryThing]] ===== Horror ===== * Books of Blood | Series [[https://www.librarything.com/series/Books+of+Blood LibraryThing]] * Neverwhere: The Author's Preferred Text by Neil Gaiman [[https://www.librarything.com/work/14623622 LibraryThing]] * Mark Z. Danielewski's House of leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1488 LibraryThing]] * The Everlasting by Tim Lebbon [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2811046 LibraryThing]] === Experiments with form and design === ==== Experimental comics ==== * RCEL Chapter 30: "Graphic narrative" by Hillary Chute * Alternative comics [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alternative_comics Wikipedia]] ===== Early twentieth century ===== * Little Nemo [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Little_Nemo Wikipedia]] * Wordless novel [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wordless_novel Wikipedia]] ** Vertigo by Lynd Ward [[https://www.librarything.com/work/334743 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vertigo_(wordless_novel) Wikipedia]] ** Frans Masereel [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frans_Masereel Wikipedia]] ** Otto Nückel [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Otto_N%C3%BCckel Wikipedia]] ** Giacomo Patri [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Giacomo_Patri Wikipedia]] ===== Late twentieth century ===== * Mad (magazine) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mad_(magazine) Wikipedia]] * Underground comix [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Underground_comix Wikipedia]] ** Robert Crumb [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Crumb Wikipedia]] *** Zap Comix [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zap_Comix Wikipedia]] *** Weirdo (comics) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weirdo_(comics) Wikipedia]] ** Art Spiegelman [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Art_Spiegelman Wikipedia]] *** Breakdowns: Portrait of the Artist as a Young %@&amp;amp;*! by Art Spiegelman [[https://www.librarything.com/work/5655445 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Breakdowns_(comics) Wikipedia]] *** Raw (magazine) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raw_(magazine) Wikipedia]] ** Here by Richard McGuire [[https://www.librarything.com/work/14952042 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Here_(comics) Wikipedia]] ** Binky Brown Meets the Holy Virgin Mary by Justin Green [[https://www.librarything.com/work/3275118 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Binky_Brown_Meets_the_Holy_Virgin_Mary Wikipedia]] ** Aline Kominsky-Crumb [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aline_Kominsky-Crumb Wikipedia]] ===== Twenty-first century ===== * PictureBox [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PictureBox Wikipedia]] * In the Shadow of No Towers by Art Spiegelman [[https://www.librarything.com/work/7016 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/In_the_Shadow_of_No_Towers Wikipedia]] * Chris Ware [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chris_Ware Wikipedia]] ** Jimmy Corrigan : the smartest kid on earth by Chris Ware [[https://www.librarything.com/work/7614 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jimmy_Corrigan,_the_Smartest_Kid_on_Earth Wikipedia]] ** Unmasked [[https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2009/11/02/unmasked-4 The New Yorker]] * Alison Bechdel [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alison_Bechdel Wikipedia]] * Joe Sacco [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joe_Sacco Wikipedia]] * Lynda Barry [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lynda_Barry Wikipedia]] ** What It Is by Lynda Barry [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4598224 LibraryThing]] ** Picture This: The Near-sighted Monkey Book by Lynda Barry [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8906129 LibraryThing]] * Jason Shiga [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jason_Shiga Wikipedia]] * 365 Days: A Diary by Julie Doucet by Julie Doucet [[https://www.librarything.com/work/3471751 LibraryThing]] * Abstract comics [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abstract_comics Wikipedia]] ** Abstract Comics: The Anthology by Andrei Molotiu [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8785206 LibraryThing]] [[http://abstractcomics.blogspot.com/ Abstract Comics: The Blog]] ==== Multimodal literature ==== * RCEL Chapter 31: "Multimodal literature and experimentation" by Alison Gibbons * Liberature [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberature Wikipedia]] ==== Information design ==== * RCEL Chapter 32: "Information design, emergent culture and experimental form in the novel" by Steve Tomasula * Exercises in Style by Raymond Queneau [[https://www.librarything.com/work/39048 LibraryThing]] * Double or Nothing by Raymond Federman [[https://www.librarything.com/work/151208 LibraryThing]] * The Gettysburg Powerpoint Presentation by Peter Norvig [[https://norvig.com/Gettysburg/ full text]] * Europeana: A Brief History of the Twentieth Century by Patrik Ouředník [[https://www.librarything.com/work/179330 LibraryThing]] * 2666 by Roberto Bolaño [[https://www.librarything.com/work/996213 LibraryThing]] ==== Interactive fiction ==== * RCEL Chapter 33: "Interactive fiction" by N. Katherine Hayles And Nick Montfort * Interactive fiction [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interactive_fiction Wikipedia]] == Experiment now: beyond the page == === The digital age === ==== Digital fiction ==== * RCEL Chapter 34: "Digital fiction: Networked narratives" by David Ciccoricco * Storyspace [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Storyspace Wikipedia]] [[http://www.digitalhumanities.org/dhq/vol/6/2/000128/000128.html Machine Enhanced (Re)minding: the Development of Storyspace - Digital Humanities Quarterly]] [[http://dtc-wsuv.org/wp/ell/2017/10/28/untangling-threads-in-the-maze/ Untangling Threads in the Labyrinth – Electronic Literature Lab]] * Click by John Barth [[https://elmcip.net/node/1991 ELMCIP]] * The Glass Snail: a Pre-Christmas Tale by Milorad Pavić [[https://elmcip.net/node/1080 ELMCIP]] * 10:01 by Lance Olsen [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1139235 LibraryThing]] [[https://elmcip.net/node/1356 ELMCIP]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/10:01 Wikipedia]] * TOC: A New Media Novel by Steve Tomasula [[https://www.librarything.com/work/9462724 LibraryThing]] [[https://elmcip.net/node/835 ELMCIP]] * The LiveJournal of Zachary Marsh by Matthew Baldwin [[https://elmcip.net/node/13635 ELMCIP]] [[https://themorningnews.org/article/the-livejournal-of-zachary-marsh full text - The Morning News]] * A Million Penguins [[https://elmcip.net/node/6215 ELMCIP]] [[https://web.archive.org/web/20090803141129/http://www.amillionpenguins.com/wiki/index.php/Welcome full text - PenguinWiki]] [[https://www.researchgate.net/publication/228465833_A_million_penguins_research_report (PDF) A million penguins research report - ResearchGate]] [[https://www.theguardian.com/books/booksblog/2007/mar/12/livingwithamillionpenguins Living with A Million Penguins: inside the wiki-novel - The Guardian]] * Blue Company by Rob Wittig [[https://elmcip.net/node/368 ELMCIP]] [[http://robwit.net/?project=blue-company robwit.net]] * Deena Larsen [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deena_Larsen Wikipedia]] ** Marble Springs 1.0 by Deena Larsen [[https://elmcip.net/node/3231 ELMCIP]] ** Marble Springs 3.0 by Deena Larsen [[https://elmcip.net/node/4417 ELMCIP]] ** Disappearing Rain by Deena Larsen [[https://elmcip.net/node/759 ELMCIP]] * Judy Malloy [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Judy_Malloy Wikipedia]] * Uncle Buddy's Phantom Funhouse by John McDaid [[https://elmcip.net/node/519 ELMCIP]] [[http://dtc-wsuv.org/wp/pathfinders/authors-works/john-mcdaid-uncle-buddys-phantom-funhouse/ Pathfinders]] [[http://scalar.usc.edu/works/pathfinders/mcdaids-traversal John McDaid's Traversal - Pathfinders]] * Michael Joyce (writer) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Joyce_(writer) Wikipedia]] ** afternoon, a story by Michael Joyce [[https://elmcip.net/node/236 ELMCIP]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Afternoon,_a_story Wikipedia]] ** Twelve Blue by Michael Joyce [[https://elmcip.net/node/237 ELMCIP]] * I Have Said Nothing by J. Yellowlees Douglas [[https://elmcip.net/node/2063 ELMCIP]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I_Have_Said_Nothing Wikipedia]] * We Descend by Bill Bly [[http://scalar.usc.edu/works/pathfinders/bill-bly Pathfinders]] ** We Descend: Archives Pertaining to Edgerus Scriptor, Volume One [[https://elmcip.net/node/1101 ELMCIP]] ** We Descend: Archives Pertaining to Egderus Scriptor, Volume Two [[https://elmcip.net/node/4269 ELMCIP]] * Patchwork Girl by Shelley Jackson [[https://elmcip.net/node/239 ELMCIP]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patchwork_Girl_(hypertext) Wikipedia]] * Califia by M. D. Coverley [[https://elmcip.net/node/723 ELMCIP]] * Victory Garden by Stuart Moulthrop [[https://elmcip.net/node/352 ELMCIP]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Victory_Garden_(novel) Wikipedia]] * The Unknown by William Gillespie, Scott Rettberg, Dirk Stratton, and Frank Marquardt [[https://elmcip.net/node/662 ELMCIP]] * GRAMMATRON by Mark Amerika [[https://elmcip.net/node/581 ELMCIP]] * 253 by Geoff Ryman [[https://elmcip.net/node/7513 ELMCIP]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/253_(novel) Wikipedia]] * The Jew's Daughter by Judd Morrissey [[https://elmcip.net/node/78 ELMCIP]] * Erik Loyer [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erik_Loyer Wikipedia]] ** Chroma by Erik Loyer [[https://elmcip.net/node/1289 ELMCIP]] ** Lair of the Marrow Monkey by Erik Loyer [[https://elmcip.net/node/5067 ELMCIP]] * Shelley Jackson [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shelley_Jackson Wikipedia]] ** my body — a Wunderkammer by Shelley Jackson [[https://elmcip.net/node/793 ELMCIP]] * About Time by Rob Swigart [[https://elmcip.net/node/4112 ELMCIP]] * The Virtual Disappearance of Miriam by Andy Campbell and Martyn Bedford [[https://elmcip.net/node/1600 ELMCIP]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Virtual_Disappearance_of_Miriam Wikipedia]] * Varicella by Adam Cadre [[https://elmcip.net/node/7775 ELMCIP]] [[http://www.ifwiki.org/index.php/Varicella IFWiki]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Varicella_(video_game) Wikipedia]] * Ruth Nestvold [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ruth_Nestvold Wikipedia]] ** Joe's Heartbeat in Budapest by Ruth Nestvold [[http://www.lit-arts.net/JHIB/begin.htm full text - Lit-Arts.Net]] * 2002: A Palindrome Story in 2002 Words by Nick Montfort and William Gillespie [[https://elmcip.net/node/7962 ELMCIP]] ==== Code poetry and new-media literature ==== * RCEL Chapter 35: "Code poetry and new-media literature" by Steve Tomasula * Code poetry [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Code_poetry Wikipedia]] ==== Computer gaming ==== * RCEL Chapter 36: "Computer gaming" by Astrid Ensslin * Art game [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Art_game Wikipedia]] ==== Virtual autobiography ==== * RCEL Chapter 37: "Virtual autobiography: Autographies, interfaces, and avatars" by Amy J. Elias ===== Comic-based autobiography ===== * Autobiographical comics [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autobiographical_comics Wikipedia]] * How to Understand Israel in 60 Days or Less by Sarah Glidden [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8372743 LibraryThing]] * DAR: A Super Girly Top Secret Comic Diary by Erika Moen [[https://www.librarything.com/series/DAR LibraryThing]] [[https://www.darcomic.com/ DAR]] * Webcomics Nation Autobiographical/Slice-of-Life Directory [[https://web.archive.org/web/20150511003243/http://www.webcomicsnation.com/genre.php?genre=4 Webcomics Nation]] * Museum of Mistakes: The Fart Party Collection by Julia Wertz [[https://www.librarything.com/work/15401747 LibraryThing]] [[http://www.juliawertz.com/ Museum of Mistakes]] * my body — a Wunderkammer by Shelley Jackson [[http://collection.eliterature.org/1/works/jackson__my_body_a_wunderkammer.html full text - Electronic Literature Collection]] ===== Web-based autobiography ===== * My War: Killing Time in Iraq by Colby Buzzell [[https://www.librarything.com/work/220797 LibraryThing]] [[http://cbftw.blogspot.com/ cbftw]] * Vlog [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vlog Wikipedia]] * Life writing [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Life_writing Wikipedia]] ** Association pour l'Autobiographie et le Patrimoine Autobiographique [[http://www.qualitative-research.net/index.php/fqs/article/view/1739/3239 The Story of a French Life-Writing Archive - Forum: Qualitative Social Research]] * Oral history [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oral_history Wikipedia]] ** Mass-Observation [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mass-Observation Wikipedia]] ** American Social History Project [[https://ashp.cuny.edu/ Center for Media and Learning]] * DissemiNET [[https://web.archive.org/web/20010405012224/http://www.dissemi.net:80/ dissemi.net]] [[https://walkerart.org/collections/artists/stryker-beth-900809 Interview with Sawad Brooks + Beth Stryker - Walker Art Center]] * Recollecting Adams [[https://mariannerpetit.com/web-video-animations/2008-09-recollecting-adams/ full video - Marianne R. Petit]] ===== Avatar-based autobiography ===== * Cell phone novel [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cell_phone_novel Wikipedia]] [[http://itre.cis.upenn.edu/~myl/languagelog/archives/005332.html A million cellphone novels - Language Log]] * MMORPG [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Massively_multiplayer_online_role-playing_game Wikipedia]] * Virtual world [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virtual_world Wikipedia]] ** Second Life [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_Life Wikipedia]] == Planned updates == * Add links to the empty categories. * Add a description for each category. * Add authors and works for the categories that only have general links. * Add links from other sites. * Normalize the reference formatting. [[Category:Developing]] [[Category:Lists]] [[Category:Experimental Literature]] 0723a44f9dc1a385ceaa650a46a4c1ca8a8bbd3f 439 438 2019-04-28T08:48:36Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added a planned update for adding works to author-only sections. wikitext text/x-wiki == Introduction == This article is a list of links to authors, works, and categories in experimental literature. Its purpose is to give you a starting point for exploring works in this set of genres. I've based the list's organization on ''The Routledge Companion to Experimental Literature'' (RCEL), a collection of scholarly essays on the subject. This project is a work in progress. == How to use this list == If a category is well established in the field, I've linked to its Wikipedia article. If the author of the RCEL article was conducting their own survey of the category, I've listed the authors and works they cover with links to Wikipedia and LibraryThing wherever corresponding pages are available. I've also included links to a work's full text when that's available and links to background information from other sources. === Wikipedia === Wikipedia articles will give you background information on their subject, and they'll usually contain bibliographies that will point you to works related to that subject, such as works in the category or works by the author. === LibraryThing === LibraryThing is a social library catalog website that lets you catalog your collection. Here I'm using it for its recommendation features and its links to other sites. When you visit a work's LibraryThing page, you can find related works in the "LibraryThing Recommendations" section and the "Member recommendations" section. You can also click on the tags users have assigned to it. Each tag link takes you to a page for that tag, which lists other works that have been assigned it, as well as related tags, subjects, and tagmashes, which are combinations of tags. You can [https://wiki.librarything.com/index.php/HelpThing:Tagmash create your own tagmashes]. In the upper right sidebar of a work's LibraryThing page, you'll find links to its corresponding page on other catalog websites, such as Amazon, Google Books, and WorldCat, a shared catalog of physical libraries worldwide. These sites will often let you look through a preview of the book. They'll also give you ways to find other related works, usually by recommendations or subject links on the work's page. If you're logged in, you can edit this section to show links from a long list of other sites. == General == * Experimental literature [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Experimental_literature Wikipedia]] * Bray, Joe, Alison Gibbons, and Brian McHale, eds. ''The Routledge Companion to Experimental Literature''. Routledge Companions. London: Routledge, 2015. [[https://www.librarything.com/work/18336113 LibraryThing]] == The historical avant-gardes == === Modernist-era experimentalism === ==== Futurism ==== * RCEL Chapter 2: "Italian Futurism and Russian Cubo-Futurism" by John White * Futurism (literature) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Futurism_(literature) Wikipedia]] ==== Expressionism ==== * RCEL Chapter 3: "The poetics of animism: Realism and the fantastic in expressionist literature and film" by Richard Murphy * Expressionism [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Expressionism Wikipedia]] ==== Surrealism ==== * RCEL Chapter 4: "The surrealist experiments with language" by Peter Stockwell * Surrealism [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surrealism Wikipedia]] ==== Absurdism ==== * RCEL Chapter 5: "The literary absurd" by Joanna Gavins * Absurdist fiction [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Absurdist_fiction Wikipedia]] === Postmodernist experimentalism === ==== Postwar experimental poetry ==== * RCEL Chapter 6: "Spontaneity and improvisation in postwar experimental poetry" by Benjamin Lee * The New American Poetry 1945–1960 [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_New_American_Poetry_1945%E2%80%931960 Wikipedia]] ==== The ''nouveau roman'' and ''Tel Quel'' ==== * RCEL Chapter 7: "The ''nouveau roman'' and ''Tel Quel''" by Danielle Marx-Scouras * Nouveau roman [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nouveau_roman Wikipedia]] * Tel Quel [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tel_Quel Wikipedia]] ==== Lettrism and situationism ==== * RCEL Chapter 8: "Lettrism and situationism" by Tyrus Miller * Lettrism [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lettrism Wikipedia]] * Situationist International [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Situationist_International Wikipedia]] ==== OuLiPo and proceduralism ==== * RCEL Chapter 9: "OuLiPo and proceduralism" by Jan Baetens * Constrained writing [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constrained_writing Wikipedia]] * Oulipo [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oulipo Wikipedia]] ==== Metafiction ==== * RCEL Chapter 10: "Metafiction" by R. M. Berry * Metafiction [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metafiction Wikipedia]] ==== Postmodern literature ==== * RCEL Chapter 11: "Postmodernism and experiment" by Brian McHale * Postmodern literature [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Postmodern_literature Wikipedia]] === Experiments with identity === ==== Twentieth-century avant-garde women writers ==== * RCEL Chapter 12: "Sexing the text: Women’s avant-garde writing in the twentieth century" by Ellen G. Friedman * Kathy Acker [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kathy_Acker Wikipedia]] * Djuna Barnes [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Djuna_Barnes Wikipedia]] * Jane Bowles [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jane_Bowles Wikipedia]] * H.D. [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H.D. Wikipedia]] * Toni Morrison [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toni_Morrison Wikipedia]] * Bharati Mukherjee [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bharati_Mukherjee Wikipedia]] * Anaïs Nin [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ana%C3%AFs_Nin Wikipedia]] * Joyce Carol Oates [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joyce_Carol_Oates Wikipedia]] * Jean Rhys [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_Rhys Wikipedia]] * Dorothy Richardson [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dorothy_Richardson Wikipedia]] * Gertrude Stein [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gertrude_Stein Wikipedia]] * Virginia Woolf [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virginia_Woolf Wikipedia]] ==== Twentieth-century avant-garde African-American poets ==== * RCEL Chapter 13: "Experiments in black: African-American avant-garde poetics" by Aldon Lynn Nielsen * Russell Atkins [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russell_Atkins Wikipedia]] * Amiri Baraka [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amiri_Baraka Wikipedia]] * Jayne Cortez [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jayne_Cortez Wikipedia]] * Negro Digest [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Negro_Digest Wikipedia]] * Langston Hughes [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Langston_Hughes Wikipedia]] * Ted Joans [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ted_Joans Wikipedia]] * Percy Johnston [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Percy_Johnston Wikipedia]] * Bob Kaufman [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bob_Kaufman Wikipedia]] * Stephen Jonas [[https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems-and-poets/poets/detail/stephen-jonas Poetry Foundation]] * William Melvin Kelley [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Melvin_Kelley Wikipedia]] * Nathaniel Mackey [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nathaniel_Mackey Wikipedia]] * Clarence Major [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clarence_Major Wikipedia]] * Tracie Morris [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tracie_Morris Wikipedia]] * Harryette Mullen [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harryette_Mullen Wikipedia]] * Claudia Rankine [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Claudia_Rankine Wikipedia]] * Gil Scott-Heron [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gil_Scott-Heron Wikipedia]] * Lorenzo Thomas (poet) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lorenzo_Thomas_(poet) Wikipedia]] * Melvin B. Tolson [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Melvin_B._Tolson Wikipedia]] * Jean Toomer [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_Toomer Wikipedia]] * Umbra (poets) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Umbra_(poets) Wikipedia]] ==== Anglophone postcolonial poetry ==== * RCEL Chapter 14: "The limits of hybridity: Language and innovation in Anglophone postcolonial poetry" by Priyamvada Gopal * Postcolonial literature [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Postcolonial_literature Wikipedia]] * G. V. Desani [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G._V._Desani Wikipedia]] * Wilson Harris [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wilson_Harris Wikipedia]] * Dambudzo Marechera [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dambudzo_Marechera Wikipedia]] * Mudrooroo [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mudrooroo Wikipedia]] * Ben Okri [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ben_Okri Wikipedia]] * Salman Rushdie [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salman_Rushdie Wikipedia]] * Vikram Seth [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vikram_Seth Wikipedia]] * Wole Soyinka [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wole_Soyinka Wikipedia]] * Amos Tutuola [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amos_Tutuola Wikipedia]] * Derek Walcott [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Derek_Walcott Wikipedia]] === The new experimentalism === ==== Avant-Pop ==== * RCEL Chapter 15: "Avant-Pop" by Lance Olsen * Avant-Pop: Fiction for a Daydream Nation (Black Ice Books) by Larry McCaffery [[https://www.librarything.com/work/512144 LibraryThing]] * After Yesterday's Crash: The Avant-Pop Anthology by Larry McCaffery [[https://www.librarything.com/work/771064 LibraryThing]] * Tomas Alfredson [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tomas_Alfredson Wikipedia]] * Italo Calvino [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Italo_Calvino Wikipedia]] * David Clark [[https://elmcip.net/node/622 ELMCIP]] * Umberto Eco [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Umberto_Eco Wikipedia]] * Betrayed by Rita Hayworth by Manuel Puig [[https://www.librarything.com/work/128453 LibraryThing]] * Naked Lunch by William S. Burroughs [[https://www.librarything.com/work/5852 LibraryThing]] * Lost in the Funhouse by John Barth [[https://www.librarything.com/work/29286 LibraryThing]] * Industrial Poetics: Demo Tracks for a Mobile Culture (Contemp North American Poetry) by Joe Amato [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2881291 LibraryThing]] * Kenneth Goldsmith [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kenneth_Goldsmith Wikipedia]] * Robert Coover [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Coover Wikipedia]] * Angela Carter [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angela_Carter Wikipedia]] * Aimee Bender [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aimee_Bender Wikipedia]] * White Noise by Don DeLillo [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4953 LibraryThing]] * Gravity's Rainbow by Thomas Pynchon [[https://www.librarything.com/work/10088 LibraryThing]] * Mark Z. Danielewski's House of leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1488 LibraryThing]] * Europeana: A Brief History of the Twentieth Century by Patrik Ouředník [[https://www.librarything.com/work/179330 LibraryThing]] * Mark Leyner [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mark_Leyner Wikipedia]] * Traveling to Utopia: With a Brief History of the Technology by Young-Hae Chang Heavy Industries [[https://www.librarything.com/work/11864011 LibraryThing]] ==== Post-postmodernism ==== * RCEL Chapter 16: "Post-postmodernism" by Robert L. McLaughlin * Post-postmodernism [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Post-postmodernism Wikipedia]] ==== Globalization and transnationalism ==== * RCEL Chapter 17: "Globalization and transnationalism" by Liam Connell * Count Zero by William Gibson [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2445 LibraryThing]] * The Fountain at the Centre of the World by Robert Newman [[https://www.librarything.com/work/18226 LibraryThing]] * Tropic of Orange by Karen Tei Yamashita [[https://www.librarything.com/work/509798 LibraryThing]] * Mark Lombardi: Global Networks by Robert Hobbs [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1066 LibraryThing]] * JPod by Douglas Coupland [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1115072 LibraryThing]] * Looking for Headless by K. D. [[https://www.librarything.com/work/10578723 LibraryThing]] ==== Altermodernist fiction ==== * RCEL Chapter 18: "Altermodernist fiction" by Alison Gibbons * The Rings of Saturn by W. G. Sebald [[https://www.librarything.com/work/28135 LibraryThing]] * Erasmus is Late by Liam Gillick [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1319708 LibraryThing]] * Shanghai Dancing by Brian Castro [[https://www.librarything.com/work/581326 LibraryThing]] * The Islanders: An Introduction by Charles Avery [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8086723 LibraryThing]] * The One Facing Us: A Novel by Ronit Matalon [[https://www.librarything.com/work/643371 LibraryThing]] * Istanbul: Memories and the City by Orhan Pamuk [[https://www.librarything.com/work/100731 LibraryThing]] * Only Revolutions by Mark Z. Danielewski [[https://www.librarything.com/work/798583 LibraryThing]] * Headless by Goldin+Senneby [[https://web.archive.org/web/20180506182844/http://www.goldinsenneby.com/gs/?p=116 Goldin+Senneby]] [[http://rhizome.org/editorial/2009/feb/04/interview-with-goldinsenneby/ Interview with Goldin+Senneby - Rhizome]] [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tOGttCSUecM Angus Cameron lecture on Headless - YouTube]] * A Visit from the Goon Squad by Jennifer Egan [[https://www.librarything.com/work/9530166 LibraryThing]] * Open City by Teju Cole [[https://www.librarything.com/work/10577676 LibraryThing]] * Rana Dasgupta [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rana_Dasgupta Wikipedia]] ==== Manifestos and ''Ars Poetica'' ==== * RCEL Chapter 19: "Manifestos and ''Ars Poetica''" by Laura Winkiel * Manifesto [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manifesto Wikipedia]] * Ars Poetica (Horace) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ars_Poetica_(Horace) Wikipedia]] * Ars Poetica by Archibald MacLeish [[https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poetrymagazine/poems/17168/ars-poetica full text]] ==== Post-criticism ==== * RCEL Chapter 20: "Post-criticism: Conceptual takes" by Gregory L. Ulmer * Heuretics: The Logic of Invention by Gregory L. Ulmer [[https://www.librarything.com/work/173585 LibraryThing]] == Experiment now: printed matter == === Experiments with language === ==== Language poetry ==== * RCEL Chapter 21: "The expanded field of ''L=A=N=G=U=A=G=E''" by Charles Bernstein * Language poets [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Language_poets Wikipedia]] ==== Concrete poetry and prose ==== * RCEL Chapter 22: "Concrete poetry and prose" by Joe Bray * Concrete poetry [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Concrete_poetry Wikipedia]] ==== Found poetry and "uncreative writing" ==== * RCEL Chapter 23: "Found poetry, 'uncreative writing,' and the art of appropriation" by Andrew Epstein * Found poetry [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Found_poetry Wikipedia]] ==== Language art ==== * RCEL Chapter 24: "Words in visual art" by Jessica Prinz * Conceptual art [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conceptual_art Wikipedia]] * Performance art [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Performance_art Wikipedia]] * Edward Ruscha [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_Ruscha Wikipedia]] ** Standard Stations by Edward Ruscha [[https://www.archeus.com/artists/piece/ruscha-i-standard-station-ii-mocha-standard-iii-cheese-mold-standard-with-o Archeus]] ** Actual Size by Edward Ruscha [[https://www.wikiart.org/en/edward-ruscha/actual-size-1962 WikiArt]] * Mel Bochner [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mel_Bochner Wikipedia]] * Jean-Michel Basquiat [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean-Michel_Basquiat Wikipedia]] * Edward Kienholz [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_Kienholz Wikipedia]] * Dan Graham [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dan_Graham Wikipedia]] * Robert Morris (artist) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Morris_(artist) Wikipedia]] * On Kawara [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_Kawara Wikipedia]] * Bruce Nauman [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bruce_Nauman Wikipedia]] * Chris Burden [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chris_Burden Wikipedia]] * Vito Acconci [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vito_Acconci Wikipedia]] * George Brecht [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Brecht Wikipedia]] * John Cage [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Cage Wikipedia]] * Marcel Broodthaers [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marcel_Broodthaers Wikipedia]] * Barbara Kruger [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barbara_Kruger Wikipedia]] * Art & Language [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Art_%26_Language Wikipedia]] ** Terry Atkinson [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terry_Atkinson Wikipedia]] ** Michael Baldwin [[https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artists/art-language-16838 Tate]] [[https://www.moma.org/artists/21325 MoMA]] ** David Bainbridge [[https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artists/art-language-17138 Tate]] ** Harold Hurrell [[https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artists/art-language-16245 Tate]] ** Charles Townsend Harrison [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Townsend_Harrison Wikipedia]] ** Joseph Kosuth [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_Kosuth Wikipedia]] *** One and Three Chairs by Joseph Kosuth [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/One_and_Three_Chairs Wikipedia]] *** Texts (Waiting for-) for Nothing by Joseph Kosuth [[https://www.skny.com/exhibitions/joseph-kosuth3 Sean Kelly Gallery]] ** Art and & language, hostages XXV - LXXVI by Christian Schlatter David Batchelor [[https://www.librarything.com/work/22244074 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:BookSources?isbn=9780947830243 Wikipedia Book Sources]] * Daniel Buren [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daniel_Buren Wikipedia]] * Joseph Beuys [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_Beuys Wikipedia]] ** How to Explain Pictures to a Dead Hare by Joseph Beuys [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/How_to_Explain_Pictures_to_a_Dead_Hare Wikipedia]] * The Bride Stripped Bare by Her Bachelors, Even by Marcel Duchamp [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Bride_Stripped_Bare_by_Her_Bachelors,_Even Wikipedia]] * Laurie Anderson [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laurie_Anderson Wikipedia]] * Jonathan Borofsky [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jonathan_Borofsky Wikipedia]] * Ann Hamilton (artist) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ann_Hamilton_(artist) Wikipedia]] ** Tropos by Ann Hamilton [[https://www.annhamiltonstudio.com/objects/tropos_books.html Ann Hamilton Studio]] ** Lineament by Ann Hamilton [[https://www.annhamiltonstudio.com/objects/lineament_bookball.html Ann Hamilton Studio]] ** Mercy by Ann Hamilton [[https://www.annhamiltonstudio.com/projects/mercy.html Ann Hamilton Studio]] ** VERSE by Ann Hamilton [[http://www.annhamiltonstudio.com/public/verse.html Ann Hamilton Studio]] * Lawrence Weiner [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lawrence_Weiner Wikipedia]] * Douglas Huebler [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Douglas_Huebler Wikipedia]] * Robert Barry (artist) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Barry_(artist) Wikipedia]] * Robert Smithson [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Smithson Wikipedia]] ** Spiral Jetty by Robert Smithson [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spiral_Jetty Wikipedia]] [[https://www.wikiart.org/en/robert-smithson/spiral-jetty-1970 WikiArt]] ** A Heap of Language by Robert Smithson [[https://www.moma.org/collection/works/149054 MoMA]] [[https://www.robertsmithson.com/essays/heap.htm Robert Smithson]] ** "Strata, a Geophotographic Fiction," Robert Smithson: The Collected Writings by Robert Smithson [[https://www.librarything.com/work/61528 LibraryThing]] ** "A Sedimentation of the Mind: Earth Proposals," Robert Smithson: The Collected Writings by Robert Smithson [[https://www.librarything.com/work/61528 LibraryThing]] * Jenny Holzer [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jenny_Holzer Wikipedia]] ** Truisms by Jenny Holzer [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Truisms_(Jenny_Holzer) Wikipedia]] ** Jenny Holzer: Laments by Jenny Holzer [[https://www.librarything.com/work/3339875 LibraryThing]] [[https://www.diaart.org/program/exhibitions-projects/jenny-holzer-laments-exhibition Dia]] ** Jenny Holzer: Lustmord by Jenny Holzer [[https://www.librarything.com/work/3338682 LibraryThing]] [[https://wellcomecollection.org/articles/WqfvayUAAKsrVreh Wellcome Collection]] ** Under a Rock: Crack the Pelvis by Jenny Holzer [[http://www.colby.edu/museum/?s=under%20a%20rock&obj=Obj220?sid=1079&x=24931 Colby College Museum of Art]] ** Jenny Holzer: Truth Before Power by Henri Cole [[https://www.librarything.com/work/3338740 LibraryThing]] ** Jenny Holzer Projections [[http://www.jennyholzer.com/Projections/list.php Jenny Holzer]] [[https://www.newyorker.com/books/page-turner/light-as-touch-jenny-holzers-nighttime-poetry-projections The New Yorker]] ** Elizabeth Bishop granite benches by Jenny Holzer [[http://info.vassar.edu/news/2005-2006/060505-jenny-holzers.html Vassar College]] ==== Literary inauthenticity ==== * RCEL Chapter 25: "Hoax-poetry and inauthenticity" by Philip Mead ===== Classical ===== * The Rowley Poems by Thomas Chatterton [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2002159 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Chatterton Thomas Chatterton - Wikipedia]] * The poems of Ossian by James MacPherson [[https://www.librarything.com/work/422650 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Macpherson James Macpherson - Wikipedia]] * Kalevala by Elias Lönnrot [[https://www.librarything.com/work/158724 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kalevala Wikipedia]] * The Tablets by Armand Schwerner [[https://www.librarything.com/work/335430 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Armand_Schwerner Armand Schwerner - Wikipedia]] ===== Modern ===== * A Million Little Pieces by James Frey [[https://www.librarything.com/work/444 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Million_Little_Pieces Wikipedia]] * Angel at the Fence: The True Story of a Love that Survived by Herman Rosenblat [[https://www.librarything.com/work/6304567 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angel_at_the_Fence Wikipedia]] * Fragments: Memories of a Wartime Childhood by Binjamin Wilkomirski [[https://www.librarything.com/work/188668 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Binjamin_Wilkomirski Binjamin Wilkomirski - Wikipedia]] * Down the Road, Worlds Away by Rahila Khan [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1737627 LibraryThing]] [[https://www.lrb.co.uk/v10/n03/toby-forward/diary Diary - Toby Forward - London Review of Books]] * The Hand That Signed The Paper by Helen Darville [[https://www.librarything.com/work/336438 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helen_Dale Helen Dale - Wikipedia]] * B. Wongar [[https://www.librarything.com/author/wongarb LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/B._Wongar Wikipedia]] [[http://sf-encyclopedia.com/entry/wongar_b Science Fiction Encyclopedia]] * My own sweet time by Wanda Koolmatrie [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1908840 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leon_Carmen Leon Carmen - Wikipedia]] * Honor Lost: Love and Death in Modern-Day Jordan by Norma Khouri [[https://www.librarything.com/work/245918 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Forbidden_Love_(novel) Wikipedia]] * The darkening ecliptic by Ern Malley [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4591077 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ern_Malley Ern Malley - Wikipedia]] * Araki Yasusada [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Araki_Yasusada Wikipedia]] [[https://hereshebe.wordpress.com/2008/09/29/on-the-araki-yasusada-hoax/ On the Araki Yasusada Hoax - Here She Be — The Battlements]] ** Doubled Flowering: From the Notebooks of Araki Yasusada by Araki Yasusada [[https://www.librarything.com/work/515083 LibraryThing]] ** Also, With My Throat, I Shall Swallow Ten Thousand Swords: Araki Yasusada's Letters in English by Tosa Motokiyu [[https://www.librarything.com/work/515079 LibraryThing]] ===== Post-hoax ===== * Fernando Pessoa [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fernando_Pessoa Wikipedia]] * Ecopoetry: a critical introduction by Scott Bryson [[https://www.librarything.com/work/129941 LibraryThing]] * Women and ecopoetics: an introduction in context by Harriet Tarlo [[https://www.asu.edu/pipercwcenter/how2journal/vol_3_no_2/ecopoetics/introstatements/tarlo_intro.html full text - HOW2]] * ecopoetics [[https://ecopoetics.wordpress.com/ full text - ecopoetics]] * Media Poetry: An International Anthology by Eduardo Kac [[https://www.librarything.com/work/5074311 LibraryThing]] * Flarf [[http://mainstreampoetry.blogspot.com/ full text - Flarf]] === Experiments with narrative and fiction === ==== Unnatural narration ==== * RCEL Chapter 26: "Unnatural voices, minds, and narration" by Jan Alber, Henrik Skov Nielsen, and Brian Richardson ===== Impossibly informed narrator ===== * Virginie: Her Two Lives by John Hawkes [[https://www.librarything.com/work/121280 LibraryThing]] * Travesties by Tom Stoppard [[https://www.librarything.com/work/27223 LibraryThing]] * Midnight's Children by Salman Rushdie [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2118 LibraryThing]] * In Search of Lost Time by Marcel Proust [[https://www.librarything.com/work/23844 LibraryThing]] * The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2964 LibraryThing]] * Moby Dick by Herman Melville [[https://www.librarything.com/work/15540 LibraryThing]] * Ulysses by James Joyce [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8520 LibraryThing]] ===== Impossibly confused narrator ===== * Molloy by Samuel Beckett [[https://www.librarything.com/work/56659 LibraryThing]] * In the Labyrinth by Alain Robbe-Grillet [[https://www.librarything.com/work/319705 LibraryThing]] * "You Are As Brave As Vincent Van Gogh," Flying to America: 45 More Stories by Donald Barthelme [[https://www.librarything.com/work/3397639 LibraryThing]] ===== Non-human narrator ===== * Kew Gardens by Virginia Woolf [[https://www.librarything.com/work/891578 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kew_Gardens_(short_story) Wikipedia]] * "The House of Asterion," The Aleph and Other Stories by Jorge Luis Borges [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1443832 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_House_of_Asterion Wikipedia]] * "Jealous Husband Returns in Form of Parrot," Tabloid Dreams: Stories by Robert Olen Butler [[https://www.librarything.com/work/150283 LibraryThing]] * Doctor Rat by William Kotzwinkle [[https://www.librarything.com/work/93750 LibraryThing]] * "My Life As a West African Gray Parrot," The Left-Handed Marriage: Stories by Leigh Buchanan Bienen [[https://www.librarything.com/work/3769284 LibraryThing]] * Shakespeare's Dog by Leon Rooke [[https://www.librarything.com/work/203121 LibraryThing]] * "The Stowaway," A History of the World in 10½ Chapters by Julian Barnes [[http://www.librarything.com/work/7133 LibraryThing]] * Sweet William: A Memoir of Old Horse by John Hawkes [[https://www.librarything.com/work/216641 LibraryThing]] * Firmin by Sam Savage [[https://www.librarything.com/work/922702 LibraryThing]] * Timbuktu by Paul Auster [[https://www.librarything.com/work/27521 LibraryThing]] ===== Dead narrator ===== * Pedro Páramo by Juan Rulfo [[https://www.librarything.com/work/84285 LibraryThing]] * Pincher Martin by William Golding [[https://www.librarything.com/work/286280 LibraryThing]] * The Third Policeman by Flann O'Brien [[https://www.librarything.com/work/7104 LibraryThing]] * "Terra Incognita," A Russian Beauty and Other Stories by Vladimir Nabokov [[https://www.librarything.com/work/224314 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terra_Incognita_(short_story) Wikipedia]] * Transparent Things by Vladimir Nabokov [[https://www.librarything.com/work/51102 LibraryThing]] * Murther and Walking Spirits by Robertson Davies [[https://www.librarything.com/work/73673 LibraryThing]] * American Desert by Percival Everett [[https://www.librarything.com/work/238787 LibraryThing]] * My Name is Red by Orhan Pamuk [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2744 LibraryThing]] * Hotel World by Ali Smith [[https://www.librarything.com/work/19451 LibraryThing]] * Destiny and Desire by Carlos Fuentes [[https://www.librarything.com/work/6516575 LibraryThing]] * The Book Thief by Markus Zusak [[https://www.librarything.com/work/393681 LibraryThing]] * "The Calmative," Stories and Texts for Nothing by Samuel Beckett [[https://www.librarything.com/work/3398 LibraryThing]] * The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4931 LibraryThing]] ===== Focalization technology ===== * "The Aleph," The Aleph and Other Stories by Jorge Luis Borges [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1443832 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Aleph_(short_story) Wikipedia]] * Neuromancer by William Gibson [[https://www.librarything.com/work/609 LibraryThing]] ===== First-person plural ===== * "A Rose for Emily" by William Faulkner, American Gothic Tales by Joyce Carol Oates [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8038219 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Rose_for_Emily Wikipedia]] * 12 Million Black Voices by Richard Wright [[https://www.librarything.com/work/666218 LibraryThing]] * Two Thousand Seasons by Ayi Kwei Armah [[https://www.librarything.com/work/77062 LibraryThing]] * You Don't Love Yourself by Nathalie Sarraute [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2374617 LibraryThing]] ===== Second-person ===== * A Pagan Place by Edna O'Brien [[https://www.librarything.com/work/218163 LibraryThing]] * "How," Self-help by Lorrie Moore [[http://www.librarything.com/work/35303 LibraryThing]] * If on a Winter's Night a Traveler by Italo Calvino [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4091153 LibraryThing]] ===== Third-person singular impersonal ===== * The Radetzky March by Joseph Roth [[https://www.librarything.com/work/10159 LibraryThing]] * The opoponax by Monique Wittig [[https://www.librarything.com/work/257236 LibraryThing]] ===== Third-person plural ===== * Things: A Story of the Sixties by Georges Perec [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1197807 LibraryThing]] * Flower Children by Maxine Swann [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2375201 LibraryThing]] ===== Gender-neutral pronouns ===== * The Cook and The Carpenter by June Arnold [[https://www.librarything.com/work/736228 LibraryThing]] ===== Pronouns omitted ===== * "Dead Doll Humility" by Kathy Acker, The Making of the American Essay (A New History of the Essay) by John D'Agata [[https://www.librarything.com/work/17216549 LibraryThing]] ===== Multiple points of view ===== * "The Cubs," The Cubs and Other Stories by Mario Vargas Llosa [[https://www.librarything.com/work/17905949 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Los_Cachorros Wikipedia]] * The Death of Artemio Cruz by Carlos Fuentes [[https://www.librarything.com/work/18213 LibraryThing]] * Maps by Nuruddin Farah [[https://www.librarything.com/work/70403 LibraryThing]] * Compact by Maurice Roche [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1287065 LibraryThing]] ===== Merged narrators ===== * Monsieur Levert by Robert Pinget [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1170050 LibraryThing]] * "13," Stories and Texts for Nothing by Samuel Beckett [[https://www.librarything.com/work/3398 LibraryThing]] * The Unnamable by Samuel Beckett [[https://www.librarything.com/work/276374 LibraryThing]] * Glamorama by Bret Easton Ellis [[https://www.librarything.com/work/7545 LibraryThing]] ===== Anachronism ===== * Flight to Canada by Ishmael Reed [[https://www.librarything.com/work/35987 LibraryThing]] ===== Mid-narrative editing ===== * Worstward Ho by Samuel Beckett [[https://www.librarything.com/work/782565 LibraryThing]] ==== Impossible worlds ==== * RCEL Chapter 27: "Impossible worlds" by Marie-Laure Ryan ===== Contradictions ===== * In the Labyrinth by Alain Robbe-Grillet [[https://www.librarything.com/work/319705 LibraryThing]] * The French Lieutenant's Woman by John Fowles [[https://www.librarything.com/work/6923 LibraryThing]] * "The Babysitter," Pricksongs & Descants: Fictions by Robert Coover [[https://www.librarything.com/work/271307 LibraryThing]] * The Libera Me Domine by Robert Pinget [[https://www.librarything.com/work/478922 LibraryThing]] * "Here We Aren’t, So Quickly" by Jonathan Safran Foer, 20 Under 40: Stories from The New Yorker by Deborah Treisman [[https://www.librarything.com/work/10491291 LibraryThing]] [[https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2010/06/14/here-we-arent-so-quickly full text - The New Yorker]] * "A Country Doctor," A Country Doctor: Short Stories by Franz Kafka [[https://www.librarything.com/work/195671 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Country_Doctor_(short_story) Wikipedia]] ===== Ontological impossibility ===== * Pleasantville [1998 film] by Gary Ross [[https://www.librarything.com/work/3510622 LibraryThing]] * "Continuity of Parks," Blow-up and Other Stories by Julio Cortázar [[https://www.librarything.com/work/9057461 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Continuidad_de_los_parques Wikipedia]] * Jasper Fforde [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jasper_Fforde Wikipedia]] * The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen omnibus by Alan Moore [[https://www.librarything.com/work/11388754 LibraryThing]] ===== Impossible space ===== * Mark Z. Danielewski's House of leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1488 LibraryThing]] * Alice's Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8288 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alice%27s_Adventures_in_Wonderland Wikipedia]] ===== Impossible time ===== * Counter-Clock World by Philip K. Dick [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1309466 LibraryThing]] * Time's Arrow, or The Nature of the Offence by Martin Amis [[https://www.librarything.com/work/11900 LibraryThing]] * The Mustache by Emmanuel Carrère [[https://www.librarything.com/work/529866 LibraryThing]] ===== Impossible texts ===== * "The Book of Sand," The Book of Sand by Jorge Luis Borges [[http://www.librarything.com/work/467534 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Book_of_Sand Wikipedia]] * One Thousand and One Nights [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/One_Thousand_and_One_Nights Wikipedia]] * "The Garden of Forking Paths," Labyrinths; Selected stories & other writings by Jorge Luis Borges [[https://www.librarything.com/work/607 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Garden_of_Forking_Paths Wikipedia]] ==== Experimental life writing ==== * RCEL Chapter 28: "Experimental life writing" by Irene Kacandes ===== Time ===== * Stuart: A Life Backwards by Alexander Masters [[https://www.librarything.com/work/93508 LibraryThing]] * One Day a Year: 1960 - 2000 by Christa Wolf [[https://www.librarything.com/work/466217 LibraryThing]] ===== Medium ===== * The Complete Maus by Art Spiegelman [[https://www.librarything.com/work/6046618 LibraryThing]] * The Complete Persepolis by Marjane Satrapi [[https://www.librarything.com/work/6392056 LibraryThing]] * Fun Home: A Family Tragicomic by Alison Bechdel [[https://www.librarything.com/work/627079 LibraryThing]] * 1941-45: a teenager's war: Crete, captivity, liberation by Frederick V. Carabott [[https://www.worldcat.org/title/1941-45-ho-polemos-henos-ephebou-krete-aichmalosia-apeleutherosis-1941-45-a-teenagers-war-crete-captivity-liberation-1941-45-der-krieg-eines-jugendlichen-kreta-gefangenschaft-befreiung/oclc/48228994 WorldCat.org]] * Running in the Family by Michael Ondaatje [[https://www.librarything.com/work/27962 LibraryThing]] * Zami: a New Spelling of My Name by Audre Lorde [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8116 LibraryThing]] * A heartbreaking work of staggering genius by Dave Eggers [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2294 LibraryThing]] * Encyclopedia of an Ordinary Life by Amy Krouse Rosenthal [[https://www.librarything.com/work/35433 LibraryThing]] * The Suicide Index: Putting My Father's Death in Order by Joan Wickersham [[https://www.librarything.com/work/5248942 LibraryThing]] ===== The relational ===== * The Search Warrant by Patrick Modiano [[https://www.librarything.com/work/331076 LibraryThing]] * Ein Kapitel aus meinem Leben by Barbara Honigmann [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4500497 LibraryThing]] * After Long Silence by Helen Fremont [[https://www.librarything.com/work/13147 LibraryThing]] ===== The work's focus ===== * Patterns of Childhood by Christa Wolf [[https://www.librarything.com/work/700778 LibraryThing]] * Boyhood: Scenes from Provincial Life by J. M. Coetzee [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8660368 LibraryThing]] * Youth by J. M. Coetzee [[https://www.librarything.com/work/105432 LibraryThing]] * Summertime: Scenes from Provincial Life by J. M. Coetzee [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8494635 LibraryThing]] * Roland Barthes by Roland Barthes [[https://www.librarything.com/work/592881 LibraryThing]] * W, or The Memory of Childhood by Georges Perec [[https://www.librarything.com/work/39076 LibraryThing]] ===== Multiple techniques ===== * Daddy's War: Greek American Stories by Irene Kacandes [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8797694 LibraryThing]] ==== Experimental genre fiction ==== * RCEL Chapter 29: "'Rotting time': Genre fiction and the avant-garde" by Elana Gomel ===== Fantasy ===== * Iron Council by China Miéville [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4813 LibraryThing]] * Vellum: The Book of All Hours by Hal Duncan [[https://www.librarything.com/work/47894 LibraryThing]] * Ink: The Book of All Hours by Hal Duncan [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1162726 LibraryThing]] ===== Science fiction ===== * Iain Banks [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iain_Banks Wikipedia]] * Stephen Baxter (author) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephen_Baxter_(author) Wikipedia]] * Paul Park [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Park Wikipedia]] * Century Rain by Alastair Reynolds [[https://www.librarything.com/work/48231 LibraryThing]] * Blindsight by Peter Watts [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1333265 LibraryThing]] ===== Horror ===== * Books of Blood | Series [[https://www.librarything.com/series/Books+of+Blood LibraryThing]] * Neverwhere: The Author's Preferred Text by Neil Gaiman [[https://www.librarything.com/work/14623622 LibraryThing]] * Mark Z. Danielewski's House of leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1488 LibraryThing]] * The Everlasting by Tim Lebbon [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2811046 LibraryThing]] === Experiments with form and design === ==== Experimental comics ==== * RCEL Chapter 30: "Graphic narrative" by Hillary Chute * Alternative comics [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alternative_comics Wikipedia]] ===== Early twentieth century ===== * Little Nemo [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Little_Nemo Wikipedia]] * Wordless novel [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wordless_novel Wikipedia]] ** Vertigo by Lynd Ward [[https://www.librarything.com/work/334743 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vertigo_(wordless_novel) Wikipedia]] ** Frans Masereel [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frans_Masereel Wikipedia]] ** Otto Nückel [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Otto_N%C3%BCckel Wikipedia]] ** Giacomo Patri [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Giacomo_Patri Wikipedia]] ===== Late twentieth century ===== * Mad (magazine) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mad_(magazine) Wikipedia]] * Underground comix [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Underground_comix Wikipedia]] ** Robert Crumb [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Crumb Wikipedia]] *** Zap Comix [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zap_Comix Wikipedia]] *** Weirdo (comics) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weirdo_(comics) Wikipedia]] ** Art Spiegelman [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Art_Spiegelman Wikipedia]] *** Breakdowns: Portrait of the Artist as a Young %@&amp;amp;*! by Art Spiegelman [[https://www.librarything.com/work/5655445 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Breakdowns_(comics) Wikipedia]] *** Raw (magazine) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raw_(magazine) Wikipedia]] ** Here by Richard McGuire [[https://www.librarything.com/work/14952042 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Here_(comics) Wikipedia]] ** Binky Brown Meets the Holy Virgin Mary by Justin Green [[https://www.librarything.com/work/3275118 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Binky_Brown_Meets_the_Holy_Virgin_Mary Wikipedia]] ** Aline Kominsky-Crumb [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aline_Kominsky-Crumb Wikipedia]] ===== Twenty-first century ===== * PictureBox [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PictureBox Wikipedia]] * In the Shadow of No Towers by Art Spiegelman [[https://www.librarything.com/work/7016 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/In_the_Shadow_of_No_Towers Wikipedia]] * Chris Ware [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chris_Ware Wikipedia]] ** Jimmy Corrigan : the smartest kid on earth by Chris Ware [[https://www.librarything.com/work/7614 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jimmy_Corrigan,_the_Smartest_Kid_on_Earth Wikipedia]] ** Unmasked [[https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2009/11/02/unmasked-4 The New Yorker]] * Alison Bechdel [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alison_Bechdel Wikipedia]] * Joe Sacco [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joe_Sacco Wikipedia]] * Lynda Barry [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lynda_Barry Wikipedia]] ** What It Is by Lynda Barry [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4598224 LibraryThing]] ** Picture This: The Near-sighted Monkey Book by Lynda Barry [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8906129 LibraryThing]] * Jason Shiga [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jason_Shiga Wikipedia]] * 365 Days: A Diary by Julie Doucet by Julie Doucet [[https://www.librarything.com/work/3471751 LibraryThing]] * Abstract comics [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abstract_comics Wikipedia]] ** Abstract Comics: The Anthology by Andrei Molotiu [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8785206 LibraryThing]] [[http://abstractcomics.blogspot.com/ Abstract Comics: The Blog]] ==== Multimodal literature ==== * RCEL Chapter 31: "Multimodal literature and experimentation" by Alison Gibbons * Liberature [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberature Wikipedia]] ==== Information design ==== * RCEL Chapter 32: "Information design, emergent culture and experimental form in the novel" by Steve Tomasula * Exercises in Style by Raymond Queneau [[https://www.librarything.com/work/39048 LibraryThing]] * Double or Nothing by Raymond Federman [[https://www.librarything.com/work/151208 LibraryThing]] * The Gettysburg Powerpoint Presentation by Peter Norvig [[https://norvig.com/Gettysburg/ full text]] * Europeana: A Brief History of the Twentieth Century by Patrik Ouředník [[https://www.librarything.com/work/179330 LibraryThing]] * 2666 by Roberto Bolaño [[https://www.librarything.com/work/996213 LibraryThing]] ==== Interactive fiction ==== * RCEL Chapter 33: "Interactive fiction" by N. Katherine Hayles And Nick Montfort * Interactive fiction [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interactive_fiction Wikipedia]] == Experiment now: beyond the page == === The digital age === ==== Digital fiction ==== * RCEL Chapter 34: "Digital fiction: Networked narratives" by David Ciccoricco * Storyspace [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Storyspace Wikipedia]] [[http://www.digitalhumanities.org/dhq/vol/6/2/000128/000128.html Machine Enhanced (Re)minding: the Development of Storyspace - Digital Humanities Quarterly]] [[http://dtc-wsuv.org/wp/ell/2017/10/28/untangling-threads-in-the-maze/ Untangling Threads in the Labyrinth – Electronic Literature Lab]] * Click by John Barth [[https://elmcip.net/node/1991 ELMCIP]] * The Glass Snail: a Pre-Christmas Tale by Milorad Pavić [[https://elmcip.net/node/1080 ELMCIP]] * 10:01 by Lance Olsen [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1139235 LibraryThing]] [[https://elmcip.net/node/1356 ELMCIP]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/10:01 Wikipedia]] * TOC: A New Media Novel by Steve Tomasula [[https://www.librarything.com/work/9462724 LibraryThing]] [[https://elmcip.net/node/835 ELMCIP]] * The LiveJournal of Zachary Marsh by Matthew Baldwin [[https://elmcip.net/node/13635 ELMCIP]] [[https://themorningnews.org/article/the-livejournal-of-zachary-marsh full text - The Morning News]] * A Million Penguins [[https://elmcip.net/node/6215 ELMCIP]] [[https://web.archive.org/web/20090803141129/http://www.amillionpenguins.com/wiki/index.php/Welcome full text - PenguinWiki]] [[https://www.researchgate.net/publication/228465833_A_million_penguins_research_report (PDF) A million penguins research report - ResearchGate]] [[https://www.theguardian.com/books/booksblog/2007/mar/12/livingwithamillionpenguins Living with A Million Penguins: inside the wiki-novel - The Guardian]] * Blue Company by Rob Wittig [[https://elmcip.net/node/368 ELMCIP]] [[http://robwit.net/?project=blue-company robwit.net]] * Deena Larsen [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deena_Larsen Wikipedia]] ** Marble Springs 1.0 by Deena Larsen [[https://elmcip.net/node/3231 ELMCIP]] ** Marble Springs 3.0 by Deena Larsen [[https://elmcip.net/node/4417 ELMCIP]] ** Disappearing Rain by Deena Larsen [[https://elmcip.net/node/759 ELMCIP]] * Judy Malloy [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Judy_Malloy Wikipedia]] * Uncle Buddy's Phantom Funhouse by John McDaid [[https://elmcip.net/node/519 ELMCIP]] [[http://dtc-wsuv.org/wp/pathfinders/authors-works/john-mcdaid-uncle-buddys-phantom-funhouse/ Pathfinders]] [[http://scalar.usc.edu/works/pathfinders/mcdaids-traversal John McDaid's Traversal - Pathfinders]] * Michael Joyce (writer) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Joyce_(writer) Wikipedia]] ** afternoon, a story by Michael Joyce [[https://elmcip.net/node/236 ELMCIP]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Afternoon,_a_story Wikipedia]] ** Twelve Blue by Michael Joyce [[https://elmcip.net/node/237 ELMCIP]] * I Have Said Nothing by J. Yellowlees Douglas [[https://elmcip.net/node/2063 ELMCIP]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I_Have_Said_Nothing Wikipedia]] * We Descend by Bill Bly [[http://scalar.usc.edu/works/pathfinders/bill-bly Pathfinders]] ** We Descend: Archives Pertaining to Edgerus Scriptor, Volume One [[https://elmcip.net/node/1101 ELMCIP]] ** We Descend: Archives Pertaining to Egderus Scriptor, Volume Two [[https://elmcip.net/node/4269 ELMCIP]] * Patchwork Girl by Shelley Jackson [[https://elmcip.net/node/239 ELMCIP]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patchwork_Girl_(hypertext) Wikipedia]] * Califia by M. D. Coverley [[https://elmcip.net/node/723 ELMCIP]] * Victory Garden by Stuart Moulthrop [[https://elmcip.net/node/352 ELMCIP]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Victory_Garden_(novel) Wikipedia]] * The Unknown by William Gillespie, Scott Rettberg, Dirk Stratton, and Frank Marquardt [[https://elmcip.net/node/662 ELMCIP]] * GRAMMATRON by Mark Amerika [[https://elmcip.net/node/581 ELMCIP]] * 253 by Geoff Ryman [[https://elmcip.net/node/7513 ELMCIP]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/253_(novel) Wikipedia]] * The Jew's Daughter by Judd Morrissey [[https://elmcip.net/node/78 ELMCIP]] * Erik Loyer [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erik_Loyer Wikipedia]] ** Chroma by Erik Loyer [[https://elmcip.net/node/1289 ELMCIP]] ** Lair of the Marrow Monkey by Erik Loyer [[https://elmcip.net/node/5067 ELMCIP]] * Shelley Jackson [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shelley_Jackson Wikipedia]] ** my body — a Wunderkammer by Shelley Jackson [[https://elmcip.net/node/793 ELMCIP]] * About Time by Rob Swigart [[https://elmcip.net/node/4112 ELMCIP]] * The Virtual Disappearance of Miriam by Andy Campbell and Martyn Bedford [[https://elmcip.net/node/1600 ELMCIP]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Virtual_Disappearance_of_Miriam Wikipedia]] * Varicella by Adam Cadre [[https://elmcip.net/node/7775 ELMCIP]] [[http://www.ifwiki.org/index.php/Varicella IFWiki]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Varicella_(video_game) Wikipedia]] * Ruth Nestvold [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ruth_Nestvold Wikipedia]] ** Joe's Heartbeat in Budapest by Ruth Nestvold [[http://www.lit-arts.net/JHIB/begin.htm full text - Lit-Arts.Net]] * 2002: A Palindrome Story in 2002 Words by Nick Montfort and William Gillespie [[https://elmcip.net/node/7962 ELMCIP]] ==== Code poetry and new-media literature ==== * RCEL Chapter 35: "Code poetry and new-media literature" by Steve Tomasula * Code poetry [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Code_poetry Wikipedia]] ==== Computer gaming ==== * RCEL Chapter 36: "Computer gaming" by Astrid Ensslin * Art game [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Art_game Wikipedia]] ==== Virtual autobiography ==== * RCEL Chapter 37: "Virtual autobiography: Autographies, interfaces, and avatars" by Amy J. Elias ===== Comic-based autobiography ===== * Autobiographical comics [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autobiographical_comics Wikipedia]] * How to Understand Israel in 60 Days or Less by Sarah Glidden [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8372743 LibraryThing]] * DAR: A Super Girly Top Secret Comic Diary by Erika Moen [[https://www.librarything.com/series/DAR LibraryThing]] [[https://www.darcomic.com/ DAR]] * Webcomics Nation Autobiographical/Slice-of-Life Directory [[https://web.archive.org/web/20150511003243/http://www.webcomicsnation.com/genre.php?genre=4 Webcomics Nation]] * Museum of Mistakes: The Fart Party Collection by Julia Wertz [[https://www.librarything.com/work/15401747 LibraryThing]] [[http://www.juliawertz.com/ Museum of Mistakes]] * my body — a Wunderkammer by Shelley Jackson [[http://collection.eliterature.org/1/works/jackson__my_body_a_wunderkammer.html full text - Electronic Literature Collection]] ===== Web-based autobiography ===== * My War: Killing Time in Iraq by Colby Buzzell [[https://www.librarything.com/work/220797 LibraryThing]] [[http://cbftw.blogspot.com/ cbftw]] * Vlog [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vlog Wikipedia]] * Life writing [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Life_writing Wikipedia]] ** Association pour l'Autobiographie et le Patrimoine Autobiographique [[http://www.qualitative-research.net/index.php/fqs/article/view/1739/3239 The Story of a French Life-Writing Archive - Forum: Qualitative Social Research]] * Oral history [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oral_history Wikipedia]] ** Mass-Observation [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mass-Observation Wikipedia]] ** American Social History Project [[https://ashp.cuny.edu/ Center for Media and Learning]] * DissemiNET [[https://web.archive.org/web/20010405012224/http://www.dissemi.net:80/ dissemi.net]] [[https://walkerart.org/collections/artists/stryker-beth-900809 Interview with Sawad Brooks + Beth Stryker - Walker Art Center]] * Recollecting Adams [[https://mariannerpetit.com/web-video-animations/2008-09-recollecting-adams/ full video - Marianne R. Petit]] ===== Avatar-based autobiography ===== * Cell phone novel [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cell_phone_novel Wikipedia]] [[http://itre.cis.upenn.edu/~myl/languagelog/archives/005332.html A million cellphone novels - Language Log]] * MMORPG [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Massively_multiplayer_online_role-playing_game Wikipedia]] * Virtual world [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virtual_world Wikipedia]] ** Second Life [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_Life Wikipedia]] == Planned updates == * Add links to the empty categories. * Add a description for each category. * Add authors and works for the categories that only have general links. * Add works from RCEL to sections that only have authors. * Add links from other sites. * Normalize the reference formatting. [[Category:Developing]] [[Category:Lists]] [[Category:Experimental Literature]] 0f6346c7ca176335e4920ae863532b40c5402b4f 440 439 2019-04-28T09:39:06Z Andy Culbertson 1 Organized the "Medium" subsection of "Experimental life writing." wikitext text/x-wiki == Introduction == This article is a list of links to authors, works, and categories in experimental literature. Its purpose is to give you a starting point for exploring works in this set of genres. I've based the list's organization on ''The Routledge Companion to Experimental Literature'' (RCEL), a collection of scholarly essays on the subject. This project is a work in progress. == How to use this list == If a category is well established in the field, I've linked to its Wikipedia article. If the author of the RCEL article was conducting their own survey of the category, I've listed the authors and works they cover with links to Wikipedia and LibraryThing wherever corresponding pages are available. I've also included links to a work's full text when that's available and links to background information from other sources. === Wikipedia === Wikipedia articles will give you background information on their subject, and they'll usually contain bibliographies that will point you to works related to that subject, such as works in the category or works by the author. === LibraryThing === LibraryThing is a social library catalog website that lets you catalog your collection. Here I'm using it for its recommendation features and its links to other sites. When you visit a work's LibraryThing page, you can find related works in the "LibraryThing Recommendations" section and the "Member recommendations" section. You can also click on the tags users have assigned to it. Each tag link takes you to a page for that tag, which lists other works that have been assigned it, as well as related tags, subjects, and tagmashes, which are combinations of tags. You can [https://wiki.librarything.com/index.php/HelpThing:Tagmash create your own tagmashes]. In the upper right sidebar of a work's LibraryThing page, you'll find links to its corresponding page on other catalog websites, such as Amazon, Google Books, and WorldCat, a shared catalog of physical libraries worldwide. These sites will often let you look through a preview of the book. They'll also give you ways to find other related works, usually by recommendations or subject links on the work's page. If you're logged in, you can edit this section to show links from a long list of other sites. == General == * Experimental literature [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Experimental_literature Wikipedia]] * Bray, Joe, Alison Gibbons, and Brian McHale, eds. ''The Routledge Companion to Experimental Literature''. Routledge Companions. London: Routledge, 2015. [[https://www.librarything.com/work/18336113 LibraryThing]] == The historical avant-gardes == === Modernist-era experimentalism === ==== Futurism ==== * RCEL Chapter 2: "Italian Futurism and Russian Cubo-Futurism" by John White * Futurism (literature) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Futurism_(literature) Wikipedia]] ==== Expressionism ==== * RCEL Chapter 3: "The poetics of animism: Realism and the fantastic in expressionist literature and film" by Richard Murphy * Expressionism [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Expressionism Wikipedia]] ==== Surrealism ==== * RCEL Chapter 4: "The surrealist experiments with language" by Peter Stockwell * Surrealism [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surrealism Wikipedia]] ==== Absurdism ==== * RCEL Chapter 5: "The literary absurd" by Joanna Gavins * Absurdist fiction [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Absurdist_fiction Wikipedia]] === Postmodernist experimentalism === ==== Postwar experimental poetry ==== * RCEL Chapter 6: "Spontaneity and improvisation in postwar experimental poetry" by Benjamin Lee * The New American Poetry 1945–1960 [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_New_American_Poetry_1945%E2%80%931960 Wikipedia]] ==== The ''nouveau roman'' and ''Tel Quel'' ==== * RCEL Chapter 7: "The ''nouveau roman'' and ''Tel Quel''" by Danielle Marx-Scouras * Nouveau roman [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nouveau_roman Wikipedia]] * Tel Quel [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tel_Quel Wikipedia]] ==== Lettrism and situationism ==== * RCEL Chapter 8: "Lettrism and situationism" by Tyrus Miller * Lettrism [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lettrism Wikipedia]] * Situationist International [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Situationist_International Wikipedia]] ==== OuLiPo and proceduralism ==== * RCEL Chapter 9: "OuLiPo and proceduralism" by Jan Baetens * Constrained writing [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constrained_writing Wikipedia]] * Oulipo [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oulipo Wikipedia]] ==== Metafiction ==== * RCEL Chapter 10: "Metafiction" by R. M. Berry * Metafiction [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metafiction Wikipedia]] ==== Postmodern literature ==== * RCEL Chapter 11: "Postmodernism and experiment" by Brian McHale * Postmodern literature [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Postmodern_literature Wikipedia]] === Experiments with identity === ==== Twentieth-century avant-garde women writers ==== * RCEL Chapter 12: "Sexing the text: Women’s avant-garde writing in the twentieth century" by Ellen G. Friedman * Kathy Acker [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kathy_Acker Wikipedia]] * Djuna Barnes [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Djuna_Barnes Wikipedia]] * Jane Bowles [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jane_Bowles Wikipedia]] * H.D. [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H.D. Wikipedia]] * Toni Morrison [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toni_Morrison Wikipedia]] * Bharati Mukherjee [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bharati_Mukherjee Wikipedia]] * Anaïs Nin [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ana%C3%AFs_Nin Wikipedia]] * Joyce Carol Oates [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joyce_Carol_Oates Wikipedia]] * Jean Rhys [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_Rhys Wikipedia]] * Dorothy Richardson [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dorothy_Richardson Wikipedia]] * Gertrude Stein [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gertrude_Stein Wikipedia]] * Virginia Woolf [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virginia_Woolf Wikipedia]] ==== Twentieth-century avant-garde African-American poets ==== * RCEL Chapter 13: "Experiments in black: African-American avant-garde poetics" by Aldon Lynn Nielsen * Russell Atkins [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russell_Atkins Wikipedia]] * Amiri Baraka [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amiri_Baraka Wikipedia]] * Jayne Cortez [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jayne_Cortez Wikipedia]] * Negro Digest [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Negro_Digest Wikipedia]] * Langston Hughes [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Langston_Hughes Wikipedia]] * Ted Joans [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ted_Joans Wikipedia]] * Percy Johnston [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Percy_Johnston Wikipedia]] * Bob Kaufman [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bob_Kaufman Wikipedia]] * Stephen Jonas [[https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems-and-poets/poets/detail/stephen-jonas Poetry Foundation]] * William Melvin Kelley [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Melvin_Kelley Wikipedia]] * Nathaniel Mackey [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nathaniel_Mackey Wikipedia]] * Clarence Major [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clarence_Major Wikipedia]] * Tracie Morris [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tracie_Morris Wikipedia]] * Harryette Mullen [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harryette_Mullen Wikipedia]] * Claudia Rankine [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Claudia_Rankine Wikipedia]] * Gil Scott-Heron [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gil_Scott-Heron Wikipedia]] * Lorenzo Thomas (poet) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lorenzo_Thomas_(poet) Wikipedia]] * Melvin B. Tolson [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Melvin_B._Tolson Wikipedia]] * Jean Toomer [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_Toomer Wikipedia]] * Umbra (poets) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Umbra_(poets) Wikipedia]] ==== Anglophone postcolonial poetry ==== * RCEL Chapter 14: "The limits of hybridity: Language and innovation in Anglophone postcolonial poetry" by Priyamvada Gopal * Postcolonial literature [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Postcolonial_literature Wikipedia]] * G. V. Desani [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G._V._Desani Wikipedia]] * Wilson Harris [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wilson_Harris Wikipedia]] * Dambudzo Marechera [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dambudzo_Marechera Wikipedia]] * Mudrooroo [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mudrooroo Wikipedia]] * Ben Okri [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ben_Okri Wikipedia]] * Salman Rushdie [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salman_Rushdie Wikipedia]] * Vikram Seth [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vikram_Seth Wikipedia]] * Wole Soyinka [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wole_Soyinka Wikipedia]] * Amos Tutuola [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amos_Tutuola Wikipedia]] * Derek Walcott [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Derek_Walcott Wikipedia]] === The new experimentalism === ==== Avant-Pop ==== * RCEL Chapter 15: "Avant-Pop" by Lance Olsen * Avant-Pop: Fiction for a Daydream Nation (Black Ice Books) by Larry McCaffery [[https://www.librarything.com/work/512144 LibraryThing]] * After Yesterday's Crash: The Avant-Pop Anthology by Larry McCaffery [[https://www.librarything.com/work/771064 LibraryThing]] * Tomas Alfredson [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tomas_Alfredson Wikipedia]] * Italo Calvino [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Italo_Calvino Wikipedia]] * David Clark [[https://elmcip.net/node/622 ELMCIP]] * Umberto Eco [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Umberto_Eco Wikipedia]] * Betrayed by Rita Hayworth by Manuel Puig [[https://www.librarything.com/work/128453 LibraryThing]] * Naked Lunch by William S. Burroughs [[https://www.librarything.com/work/5852 LibraryThing]] * Lost in the Funhouse by John Barth [[https://www.librarything.com/work/29286 LibraryThing]] * Industrial Poetics: Demo Tracks for a Mobile Culture (Contemp North American Poetry) by Joe Amato [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2881291 LibraryThing]] * Kenneth Goldsmith [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kenneth_Goldsmith Wikipedia]] * Robert Coover [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Coover Wikipedia]] * Angela Carter [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angela_Carter Wikipedia]] * Aimee Bender [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aimee_Bender Wikipedia]] * White Noise by Don DeLillo [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4953 LibraryThing]] * Gravity's Rainbow by Thomas Pynchon [[https://www.librarything.com/work/10088 LibraryThing]] * Mark Z. Danielewski's House of leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1488 LibraryThing]] * Europeana: A Brief History of the Twentieth Century by Patrik Ouředník [[https://www.librarything.com/work/179330 LibraryThing]] * Mark Leyner [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mark_Leyner Wikipedia]] * Traveling to Utopia: With a Brief History of the Technology by Young-Hae Chang Heavy Industries [[https://www.librarything.com/work/11864011 LibraryThing]] ==== Post-postmodernism ==== * RCEL Chapter 16: "Post-postmodernism" by Robert L. McLaughlin * Post-postmodernism [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Post-postmodernism Wikipedia]] ==== Globalization and transnationalism ==== * RCEL Chapter 17: "Globalization and transnationalism" by Liam Connell * Count Zero by William Gibson [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2445 LibraryThing]] * The Fountain at the Centre of the World by Robert Newman [[https://www.librarything.com/work/18226 LibraryThing]] * Tropic of Orange by Karen Tei Yamashita [[https://www.librarything.com/work/509798 LibraryThing]] * Mark Lombardi: Global Networks by Robert Hobbs [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1066 LibraryThing]] * JPod by Douglas Coupland [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1115072 LibraryThing]] * Looking for Headless by K. D. [[https://www.librarything.com/work/10578723 LibraryThing]] ==== Altermodernist fiction ==== * RCEL Chapter 18: "Altermodernist fiction" by Alison Gibbons * The Rings of Saturn by W. G. Sebald [[https://www.librarything.com/work/28135 LibraryThing]] * Erasmus is Late by Liam Gillick [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1319708 LibraryThing]] * Shanghai Dancing by Brian Castro [[https://www.librarything.com/work/581326 LibraryThing]] * The Islanders: An Introduction by Charles Avery [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8086723 LibraryThing]] * The One Facing Us: A Novel by Ronit Matalon [[https://www.librarything.com/work/643371 LibraryThing]] * Istanbul: Memories and the City by Orhan Pamuk [[https://www.librarything.com/work/100731 LibraryThing]] * Only Revolutions by Mark Z. Danielewski [[https://www.librarything.com/work/798583 LibraryThing]] * Headless by Goldin+Senneby [[https://web.archive.org/web/20180506182844/http://www.goldinsenneby.com/gs/?p=116 Goldin+Senneby]] [[http://rhizome.org/editorial/2009/feb/04/interview-with-goldinsenneby/ Interview with Goldin+Senneby - Rhizome]] [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tOGttCSUecM Angus Cameron lecture on Headless - YouTube]] * A Visit from the Goon Squad by Jennifer Egan [[https://www.librarything.com/work/9530166 LibraryThing]] * Open City by Teju Cole [[https://www.librarything.com/work/10577676 LibraryThing]] * Rana Dasgupta [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rana_Dasgupta Wikipedia]] ==== Manifestos and ''Ars Poetica'' ==== * RCEL Chapter 19: "Manifestos and ''Ars Poetica''" by Laura Winkiel * Manifesto [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manifesto Wikipedia]] * Ars Poetica (Horace) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ars_Poetica_(Horace) Wikipedia]] * Ars Poetica by Archibald MacLeish [[https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poetrymagazine/poems/17168/ars-poetica full text]] ==== Post-criticism ==== * RCEL Chapter 20: "Post-criticism: Conceptual takes" by Gregory L. Ulmer * Heuretics: The Logic of Invention by Gregory L. Ulmer [[https://www.librarything.com/work/173585 LibraryThing]] == Experiment now: printed matter == === Experiments with language === ==== Language poetry ==== * RCEL Chapter 21: "The expanded field of ''L=A=N=G=U=A=G=E''" by Charles Bernstein * Language poets [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Language_poets Wikipedia]] ==== Concrete poetry and prose ==== * RCEL Chapter 22: "Concrete poetry and prose" by Joe Bray * Concrete poetry [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Concrete_poetry Wikipedia]] ==== Found poetry and "uncreative writing" ==== * RCEL Chapter 23: "Found poetry, 'uncreative writing,' and the art of appropriation" by Andrew Epstein * Found poetry [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Found_poetry Wikipedia]] ==== Language art ==== * RCEL Chapter 24: "Words in visual art" by Jessica Prinz * Conceptual art [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conceptual_art Wikipedia]] * Performance art [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Performance_art Wikipedia]] * Edward Ruscha [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_Ruscha Wikipedia]] ** Standard Stations by Edward Ruscha [[https://www.archeus.com/artists/piece/ruscha-i-standard-station-ii-mocha-standard-iii-cheese-mold-standard-with-o Archeus]] ** Actual Size by Edward Ruscha [[https://www.wikiart.org/en/edward-ruscha/actual-size-1962 WikiArt]] * Mel Bochner [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mel_Bochner Wikipedia]] * Jean-Michel Basquiat [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean-Michel_Basquiat Wikipedia]] * Edward Kienholz [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_Kienholz Wikipedia]] * Dan Graham [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dan_Graham Wikipedia]] * Robert Morris (artist) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Morris_(artist) Wikipedia]] * On Kawara [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_Kawara Wikipedia]] * Bruce Nauman [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bruce_Nauman Wikipedia]] * Chris Burden [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chris_Burden Wikipedia]] * Vito Acconci [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vito_Acconci Wikipedia]] * George Brecht [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Brecht Wikipedia]] * John Cage [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Cage Wikipedia]] * Marcel Broodthaers [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marcel_Broodthaers Wikipedia]] * Barbara Kruger [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barbara_Kruger Wikipedia]] * Art & Language [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Art_%26_Language Wikipedia]] ** Terry Atkinson [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terry_Atkinson Wikipedia]] ** Michael Baldwin [[https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artists/art-language-16838 Tate]] [[https://www.moma.org/artists/21325 MoMA]] ** David Bainbridge [[https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artists/art-language-17138 Tate]] ** Harold Hurrell [[https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artists/art-language-16245 Tate]] ** Charles Townsend Harrison [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Townsend_Harrison Wikipedia]] ** Joseph Kosuth [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_Kosuth Wikipedia]] *** One and Three Chairs by Joseph Kosuth [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/One_and_Three_Chairs Wikipedia]] *** Texts (Waiting for-) for Nothing by Joseph Kosuth [[https://www.skny.com/exhibitions/joseph-kosuth3 Sean Kelly Gallery]] ** Art and & language, hostages XXV - LXXVI by Christian Schlatter David Batchelor [[https://www.librarything.com/work/22244074 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:BookSources?isbn=9780947830243 Wikipedia Book Sources]] * Daniel Buren [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daniel_Buren Wikipedia]] * Joseph Beuys [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_Beuys Wikipedia]] ** How to Explain Pictures to a Dead Hare by Joseph Beuys [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/How_to_Explain_Pictures_to_a_Dead_Hare Wikipedia]] * The Bride Stripped Bare by Her Bachelors, Even by Marcel Duchamp [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Bride_Stripped_Bare_by_Her_Bachelors,_Even Wikipedia]] * Laurie Anderson [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laurie_Anderson Wikipedia]] * Jonathan Borofsky [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jonathan_Borofsky Wikipedia]] * Ann Hamilton (artist) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ann_Hamilton_(artist) Wikipedia]] ** Tropos by Ann Hamilton [[https://www.annhamiltonstudio.com/objects/tropos_books.html Ann Hamilton Studio]] ** Lineament by Ann Hamilton [[https://www.annhamiltonstudio.com/objects/lineament_bookball.html Ann Hamilton Studio]] ** Mercy by Ann Hamilton [[https://www.annhamiltonstudio.com/projects/mercy.html Ann Hamilton Studio]] ** VERSE by Ann Hamilton [[http://www.annhamiltonstudio.com/public/verse.html Ann Hamilton Studio]] * Lawrence Weiner [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lawrence_Weiner Wikipedia]] * Douglas Huebler [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Douglas_Huebler Wikipedia]] * Robert Barry (artist) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Barry_(artist) Wikipedia]] * Robert Smithson [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Smithson Wikipedia]] ** Spiral Jetty by Robert Smithson [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spiral_Jetty Wikipedia]] [[https://www.wikiart.org/en/robert-smithson/spiral-jetty-1970 WikiArt]] ** A Heap of Language by Robert Smithson [[https://www.moma.org/collection/works/149054 MoMA]] [[https://www.robertsmithson.com/essays/heap.htm Robert Smithson]] ** "Strata, a Geophotographic Fiction," Robert Smithson: The Collected Writings by Robert Smithson [[https://www.librarything.com/work/61528 LibraryThing]] ** "A Sedimentation of the Mind: Earth Proposals," Robert Smithson: The Collected Writings by Robert Smithson [[https://www.librarything.com/work/61528 LibraryThing]] * Jenny Holzer [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jenny_Holzer Wikipedia]] ** Truisms by Jenny Holzer [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Truisms_(Jenny_Holzer) Wikipedia]] ** Jenny Holzer: Laments by Jenny Holzer [[https://www.librarything.com/work/3339875 LibraryThing]] [[https://www.diaart.org/program/exhibitions-projects/jenny-holzer-laments-exhibition Dia]] ** Jenny Holzer: Lustmord by Jenny Holzer [[https://www.librarything.com/work/3338682 LibraryThing]] [[https://wellcomecollection.org/articles/WqfvayUAAKsrVreh Wellcome Collection]] ** Under a Rock: Crack the Pelvis by Jenny Holzer [[http://www.colby.edu/museum/?s=under%20a%20rock&obj=Obj220?sid=1079&x=24931 Colby College Museum of Art]] ** Jenny Holzer: Truth Before Power by Henri Cole [[https://www.librarything.com/work/3338740 LibraryThing]] ** Jenny Holzer Projections [[http://www.jennyholzer.com/Projections/list.php Jenny Holzer]] [[https://www.newyorker.com/books/page-turner/light-as-touch-jenny-holzers-nighttime-poetry-projections The New Yorker]] ** Elizabeth Bishop granite benches by Jenny Holzer [[http://info.vassar.edu/news/2005-2006/060505-jenny-holzers.html Vassar College]] ==== Literary inauthenticity ==== * RCEL Chapter 25: "Hoax-poetry and inauthenticity" by Philip Mead ===== Classical ===== * The Rowley Poems by Thomas Chatterton [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2002159 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Chatterton Thomas Chatterton - Wikipedia]] * The poems of Ossian by James MacPherson [[https://www.librarything.com/work/422650 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Macpherson James Macpherson - Wikipedia]] * Kalevala by Elias Lönnrot [[https://www.librarything.com/work/158724 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kalevala Wikipedia]] * The Tablets by Armand Schwerner [[https://www.librarything.com/work/335430 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Armand_Schwerner Armand Schwerner - Wikipedia]] ===== Modern ===== * A Million Little Pieces by James Frey [[https://www.librarything.com/work/444 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Million_Little_Pieces Wikipedia]] * Angel at the Fence: The True Story of a Love that Survived by Herman Rosenblat [[https://www.librarything.com/work/6304567 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angel_at_the_Fence Wikipedia]] * Fragments: Memories of a Wartime Childhood by Binjamin Wilkomirski [[https://www.librarything.com/work/188668 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Binjamin_Wilkomirski Binjamin Wilkomirski - Wikipedia]] * Down the Road, Worlds Away by Rahila Khan [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1737627 LibraryThing]] [[https://www.lrb.co.uk/v10/n03/toby-forward/diary Diary - Toby Forward - London Review of Books]] * The Hand That Signed The Paper by Helen Darville [[https://www.librarything.com/work/336438 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helen_Dale Helen Dale - Wikipedia]] * B. Wongar [[https://www.librarything.com/author/wongarb LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/B._Wongar Wikipedia]] [[http://sf-encyclopedia.com/entry/wongar_b Science Fiction Encyclopedia]] * My own sweet time by Wanda Koolmatrie [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1908840 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leon_Carmen Leon Carmen - Wikipedia]] * Honor Lost: Love and Death in Modern-Day Jordan by Norma Khouri [[https://www.librarything.com/work/245918 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Forbidden_Love_(novel) Wikipedia]] * The darkening ecliptic by Ern Malley [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4591077 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ern_Malley Ern Malley - Wikipedia]] * Araki Yasusada [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Araki_Yasusada Wikipedia]] [[https://hereshebe.wordpress.com/2008/09/29/on-the-araki-yasusada-hoax/ On the Araki Yasusada Hoax - Here She Be — The Battlements]] ** Doubled Flowering: From the Notebooks of Araki Yasusada by Araki Yasusada [[https://www.librarything.com/work/515083 LibraryThing]] ** Also, With My Throat, I Shall Swallow Ten Thousand Swords: Araki Yasusada's Letters in English by Tosa Motokiyu [[https://www.librarything.com/work/515079 LibraryThing]] ===== Post-hoax ===== * Fernando Pessoa [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fernando_Pessoa Wikipedia]] * Ecopoetry: a critical introduction by Scott Bryson [[https://www.librarything.com/work/129941 LibraryThing]] * Women and ecopoetics: an introduction in context by Harriet Tarlo [[https://www.asu.edu/pipercwcenter/how2journal/vol_3_no_2/ecopoetics/introstatements/tarlo_intro.html full text - HOW2]] * ecopoetics [[https://ecopoetics.wordpress.com/ full text - ecopoetics]] * Media Poetry: An International Anthology by Eduardo Kac [[https://www.librarything.com/work/5074311 LibraryThing]] * Flarf [[http://mainstreampoetry.blogspot.com/ full text - Flarf]] === Experiments with narrative and fiction === ==== Unnatural narration ==== * RCEL Chapter 26: "Unnatural voices, minds, and narration" by Jan Alber, Henrik Skov Nielsen, and Brian Richardson ===== Impossibly informed narrator ===== * Virginie: Her Two Lives by John Hawkes [[https://www.librarything.com/work/121280 LibraryThing]] * Travesties by Tom Stoppard [[https://www.librarything.com/work/27223 LibraryThing]] * Midnight's Children by Salman Rushdie [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2118 LibraryThing]] * In Search of Lost Time by Marcel Proust [[https://www.librarything.com/work/23844 LibraryThing]] * The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2964 LibraryThing]] * Moby Dick by Herman Melville [[https://www.librarything.com/work/15540 LibraryThing]] * Ulysses by James Joyce [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8520 LibraryThing]] ===== Impossibly confused narrator ===== * Molloy by Samuel Beckett [[https://www.librarything.com/work/56659 LibraryThing]] * In the Labyrinth by Alain Robbe-Grillet [[https://www.librarything.com/work/319705 LibraryThing]] * "You Are As Brave As Vincent Van Gogh," Flying to America: 45 More Stories by Donald Barthelme [[https://www.librarything.com/work/3397639 LibraryThing]] ===== Non-human narrator ===== * Kew Gardens by Virginia Woolf [[https://www.librarything.com/work/891578 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kew_Gardens_(short_story) Wikipedia]] * "The House of Asterion," The Aleph and Other Stories by Jorge Luis Borges [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1443832 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_House_of_Asterion Wikipedia]] * "Jealous Husband Returns in Form of Parrot," Tabloid Dreams: Stories by Robert Olen Butler [[https://www.librarything.com/work/150283 LibraryThing]] * Doctor Rat by William Kotzwinkle [[https://www.librarything.com/work/93750 LibraryThing]] * "My Life As a West African Gray Parrot," The Left-Handed Marriage: Stories by Leigh Buchanan Bienen [[https://www.librarything.com/work/3769284 LibraryThing]] * Shakespeare's Dog by Leon Rooke [[https://www.librarything.com/work/203121 LibraryThing]] * "The Stowaway," A History of the World in 10½ Chapters by Julian Barnes [[http://www.librarything.com/work/7133 LibraryThing]] * Sweet William: A Memoir of Old Horse by John Hawkes [[https://www.librarything.com/work/216641 LibraryThing]] * Firmin by Sam Savage [[https://www.librarything.com/work/922702 LibraryThing]] * Timbuktu by Paul Auster [[https://www.librarything.com/work/27521 LibraryThing]] ===== Dead narrator ===== * Pedro Páramo by Juan Rulfo [[https://www.librarything.com/work/84285 LibraryThing]] * Pincher Martin by William Golding [[https://www.librarything.com/work/286280 LibraryThing]] * The Third Policeman by Flann O'Brien [[https://www.librarything.com/work/7104 LibraryThing]] * "Terra Incognita," A Russian Beauty and Other Stories by Vladimir Nabokov [[https://www.librarything.com/work/224314 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terra_Incognita_(short_story) Wikipedia]] * Transparent Things by Vladimir Nabokov [[https://www.librarything.com/work/51102 LibraryThing]] * Murther and Walking Spirits by Robertson Davies [[https://www.librarything.com/work/73673 LibraryThing]] * American Desert by Percival Everett [[https://www.librarything.com/work/238787 LibraryThing]] * My Name is Red by Orhan Pamuk [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2744 LibraryThing]] * Hotel World by Ali Smith [[https://www.librarything.com/work/19451 LibraryThing]] * Destiny and Desire by Carlos Fuentes [[https://www.librarything.com/work/6516575 LibraryThing]] * The Book Thief by Markus Zusak [[https://www.librarything.com/work/393681 LibraryThing]] * "The Calmative," Stories and Texts for Nothing by Samuel Beckett [[https://www.librarything.com/work/3398 LibraryThing]] * The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4931 LibraryThing]] ===== Focalization technology ===== * "The Aleph," The Aleph and Other Stories by Jorge Luis Borges [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1443832 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Aleph_(short_story) Wikipedia]] * Neuromancer by William Gibson [[https://www.librarything.com/work/609 LibraryThing]] ===== First-person plural ===== * "A Rose for Emily" by William Faulkner, American Gothic Tales by Joyce Carol Oates [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8038219 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Rose_for_Emily Wikipedia]] * 12 Million Black Voices by Richard Wright [[https://www.librarything.com/work/666218 LibraryThing]] * Two Thousand Seasons by Ayi Kwei Armah [[https://www.librarything.com/work/77062 LibraryThing]] * You Don't Love Yourself by Nathalie Sarraute [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2374617 LibraryThing]] ===== Second-person ===== * A Pagan Place by Edna O'Brien [[https://www.librarything.com/work/218163 LibraryThing]] * "How," Self-help by Lorrie Moore [[http://www.librarything.com/work/35303 LibraryThing]] * If on a Winter's Night a Traveler by Italo Calvino [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4091153 LibraryThing]] ===== Third-person singular impersonal ===== * The Radetzky March by Joseph Roth [[https://www.librarything.com/work/10159 LibraryThing]] * The opoponax by Monique Wittig [[https://www.librarything.com/work/257236 LibraryThing]] ===== Third-person plural ===== * Things: A Story of the Sixties by Georges Perec [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1197807 LibraryThing]] * Flower Children by Maxine Swann [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2375201 LibraryThing]] ===== Gender-neutral pronouns ===== * The Cook and The Carpenter by June Arnold [[https://www.librarything.com/work/736228 LibraryThing]] ===== Pronouns omitted ===== * "Dead Doll Humility" by Kathy Acker, The Making of the American Essay (A New History of the Essay) by John D'Agata [[https://www.librarything.com/work/17216549 LibraryThing]] ===== Multiple points of view ===== * "The Cubs," The Cubs and Other Stories by Mario Vargas Llosa [[https://www.librarything.com/work/17905949 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Los_Cachorros Wikipedia]] * The Death of Artemio Cruz by Carlos Fuentes [[https://www.librarything.com/work/18213 LibraryThing]] * Maps by Nuruddin Farah [[https://www.librarything.com/work/70403 LibraryThing]] * Compact by Maurice Roche [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1287065 LibraryThing]] ===== Merged narrators ===== * Monsieur Levert by Robert Pinget [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1170050 LibraryThing]] * "13," Stories and Texts for Nothing by Samuel Beckett [[https://www.librarything.com/work/3398 LibraryThing]] * The Unnamable by Samuel Beckett [[https://www.librarything.com/work/276374 LibraryThing]] * Glamorama by Bret Easton Ellis [[https://www.librarything.com/work/7545 LibraryThing]] ===== Anachronism ===== * Flight to Canada by Ishmael Reed [[https://www.librarything.com/work/35987 LibraryThing]] ===== Mid-narrative editing ===== * Worstward Ho by Samuel Beckett [[https://www.librarything.com/work/782565 LibraryThing]] ==== Impossible worlds ==== * RCEL Chapter 27: "Impossible worlds" by Marie-Laure Ryan ===== Contradictions ===== * In the Labyrinth by Alain Robbe-Grillet [[https://www.librarything.com/work/319705 LibraryThing]] * The French Lieutenant's Woman by John Fowles [[https://www.librarything.com/work/6923 LibraryThing]] * "The Babysitter," Pricksongs & Descants: Fictions by Robert Coover [[https://www.librarything.com/work/271307 LibraryThing]] * The Libera Me Domine by Robert Pinget [[https://www.librarything.com/work/478922 LibraryThing]] * "Here We Aren’t, So Quickly" by Jonathan Safran Foer, 20 Under 40: Stories from The New Yorker by Deborah Treisman [[https://www.librarything.com/work/10491291 LibraryThing]] [[https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2010/06/14/here-we-arent-so-quickly full text - The New Yorker]] * "A Country Doctor," A Country Doctor: Short Stories by Franz Kafka [[https://www.librarything.com/work/195671 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Country_Doctor_(short_story) Wikipedia]] ===== Ontological impossibility ===== * Pleasantville [1998 film] by Gary Ross [[https://www.librarything.com/work/3510622 LibraryThing]] * "Continuity of Parks," Blow-up and Other Stories by Julio Cortázar [[https://www.librarything.com/work/9057461 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Continuidad_de_los_parques Wikipedia]] * Jasper Fforde [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jasper_Fforde Wikipedia]] * The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen omnibus by Alan Moore [[https://www.librarything.com/work/11388754 LibraryThing]] ===== Impossible space ===== * Mark Z. Danielewski's House of leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1488 LibraryThing]] * Alice's Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8288 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alice%27s_Adventures_in_Wonderland Wikipedia]] ===== Impossible time ===== * Counter-Clock World by Philip K. Dick [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1309466 LibraryThing]] * Time's Arrow, or The Nature of the Offence by Martin Amis [[https://www.librarything.com/work/11900 LibraryThing]] * The Mustache by Emmanuel Carrère [[https://www.librarything.com/work/529866 LibraryThing]] ===== Impossible texts ===== * "The Book of Sand," The Book of Sand by Jorge Luis Borges [[http://www.librarything.com/work/467534 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Book_of_Sand Wikipedia]] * One Thousand and One Nights [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/One_Thousand_and_One_Nights Wikipedia]] * "The Garden of Forking Paths," Labyrinths; Selected stories & other writings by Jorge Luis Borges [[https://www.librarything.com/work/607 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Garden_of_Forking_Paths Wikipedia]] ==== Experimental life writing ==== * RCEL Chapter 28: "Experimental life writing" by Irene Kacandes ===== Time ===== * Stuart: A Life Backwards by Alexander Masters [[https://www.librarything.com/work/93508 LibraryThing]] * One Day a Year: 1960 - 2000 by Christa Wolf [[https://www.librarything.com/work/466217 LibraryThing]] ===== Medium ===== * Comics ** The Complete Maus by Art Spiegelman [[https://www.librarything.com/work/6046618 LibraryThing]] ** The Complete Persepolis by Marjane Satrapi [[https://www.librarything.com/work/6392056 LibraryThing]] ** Fun Home: A Family Tragicomic by Alison Bechdel [[https://www.librarything.com/work/627079 LibraryThing]] ** 1941-45: a teenager's war: Crete, captivity, liberation by Frederick V. Carabott [[https://www.worldcat.org/title/1941-45-ho-polemos-henos-ephebou-krete-aichmalosia-apeleutherosis-1941-45-a-teenagers-war-crete-captivity-liberation-1941-45-der-krieg-eines-jugendlichen-kreta-gefangenschaft-befreiung/oclc/48228994 WorldCat.org]] * Non-diegetic poetry ** Running in the Family by Michael Ondaatje [[https://www.librarything.com/work/27962 LibraryThing]] ** Zami: a New Spelling of My Name by Audre Lorde [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8116 LibraryThing]] * Reference-work structure ** A heartbreaking work of staggering genius by Dave Eggers [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2294 LibraryThing]] ** Encyclopedia of an Ordinary Life by Amy Krouse Rosenthal [[https://www.librarything.com/work/35433 LibraryThing]] ** The Suicide Index: Putting My Father's Death in Order by Joan Wickersham [[https://www.librarything.com/work/5248942 LibraryThing]] ===== The relational ===== * The Search Warrant by Patrick Modiano [[https://www.librarything.com/work/331076 LibraryThing]] * Ein Kapitel aus meinem Leben by Barbara Honigmann [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4500497 LibraryThing]] * After Long Silence by Helen Fremont [[https://www.librarything.com/work/13147 LibraryThing]] ===== The work's focus ===== * Patterns of Childhood by Christa Wolf [[https://www.librarything.com/work/700778 LibraryThing]] * Boyhood: Scenes from Provincial Life by J. M. Coetzee [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8660368 LibraryThing]] * Youth by J. M. Coetzee [[https://www.librarything.com/work/105432 LibraryThing]] * Summertime: Scenes from Provincial Life by J. M. Coetzee [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8494635 LibraryThing]] * Roland Barthes by Roland Barthes [[https://www.librarything.com/work/592881 LibraryThing]] * W, or The Memory of Childhood by Georges Perec [[https://www.librarything.com/work/39076 LibraryThing]] ===== Multiple techniques ===== * Daddy's War: Greek American Stories by Irene Kacandes [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8797694 LibraryThing]] ==== Experimental genre fiction ==== * RCEL Chapter 29: "'Rotting time': Genre fiction and the avant-garde" by Elana Gomel ===== Fantasy ===== * Iron Council by China Miéville [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4813 LibraryThing]] * Vellum: The Book of All Hours by Hal Duncan [[https://www.librarything.com/work/47894 LibraryThing]] * Ink: The Book of All Hours by Hal Duncan [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1162726 LibraryThing]] ===== Science fiction ===== * Iain Banks [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iain_Banks Wikipedia]] * Stephen Baxter (author) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephen_Baxter_(author) Wikipedia]] * Paul Park [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Park Wikipedia]] * Century Rain by Alastair Reynolds [[https://www.librarything.com/work/48231 LibraryThing]] * Blindsight by Peter Watts [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1333265 LibraryThing]] ===== Horror ===== * Books of Blood | Series [[https://www.librarything.com/series/Books+of+Blood LibraryThing]] * Neverwhere: The Author's Preferred Text by Neil Gaiman [[https://www.librarything.com/work/14623622 LibraryThing]] * Mark Z. Danielewski's House of leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1488 LibraryThing]] * The Everlasting by Tim Lebbon [[https://www.librarything.com/work/2811046 LibraryThing]] === Experiments with form and design === ==== Experimental comics ==== * RCEL Chapter 30: "Graphic narrative" by Hillary Chute * Alternative comics [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alternative_comics Wikipedia]] ===== Early twentieth century ===== * Little Nemo [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Little_Nemo Wikipedia]] * Wordless novel [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wordless_novel Wikipedia]] ** Vertigo by Lynd Ward [[https://www.librarything.com/work/334743 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vertigo_(wordless_novel) Wikipedia]] ** Frans Masereel [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frans_Masereel Wikipedia]] ** Otto Nückel [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Otto_N%C3%BCckel Wikipedia]] ** Giacomo Patri [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Giacomo_Patri Wikipedia]] ===== Late twentieth century ===== * Mad (magazine) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mad_(magazine) Wikipedia]] * Underground comix [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Underground_comix Wikipedia]] ** Robert Crumb [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Crumb Wikipedia]] *** Zap Comix [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zap_Comix Wikipedia]] *** Weirdo (comics) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weirdo_(comics) Wikipedia]] ** Art Spiegelman [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Art_Spiegelman Wikipedia]] *** Breakdowns: Portrait of the Artist as a Young %@&amp;amp;*! by Art Spiegelman [[https://www.librarything.com/work/5655445 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Breakdowns_(comics) Wikipedia]] *** Raw (magazine) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raw_(magazine) Wikipedia]] ** Here by Richard McGuire [[https://www.librarything.com/work/14952042 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Here_(comics) Wikipedia]] ** Binky Brown Meets the Holy Virgin Mary by Justin Green [[https://www.librarything.com/work/3275118 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Binky_Brown_Meets_the_Holy_Virgin_Mary Wikipedia]] ** Aline Kominsky-Crumb [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aline_Kominsky-Crumb Wikipedia]] ===== Twenty-first century ===== * PictureBox [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PictureBox Wikipedia]] * In the Shadow of No Towers by Art Spiegelman [[https://www.librarything.com/work/7016 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/In_the_Shadow_of_No_Towers Wikipedia]] * Chris Ware [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chris_Ware Wikipedia]] ** Jimmy Corrigan : the smartest kid on earth by Chris Ware [[https://www.librarything.com/work/7614 LibraryThing]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jimmy_Corrigan,_the_Smartest_Kid_on_Earth Wikipedia]] ** Unmasked [[https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2009/11/02/unmasked-4 The New Yorker]] * Alison Bechdel [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alison_Bechdel Wikipedia]] * Joe Sacco [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joe_Sacco Wikipedia]] * Lynda Barry [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lynda_Barry Wikipedia]] ** What It Is by Lynda Barry [[https://www.librarything.com/work/4598224 LibraryThing]] ** Picture This: The Near-sighted Monkey Book by Lynda Barry [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8906129 LibraryThing]] * Jason Shiga [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jason_Shiga Wikipedia]] * 365 Days: A Diary by Julie Doucet by Julie Doucet [[https://www.librarything.com/work/3471751 LibraryThing]] * Abstract comics [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abstract_comics Wikipedia]] ** Abstract Comics: The Anthology by Andrei Molotiu [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8785206 LibraryThing]] [[http://abstractcomics.blogspot.com/ Abstract Comics: The Blog]] ==== Multimodal literature ==== * RCEL Chapter 31: "Multimodal literature and experimentation" by Alison Gibbons * Liberature [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberature Wikipedia]] ==== Information design ==== * RCEL Chapter 32: "Information design, emergent culture and experimental form in the novel" by Steve Tomasula * Exercises in Style by Raymond Queneau [[https://www.librarything.com/work/39048 LibraryThing]] * Double or Nothing by Raymond Federman [[https://www.librarything.com/work/151208 LibraryThing]] * The Gettysburg Powerpoint Presentation by Peter Norvig [[https://norvig.com/Gettysburg/ full text]] * Europeana: A Brief History of the Twentieth Century by Patrik Ouředník [[https://www.librarything.com/work/179330 LibraryThing]] * 2666 by Roberto Bolaño [[https://www.librarything.com/work/996213 LibraryThing]] ==== Interactive fiction ==== * RCEL Chapter 33: "Interactive fiction" by N. Katherine Hayles And Nick Montfort * Interactive fiction [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interactive_fiction Wikipedia]] == Experiment now: beyond the page == === The digital age === ==== Digital fiction ==== * RCEL Chapter 34: "Digital fiction: Networked narratives" by David Ciccoricco * Storyspace [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Storyspace Wikipedia]] [[http://www.digitalhumanities.org/dhq/vol/6/2/000128/000128.html Machine Enhanced (Re)minding: the Development of Storyspace - Digital Humanities Quarterly]] [[http://dtc-wsuv.org/wp/ell/2017/10/28/untangling-threads-in-the-maze/ Untangling Threads in the Labyrinth – Electronic Literature Lab]] * Click by John Barth [[https://elmcip.net/node/1991 ELMCIP]] * The Glass Snail: a Pre-Christmas Tale by Milorad Pavić [[https://elmcip.net/node/1080 ELMCIP]] * 10:01 by Lance Olsen [[https://www.librarything.com/work/1139235 LibraryThing]] [[https://elmcip.net/node/1356 ELMCIP]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/10:01 Wikipedia]] * TOC: A New Media Novel by Steve Tomasula [[https://www.librarything.com/work/9462724 LibraryThing]] [[https://elmcip.net/node/835 ELMCIP]] * The LiveJournal of Zachary Marsh by Matthew Baldwin [[https://elmcip.net/node/13635 ELMCIP]] [[https://themorningnews.org/article/the-livejournal-of-zachary-marsh full text - The Morning News]] * A Million Penguins [[https://elmcip.net/node/6215 ELMCIP]] [[https://web.archive.org/web/20090803141129/http://www.amillionpenguins.com/wiki/index.php/Welcome full text - PenguinWiki]] [[https://www.researchgate.net/publication/228465833_A_million_penguins_research_report (PDF) A million penguins research report - ResearchGate]] [[https://www.theguardian.com/books/booksblog/2007/mar/12/livingwithamillionpenguins Living with A Million Penguins: inside the wiki-novel - The Guardian]] * Blue Company by Rob Wittig [[https://elmcip.net/node/368 ELMCIP]] [[http://robwit.net/?project=blue-company robwit.net]] * Deena Larsen [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deena_Larsen Wikipedia]] ** Marble Springs 1.0 by Deena Larsen [[https://elmcip.net/node/3231 ELMCIP]] ** Marble Springs 3.0 by Deena Larsen [[https://elmcip.net/node/4417 ELMCIP]] ** Disappearing Rain by Deena Larsen [[https://elmcip.net/node/759 ELMCIP]] * Judy Malloy [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Judy_Malloy Wikipedia]] * Uncle Buddy's Phantom Funhouse by John McDaid [[https://elmcip.net/node/519 ELMCIP]] [[http://dtc-wsuv.org/wp/pathfinders/authors-works/john-mcdaid-uncle-buddys-phantom-funhouse/ Pathfinders]] [[http://scalar.usc.edu/works/pathfinders/mcdaids-traversal John McDaid's Traversal - Pathfinders]] * Michael Joyce (writer) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Joyce_(writer) Wikipedia]] ** afternoon, a story by Michael Joyce [[https://elmcip.net/node/236 ELMCIP]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Afternoon,_a_story Wikipedia]] ** Twelve Blue by Michael Joyce [[https://elmcip.net/node/237 ELMCIP]] * I Have Said Nothing by J. Yellowlees Douglas [[https://elmcip.net/node/2063 ELMCIP]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I_Have_Said_Nothing Wikipedia]] * We Descend by Bill Bly [[http://scalar.usc.edu/works/pathfinders/bill-bly Pathfinders]] ** We Descend: Archives Pertaining to Edgerus Scriptor, Volume One [[https://elmcip.net/node/1101 ELMCIP]] ** We Descend: Archives Pertaining to Egderus Scriptor, Volume Two [[https://elmcip.net/node/4269 ELMCIP]] * Patchwork Girl by Shelley Jackson [[https://elmcip.net/node/239 ELMCIP]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patchwork_Girl_(hypertext) Wikipedia]] * Califia by M. D. Coverley [[https://elmcip.net/node/723 ELMCIP]] * Victory Garden by Stuart Moulthrop [[https://elmcip.net/node/352 ELMCIP]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Victory_Garden_(novel) Wikipedia]] * The Unknown by William Gillespie, Scott Rettberg, Dirk Stratton, and Frank Marquardt [[https://elmcip.net/node/662 ELMCIP]] * GRAMMATRON by Mark Amerika [[https://elmcip.net/node/581 ELMCIP]] * 253 by Geoff Ryman [[https://elmcip.net/node/7513 ELMCIP]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/253_(novel) Wikipedia]] * The Jew's Daughter by Judd Morrissey [[https://elmcip.net/node/78 ELMCIP]] * Erik Loyer [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erik_Loyer Wikipedia]] ** Chroma by Erik Loyer [[https://elmcip.net/node/1289 ELMCIP]] ** Lair of the Marrow Monkey by Erik Loyer [[https://elmcip.net/node/5067 ELMCIP]] * Shelley Jackson [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shelley_Jackson Wikipedia]] ** my body — a Wunderkammer by Shelley Jackson [[https://elmcip.net/node/793 ELMCIP]] * About Time by Rob Swigart [[https://elmcip.net/node/4112 ELMCIP]] * The Virtual Disappearance of Miriam by Andy Campbell and Martyn Bedford [[https://elmcip.net/node/1600 ELMCIP]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Virtual_Disappearance_of_Miriam Wikipedia]] * Varicella by Adam Cadre [[https://elmcip.net/node/7775 ELMCIP]] [[http://www.ifwiki.org/index.php/Varicella IFWiki]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Varicella_(video_game) Wikipedia]] * Ruth Nestvold [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ruth_Nestvold Wikipedia]] ** Joe's Heartbeat in Budapest by Ruth Nestvold [[http://www.lit-arts.net/JHIB/begin.htm full text - Lit-Arts.Net]] * 2002: A Palindrome Story in 2002 Words by Nick Montfort and William Gillespie [[https://elmcip.net/node/7962 ELMCIP]] ==== Code poetry and new-media literature ==== * RCEL Chapter 35: "Code poetry and new-media literature" by Steve Tomasula * Code poetry [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Code_poetry Wikipedia]] ==== Computer gaming ==== * RCEL Chapter 36: "Computer gaming" by Astrid Ensslin * Art game [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Art_game Wikipedia]] ==== Virtual autobiography ==== * RCEL Chapter 37: "Virtual autobiography: Autographies, interfaces, and avatars" by Amy J. Elias ===== Comic-based autobiography ===== * Autobiographical comics [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autobiographical_comics Wikipedia]] * How to Understand Israel in 60 Days or Less by Sarah Glidden [[https://www.librarything.com/work/8372743 LibraryThing]] * DAR: A Super Girly Top Secret Comic Diary by Erika Moen [[https://www.librarything.com/series/DAR LibraryThing]] [[https://www.darcomic.com/ DAR]] * Webcomics Nation Autobiographical/Slice-of-Life Directory [[https://web.archive.org/web/20150511003243/http://www.webcomicsnation.com/genre.php?genre=4 Webcomics Nation]] * Museum of Mistakes: The Fart Party Collection by Julia Wertz [[https://www.librarything.com/work/15401747 LibraryThing]] [[http://www.juliawertz.com/ Museum of Mistakes]] * my body — a Wunderkammer by Shelley Jackson [[http://collection.eliterature.org/1/works/jackson__my_body_a_wunderkammer.html full text - Electronic Literature Collection]] ===== Web-based autobiography ===== * My War: Killing Time in Iraq by Colby Buzzell [[https://www.librarything.com/work/220797 LibraryThing]] [[http://cbftw.blogspot.com/ cbftw]] * Vlog [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vlog Wikipedia]] * Life writing [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Life_writing Wikipedia]] ** Association pour l'Autobiographie et le Patrimoine Autobiographique [[http://www.qualitative-research.net/index.php/fqs/article/view/1739/3239 The Story of a French Life-Writing Archive - Forum: Qualitative Social Research]] * Oral history [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oral_history Wikipedia]] ** Mass-Observation [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mass-Observation Wikipedia]] ** American Social History Project [[https://ashp.cuny.edu/ Center for Media and Learning]] * DissemiNET [[https://web.archive.org/web/20010405012224/http://www.dissemi.net:80/ dissemi.net]] [[https://walkerart.org/collections/artists/stryker-beth-900809 Interview with Sawad Brooks + Beth Stryker - Walker Art Center]] * Recollecting Adams [[https://mariannerpetit.com/web-video-animations/2008-09-recollecting-adams/ full video - Marianne R. Petit]] ===== Avatar-based autobiography ===== * Cell phone novel [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cell_phone_novel Wikipedia]] [[http://itre.cis.upenn.edu/~myl/languagelog/archives/005332.html A million cellphone novels - Language Log]] * MMORPG [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Massively_multiplayer_online_role-playing_game Wikipedia]] * Virtual world [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virtual_world Wikipedia]] ** Second Life [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_Life Wikipedia]] == Planned updates == * Add links to the empty categories. * Add a description for each category. * Add authors and works for the categories that only have general links. * Add links from other sites. * Normalize the reference formatting. [[Category:Developing]] [[Category:Lists]] [[Category:Experimental Literature]] 3f665026f4ba043c88e80f703c0e9952144827d8 0 158 417 2019-03-30T19:44:50Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the article. wikitext text/x-wiki == Pre-''Crisis'' == == ''Crisis on Infinite Earths'' and post-''Crisis'' == === ''Crisis on Infinite Earths'' === * ''Crisis on Infinite Earths'' [[https://www.librarything.com/work/9752473 LibraryThing]] === ''Flashpoint'' === * ''Flashpoint'' [[https://www.librarything.com/work/11695736 LibraryThing]] == Post-''Flashpoint'' == === ''DC Rebirth'' === * ''DC Universe: Rebirth Deluxe Edition'' [[https://www.librarything.com/work/18628182 LibraryThing]] == Post-''DC Rebirth'' == [[Category:Comics]] [[Category:Lists]] [[Category:Developing]] d1d12c516dcbda0591c2150c2bc34fb026ff04fb 418 417 2019-03-30T19:48:28Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the Sources section. wikitext text/x-wiki == Pre-''Crisis'' == == ''Crisis on Infinite Earths'' and post-''Crisis'' == === ''Crisis on Infinite Earths'' === * ''Crisis on Infinite Earths'' [[https://www.librarything.com/work/9752473 LibraryThing]] === ''Flashpoint'' === * ''Flashpoint'' [[https://www.librarything.com/work/11695736 LibraryThing]] == Post-''Flashpoint'' == === ''DC Rebirth'' === * ''DC Universe: Rebirth Deluxe Edition'' [[https://www.librarything.com/work/18628182 LibraryThing]] == Post-''DC Rebirth'' == == Sources == * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Publication_history_of_DC_Comics_crossover_events Publication history of DC Comics crossover events - Wikipedia] * [https://www.alltimelines.com/dc-comics-multiverse-chronology/events/ DC Events Timeline and Recommended Reading - All Timelines] [[Category:Comics]] [[Category:Lists]] [[Category:Developing]] e2f62af1cd969ca93dcb71d0efd799f2ba27d9fb 419 418 2019-03-31T01:08:39Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the rest of the headings and all the levels, along with an explanation of them. wikitext text/x-wiki == Introduction == === Levels === I've assigned each event a level that indicates its importance. These will let you be selective if you don't want to read every event. You can limit your reading to levels 1 and 2, for example, if you only care about events that affect DC's whole universe. * Level 1: These are publisher-wide events that are so important that they organize the whole list. * Level 2: These are less important publisher-wide events. * Level 3: These events involve smaller sets of characters, but they're important enough to merit their own Wikipedia articles. * Level 4: These are smaller events that don't have their own articles. == Pre-''Crisis'' == === ''Flash of Two Worlds'' === Level 3 === ''Crisis on Earth-One!'', ''Crisis on Earth-Two!'' === Level 3 === ''JLA: Zatanna's Search'' === Level 3 === ''Green Lantern'' #40, ''Secret Origin of the Guardians!'' === Level 3 === ''Green Lantern/Green Arrow: Snowbirds Don't Fly'' === Level 3 === ''Showcase'' #100 === Level 3 === ''Crisis on Earth Prime'' === Level 3 === ''Superman: Whatever Happened to the Man of Tomorrow?'' === Level 3 === ''Watchmen'' === Level 3 == ''Crisis on Infinite Earths'' and post-''Crisis'' == === ''Crisis on Infinite Earths'' === Level 1 * ''Crisis on Infinite Earths'' [[https://www.librarything.com/work/9752473 LibraryThing]] === ''Legends'' === Level 2 === ''Millennium'' === Level 2 === ''Cosmic Odyssey'' === Level 2 === ''Invasion!'' === Level 2 === ''Suicide Squad: The Janus Directive'' === Level 3 === ''Batman: A Lonely Place of Dying'' === Level 4 === ''Armageddon 2001'' === Level 2 === ''War of the Gods'' === Level 2 === ''Eclipso: The Darkness Within'' === Level 2 === ''Superman: Panic in the Sky'' === Level 4 === ''The Death of Superman'' === Level 3 === ''Trinity'' === Level 3 === ''Batman: Knightfall'' === Level 3 === ''Bloodlines'' === Level 2 === ''Justice League: Breakdowns'' === Level 3 === ''End of an Era'' === Level 3 === ''Superman: Fall of Metropolis'' === Level 4 === ''Zero Hour: Crisis in Time'' === Level 2 === ''The Way of the Warrior'' === Level 4 === ''Underworld Unleashed'' === Level 2 === ''The Flash: Dead Heat'' === Level 4 === ''The Final Night'' === Level 2 === ''Batman: Contagion'' === Level 3 === ''Genesis'' === Level 2 === ''Batman: Cataclysm'' === Level 3 === ''DC One Million'' === Level 2 === ''Superman: Behold! The Millennium Giants!'' === Level 4 === ''Day of Judgment'' === Level 2 === ''JLApe: Gorilla Warfare!'' === Level 3 === ''The Flash: Chain Lightning'' === Level 4 === ''Superboy: The Evil Factory'' === Level 4 === ''Our Worlds at War'' === Level 3 === ''Joker: Last Laugh'' === Level 3 === ''Bruce Wayne: Fugitive'' === Level 3 === ''A World Without Young Justice'' === Level 4 === ''JSA: Black Reign'' === Level 3 === ''Identity Crisis'' === Level 2 === ''Infinite Crisis'' === Level 2 === ''Amazons Attack'' === Level 3 === ''Sinestro Corps War'' === Level 3 === ''Final Crisis'' === Level 2 === ''Blackest Night'' === Level 2 === ''Superman: New Krypton'' === Level 3 === ''Batman: The Return of Bruce Wayne'' === Level 3 === ''Reign of Doomsday'' === Level 3 === ''Flashpoint'' === Level 1 * ''Flashpoint'' [[https://www.librarything.com/work/11695736 LibraryThing]] == Post-''Flashpoint'' == === ''The New 52'' === Level 2 === ''I, Vampire: Rise of the Vampires'' === Level 4 === ''The Culling: Rise of the Ravagers'' === Level 3 === ''Green Lantern: Rise of the Third Army'' === Level 3 === ''Rotworld'' === Level 4 === ''Hawkman: Wanted'' === Level 4 === ''The Black Diamond Probabilty'' === Level 4 === ''Batman: Death of the Family'' === Level 3 === ''Superman: H'El on Earth'' === Level 3 === ''Justice League: Throne of Atlantis'' === Level 3 === ''Batman: Requiem'' === Level 4 === ''Superman: Psi War'' === Level 4 === ''Batman: Zero Year'' === Level 3 === ''Justice League: Trinity War'' === Level 3 === ''Forever Evil'' === Level 2 === ''Green Lantern: Lights Out'' === Level 4 === ''Supergirl: Red Daughter of Krypton'' === Level 4 === ''Batman: Gothtopia'' === Level 4 === ''Superman: Doomed'' === Level 3 === ''Green Lantern: Uprising'' === Level 4 === ''Batman: Endgame'' === Level 3 === ''Green Lanterns/New Gods: Godhead'' === Level 4 === ''The New 52: Futures End'' === Level 2 === ''Earth 2: World's End'' === Level 3 === ''Convergence'' === Level 2 === ''Truth'' === Level 4 === ''Darkseid War'' === Level 4 === ''Robin War'' === Level 4 === ''The Savage Dawn'' === Level 4 === ''The Final Days of Superman'' === Level 4 === ''DC Rebirth'' === Level 1 * ''DC Universe: Rebirth Deluxe Edition'' [[https://www.librarything.com/work/18628182 LibraryThing]] == Post-''DC Rebirth'' == === ''Batman: Night of the Monster Men'' === Level 4 === ''Justice League vs. Suicide Squad'' === Level 4 === ''Superman Reborn'' === Level 4 === ''Batman/The Flash: The Button'' === Level 3 === ''Titans: The Lazarus Contract'' === Level 4 === ''Dark Nights: Metal'' === Level 2 === ''Doomsday Clock'' === Level 2 === ''Super Sons of Tomorrow'' === Level 4 === ''Milk Wars'' === Level 3 === ''The Wedding'' === Level 4 === ''Sink Atlantis'' === Level 4 === ''Heroes in Crisis'' === Level 2 === ''The Witching Hour'' === Level 4 === ''Drowned Earth'' === Level 4 === ''Event Leviathan'' === Level 3 == Sources == * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Publication_history_of_DC_Comics_crossover_events Publication history of DC Comics crossover events - Wikipedia] * [https://www.alltimelines.com/dc-comics-multiverse-chronology/events/ DC Events Timeline and Recommended Reading - All Timelines] [[Category:Comics]] [[Category:Lists]] [[Category:Developing]] 4fc3b7e020ae07db1a67b4a041e78ff9e0b6b70d 420 419 2019-04-02T04:56:27Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added publication dates, Wikipedia article links, and tie-ins. Switched book links to Wikipedia. wikitext text/x-wiki == Introduction == === Levels === I've assigned each event a level that indicates its importance. These will let you be selective if you don't want to read every event. You can limit your reading to levels 1 and 2, for example, if you only care about events that affect DC's whole universe. * Level 1: These are publisher-wide events that are so important that they organize the whole list. * Level 2: These are less important publisher-wide events. * Level 3: These events involve smaller sets of characters, but they're important enough to merit their own Wikipedia articles. * Level 4: These are smaller events that don't have their own articles. == Pre-''Crisis'' == === ''Flash of Two Worlds'' === Level 3 === ''Crisis on Earth-One!'', ''Crisis on Earth-Two!'' === Level 3 === ''JLA: Zatanna's Search'' === Level 3 === ''Green Lantern'' #40, ''Secret Origin of the Guardians!'' === Level 3 === ''Green Lantern/Green Arrow: Snowbirds Don't Fly'' === Level 3 === ''Showcase'' #100 === Level 3 === ''Crisis on Earth Prime'' === Level 3 === ''Superman: Whatever Happened to the Man of Tomorrow?'' === Level 3 === ''Watchmen'' === Level 3 == ''Crisis on Infinite Earths'' and post-''Crisis'' == === ''Crisis on Infinite Earths'' === Publication date: 1985-1986 Level 1 [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crisis_on_Infinite_Earths ''Crisis on Infinite Earths'' - Wikipedia] * ''Crisis on Infinite Earths'' - main series [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:BookSources/1563897504 Wikipedia Book Sources (softcover)]] * ''Crisis on Infinite Earths Companion Deluxe Edition Vol. 1'' - tie-ins [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:BookSources/1401274595 Wikipedia Book Sources]] === ''Legends'' === Level 2 === ''Millennium'' === Level 2 === ''Cosmic Odyssey'' === Level 2 === ''Invasion!'' === Level 2 === ''Suicide Squad: The Janus Directive'' === Level 3 === ''Batman: A Lonely Place of Dying'' === Level 4 === ''Armageddon 2001'' === Level 2 === ''War of the Gods'' === Level 2 === ''Eclipso: The Darkness Within'' === Level 2 === ''Superman: Panic in the Sky'' === Level 4 === ''The Death of Superman'' === Level 3 === ''Trinity'' === Level 3 === ''Batman: Knightfall'' === Level 3 === ''Bloodlines'' === Level 2 === ''Justice League: Breakdowns'' === Level 3 === ''End of an Era'' === Level 3 === ''Superman: Fall of Metropolis'' === Level 4 === ''Zero Hour: Crisis in Time'' === Level 2 === ''The Way of the Warrior'' === Level 4 === ''Underworld Unleashed'' === Level 2 === ''The Flash: Dead Heat'' === Level 4 === ''The Final Night'' === Level 2 === ''Batman: Contagion'' === Level 3 === ''Genesis'' === Level 2 === ''Batman: Cataclysm'' === Level 3 === ''DC One Million'' === Level 2 === ''Superman: Behold! The Millennium Giants!'' === Level 4 === ''Day of Judgment'' === Level 2 === ''JLApe: Gorilla Warfare!'' === Level 3 === ''The Flash: Chain Lightning'' === Level 4 === ''Superboy: The Evil Factory'' === Level 4 === ''Our Worlds at War'' === Level 3 === ''Joker: Last Laugh'' === Level 3 === ''Bruce Wayne: Fugitive'' === Level 3 === ''A World Without Young Justice'' === Level 4 === ''JSA: Black Reign'' === Level 3 === ''Identity Crisis'' === Level 2 === ''Infinite Crisis'' === Level 2 === ''Amazons Attack'' === Level 3 === ''Sinestro Corps War'' === Level 3 === ''Final Crisis'' === Level 2 === ''Blackest Night'' === Level 2 === ''Superman: New Krypton'' === Level 3 === ''Batman: The Return of Bruce Wayne'' === Level 3 === ''Reign of Doomsday'' === Level 3 === ''Flashpoint'' === Publication date: 2011 Level 1 [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flashpoint_(comics) ''Flashpoint'' - Wikipedia] * ''Time Masters: Vanishing Point'' - prelude [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:BookSources/1401230474 Wikipedia Book Sources]] * ''The Flash Volume 2: The Road to Flashpoint'' - prelude [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:BookSources/1401232795 Wikipedia Book Sources]] * ''Flashpoint'' - main series [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:BookSources/1401233384 Wikipedia Book Sources (softcover)]] * ''Flashpoint: The World of Flashpoint Featuring The Flash'' - tie-ins [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:BookSources/1401234089 Wikipedia Book Sources]] * ''Flashpoint: The World of Flashpoint Featuring Wonder Woman'' - tie-ins [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:BookSources/1401234100 Wikipedia Book Sources]] * ''Flashpoint: The World of Flashpoint Featuring Superman'' - tie-ins [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:BookSources/1401234348 Wikipedia Book Sources]] * ''Flashpoint: The World of Flashpoint Featuring Batman'' - tie-ins [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:BookSources/1401234054 Wikipedia Book Sources]] * ''Flashpoint: The World of Flashpoint Featuring Green Lantern'' - tie-ins [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:BookSources/1401234062 Wikipedia Book Sources]] == Post-''Flashpoint'' == === ''The New 52'' === Level 2 === ''I, Vampire: Rise of the Vampires'' === Level 4 === ''The Culling: Rise of the Ravagers'' === Level 3 === ''Green Lantern: Rise of the Third Army'' === Level 3 === ''Rotworld'' === Level 4 === ''Hawkman: Wanted'' === Level 4 === ''The Black Diamond Probabilty'' === Level 4 === ''Batman: Death of the Family'' === Level 3 === ''Superman: H'El on Earth'' === Level 3 === ''Justice League: Throne of Atlantis'' === Level 3 === ''Batman: Requiem'' === Level 4 === ''Superman: Psi War'' === Level 4 === ''Batman: Zero Year'' === Level 3 === ''Justice League: Trinity War'' === Level 3 === ''Forever Evil'' === Level 2 === ''Green Lantern: Lights Out'' === Level 4 === ''Supergirl: Red Daughter of Krypton'' === Level 4 === ''Batman: Gothtopia'' === Level 4 === ''Superman: Doomed'' === Level 3 === ''Green Lantern: Uprising'' === Level 4 === ''Batman: Endgame'' === Level 3 === ''Green Lanterns/New Gods: Godhead'' === Level 4 === ''The New 52: Futures End'' === Level 2 === ''Earth 2: World's End'' === Level 3 === ''Convergence'' === Level 2 === ''Truth'' === Level 4 === ''Darkseid War'' === Level 4 === ''Robin War'' === Level 4 === ''The Savage Dawn'' === Level 4 === ''The Final Days of Superman'' === Level 4 === DC Rebirth === Publication date: 2016 Level 1 [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DC_Rebirth DC Rebirth - Wikipedia] * ''DC Universe: Rebirth Deluxe Edition'' [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:BookSources?isbn=9781401270728 Wikipedia Book Sources]] == Post-''DC Rebirth'' == === ''Batman: Night of the Monster Men'' === Level 4 === ''Justice League vs. Suicide Squad'' === Level 4 === ''Superman Reborn'' === Level 4 === ''Batman/The Flash: The Button'' === Level 3 === ''Titans: The Lazarus Contract'' === Level 4 === ''Dark Nights: Metal'' === Level 2 === ''Doomsday Clock'' === Level 2 === ''Super Sons of Tomorrow'' === Level 4 === ''Milk Wars'' === Level 3 === ''The Wedding'' === Level 4 === ''Sink Atlantis'' === Level 4 === ''Heroes in Crisis'' === Level 2 === ''The Witching Hour'' === Level 4 === ''Drowned Earth'' === Level 4 === ''Event Leviathan'' === Level 3 == Sources == * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Publication_history_of_DC_Comics_crossover_events Publication history of DC Comics crossover events - Wikipedia] * [https://www.alltimelines.com/dc-comics-multiverse-chronology/events/ DC Events Timeline and Recommended Reading - All Timelines] [[Category:Comics]] [[Category:Lists]] [[Category:Developing]] 1133f07d097d7290728b277e6a21b279b9682e34 421 420 2019-04-09T04:06:39Z Andy Culbertson 1 Replaced the contents with a procedure for creating the reading order. wikitext text/x-wiki == Introduction == This is a strategy guide for one type of comic reading plan: reading through DC's events using collected editions. The idea is to explore the overarching story of DC's main continuity. This plan is an example of my overall [[Navigating the World of Comics|comic reading strategy]]. In terms of that guide, the plan uses ranked selecting and an event-oriented route. Here are our guidelines: * '''Focus on the major crossover events.''' This is a flexible example, so what counts as major is up to you. DC's events range from short ones involving a few characters to line-wide, universe-shaping cataclysms. Wikipedia lists a little over 100 events in total. * '''Include important background and follow-up stories, if possible.''' Again, how much of this you include is up to you. * '''Read only collections as much as possible, rather than individual issues.''' A collection is a volume that includes reprints of multiple related issues. Using collections lets you read more comics with less work. == Information sources == Where will we find our reading order for this plan? Here are some possibilities. === [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Publication_history_of_DC_Comics_crossover_events Publication history of DC Comics crossover events - Wikipedia] === ==== Pros ==== * It offers a convenient list of events with descriptions that give an idea of where they fit into the overall chronology. You can get a sense of how important each event is by its formatting: ** The most important events have section headings named after them. ** Other publisher-wide events are in bold. ** The other events involve smaller sets of characters. It's possible that the events with their own Wikipedia articles are the more important of these. ** Note that some publisher-wide events are tied to more localized events. For example, the publisher-wide ''Forever Evil'' contains the conclusion of ''Justice League: Trinity War''. ==== Cons ==== * Not all the events have collections listed, so you'll have to find them yourself. See the Comic Book Reading Orders procedure below for information on finding collections in Grand Comics Database. * There might be better opinions on which events are most important, so you might want to compare this list to other sites. * You might miss helpful background and follow-up stories. For example, you won't necessarily get characters' origin stories before they show up in an event. === [https://www.comicbookherald.com/reading-dc-comics/ Reading DC Comics - Comic Book Herald] === ==== Pros ==== * It has "fast track guides" to the major periods of DC's publishing history. * Each entry has a long description that will tell you why they recommend the story. ==== Cons ==== * The guides list the curators' picks for the best stories, but that doesn't necessarily cover all the stories that interest us in this example--the important events and the important surrounding stories related to them. For example, if you care about ''Crisis on Earth-One'' and ''Crisis on Earth-Two'', you'll be disappointed to find that they aren't in the [https://www.comicbookherald.com/the-best-40-dc-comics-from-1942-to-2000/ Classic DC fast track]. === [https://www.alltimelines.com/dc-comics-multiverse-chronology/ DC Comics Timelines and Reading Orders - All Timelines] === ==== Pros ==== * It focuses on collections. * It has many lists that each focus on a different goal, such as reading through [https://www.alltimelines.com/dc-comics-multiverse-chronology/dc-comics-main-continuity-timeline/ the entire main continuity], [https://www.alltimelines.com/dc-comics-multiverse-chronology/events/ only the events (and other quality stories)], or [https://www.alltimelines.com/dc-comics-multiverse-chronology/dc-extended-universe/ comics related to the DC Cinematic Universe]. * It has a helpful [https://www.alltimelines.com/2017/04/beginners-guide-dc-multiverse/ introduction to the DC multiverse] that will give you some basic starting points for reading the comics. * The lists include a description of each item so you generally know what it's about. You can view the description by either clicking the plus next to the title to show the description underneath it or clicking the title itself to go to the item's page. ==== Cons ==== * The item descriptions don't necessarily tell you enough to decide whether they fit into your reading plan. === [https://comicbookreadingorders.com/dc/ DC Reading Orders - Comic Book Reading Orders] === ==== Pros ==== * It appears to be comprehensive. * It contains several reading plans, including a nicely organized set of events. * The overview page (linked above) summarizes various starting points for reading. * The reading orders include some comments about issue contents that can help you decide whether an issue fits into your reading plan. ==== Cons ==== * It lists individual issues rather than collections. The trade paperback (TPB) reading orders that would fill this need are planned. See the section "Procedure for using Comic Book Reading Orders" below for an idea of how you could create collection reading order out of an issue reading order. * The issues aren't linked to anything, so to connect them with any outside information, you'd have to search for them yourself in the relevant websites. * A lot of the issues don't have comments, so you'd have to research them you're not sure they fit into your plan. == Recommendations == === The easy plan === If you're not worried about utter completeness and you just want to jump in without too much extra work, I'd say follow the [https://www.alltimelines.com/dc-comics-multiverse-chronology/events/ events reading order from All Timelines]. If you find you need more information, you can always fill in the gaps from other sources. === The hard plan === If you want more control over your reading and you don't mind a lot more work, try one of the reading orders from Comic Book Reading Orders (CBRO). Since in this example we want to read collections, the next section will suggest a procedure for finding collections based on CBRO's lists. === Either plan === Even if you don't create your own list from CBRO, skimming through the procedure might give you some helpful tips for whatever reading method you choose. == Procedure for using Comic Book Reading Orders == # Go to [https://comicbookreadingorders.com/dc/ the main DC page on Comic Book Reading Orders]. Decide if you want an event reading order or the comprehensive (master) one. Let's be intense and try the master reading order. Here's [https://comicbookreadingorders.com/dc/dc-master-reading-order-part-1/ part 1]. # Choose some issues to read. CBRO comments on some of the issues in its reading orders, which can help you decide whether you want to read or skip them. # Begin searching for the issues on [https://www.comics.org/ Grand Comics Database] (GCD). Here's [https://www.comics.org/searchNew/?q=Action%20Comics%20%231%20%281938%29 an example of a search]. # Look for a result labeled "[ISSUE]" that matches the title, issue number, and title year (if included), and follow the issue's link. For example: [https://www.comics.org/issue/293/ Action Comics (DC, 1938 series) #1]. # There will be a section toward the top of the page with information that applies to the whole issue. The sections below that apply to each story in the issue. In the issue overview section, look for the list of reprints, if there is one. These are mostly collections (represented by a series title and number) that include that issue. The title should have the word "in" before it. If it has the word "from," then the issue you're looking at is the reprint of that story or issue. For example, at the time I'm writing this, the first reprint in the list for our example issue is [https://www.comics.org/issue/24740/#1233765 Superman from the Thirties to the Seventies (Crown Publishers, 1971 series)]. # For efficient reading, we're especially looking for volumes that also include other issues from the reading order. They should probably also be published in your country, indicated by the flag icon. If you don't want to put in a lot of effort coordinating volumes, you can just pick one and move on to the next step. If you don't mind the work, there are a couple of ways to do it: #* The hard way: View some promising collections for an issue and compare their contents to the issues in the reading order. You're looking for stories in the collection that say they're reprints "from" an issue in your reading order. For example, [https://www.comics.org/issue/59761/ Superman: The Action Comics Archives #1] has a section called "[Action Comics #1]." In that section the reprints list has one item, "from Action Comics (DC, 1938 series) #1 (June 1938)." Down the page in the section called "[Action Comics #6]" there's another reprinted issue from our reading order, Action Comics (DC, 1938 series) #6. #* The less hard way: Search for each issue and compare their lists of reprints. This method seems simpler, so I recommend this over the first one. You won't have to hunt through so many GCD pages looking for reprinted issues. For example, [https://www.comics.org/issue/293/ Action Comics (DC, 1938 series) #1] and [https://www.comics.org/issue/2894/ Action Comics #60] both list the collection [https://www.comics.org/issue/1540211/ Superman: The War Years 1938-1945]. Unfortunately, that collection only includes the cover from Action Comics #60 and not any of its stories, so you'd have to look somewhere else for the whole issue, or at least the relevant parts. [https://www.comics.org/issue/1658497/ Superman: The Golden Age Omnibus #3] contains the 12-page Superman-related story from that issue. # Once you've chosen one or more collections and you're ready to read, then buy or borrow them. # Repeat this procedure till you've finished your reading plan. == Conclusion == As you can see, compiling a complete list of DC event collections takes a lot of time. We can be grateful that others have done most of the work for us. If there's more work to be done, it might be the kind that can be largely automated. If you have programming skills, that could be a worthwhile project. [[Category:Comics]] [[Category:Procedures]] [[Category:Complete]] ecafa41c663e4d199cf9e56a1b574872a66af06e 424 421 2019-04-09T04:27:14Z Andy Culbertson 1 Clarified the introduction. wikitext text/x-wiki == Introduction == This is a strategy guide for developing one type of comic reading plan: reading through DC's events using collected editions. Following these suggestions will help you put together a reading list that will cover the overarching story of DC's main continuity. This plan is an example of my overall [[Navigating the World of Comics|comic reading strategy]]. In terms of that guide, the plan uses ranked selecting and an event-oriented route. Here are our guidelines: * '''Focus on the major crossover events.''' This is a flexible plan, so what counts as major is up to you. DC's events range from short ones involving a few characters to publisher-wide, universe-shaping cataclysms. Wikipedia lists a little over 100 events in total. * '''Include important background and follow-up stories, if possible.''' Again, how much of this you include is up to you. * '''Read only collections as much as possible, rather than individual issues.''' A collection is a volume that includes reprints of multiple related issues. Using collections lets you read more comics with less work. == Information sources == Where will we find our reading order for this plan? Here are some possibilities. === [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Publication_history_of_DC_Comics_crossover_events Publication history of DC Comics crossover events - Wikipedia] === ==== Pros ==== * It offers a convenient list of events with descriptions that give an idea of where they fit into the overall chronology. You can get a sense of how important each event is by its formatting: ** The most important events have section headings named after them. ** Other publisher-wide events are in bold. ** The other events involve smaller sets of characters. It's possible that the events with their own Wikipedia articles are the more important of these. ** Note that some publisher-wide events are tied to more localized events. For example, the publisher-wide ''Forever Evil'' contains the conclusion of ''Justice League: Trinity War''. ==== Cons ==== * Not all the events have collections listed, so you'll have to find them yourself. See the Comic Book Reading Orders procedure below for information on finding collections in Grand Comics Database. * There might be better opinions on which events are most important, so you might want to compare this list to other sites. * You might miss helpful background and follow-up stories. For example, you won't necessarily get characters' origin stories before they show up in an event. === [https://www.comicbookherald.com/reading-dc-comics/ Reading DC Comics - Comic Book Herald] === ==== Pros ==== * It has "fast track guides" to the major periods of DC's publishing history. * Each entry has a long description that will tell you why they recommend the story. ==== Cons ==== * The guides list the curators' picks for the best stories, but that doesn't necessarily cover all the stories that interest us in this example--the important events and the important surrounding stories related to them. For example, if you care about ''Crisis on Earth-One'' and ''Crisis on Earth-Two'', you'll be disappointed to find that they aren't in the [https://www.comicbookherald.com/the-best-40-dc-comics-from-1942-to-2000/ Classic DC fast track]. === [https://www.alltimelines.com/dc-comics-multiverse-chronology/ DC Comics Timelines and Reading Orders - All Timelines] === ==== Pros ==== * It focuses on collections. * It has many lists that each focus on a different goal, such as reading through [https://www.alltimelines.com/dc-comics-multiverse-chronology/dc-comics-main-continuity-timeline/ the entire main continuity], [https://www.alltimelines.com/dc-comics-multiverse-chronology/events/ only the events (and other quality stories)], or [https://www.alltimelines.com/dc-comics-multiverse-chronology/dc-extended-universe/ comics related to the DC Cinematic Universe]. * It has a helpful [https://www.alltimelines.com/2017/04/beginners-guide-dc-multiverse/ introduction to the DC multiverse] that will give you some basic starting points for reading the comics. * The lists include a description of each item so you generally know what it's about. You can view the description by either clicking the plus next to the title to show the description underneath it or clicking the title itself to go to the item's page. ==== Cons ==== * The item descriptions don't necessarily tell you enough to decide whether they fit into your reading plan. === [https://comicbookreadingorders.com/dc/ DC Reading Orders - Comic Book Reading Orders] === ==== Pros ==== * It appears to be comprehensive. * It contains several reading plans, including a nicely organized set of events. * The overview page (linked above) summarizes various starting points for reading. * The reading orders include some comments about issue contents that can help you decide whether an issue fits into your reading plan. ==== Cons ==== * It lists individual issues rather than collections. The trade paperback (TPB) reading orders that would fill this need are planned. See the section "Procedure for using Comic Book Reading Orders" below for an idea of how you could create collection reading order out of an issue reading order. * The issues aren't linked to anything, so to connect them with any outside information, you'd have to search for them yourself in the relevant websites. * A lot of the issues don't have comments, so you'd have to research them you're not sure they fit into your plan. == Recommendations == === The easy plan === If you're not worried about utter completeness and you just want to jump in without too much extra work, I'd say follow the [https://www.alltimelines.com/dc-comics-multiverse-chronology/events/ events reading order from All Timelines]. If you find you need more information, you can always fill in the gaps from other sources. === The hard plan === If you want more control over your reading and you don't mind a lot more work, try one of the reading orders from Comic Book Reading Orders (CBRO). Since in this example we want to read collections, the next section will suggest a procedure for finding collections based on CBRO's lists. === Either plan === Even if you don't create your own list from CBRO, skimming through the procedure might give you some helpful tips for whatever reading method you choose. == Procedure for using Comic Book Reading Orders == # Go to [https://comicbookreadingorders.com/dc/ the main DC page on Comic Book Reading Orders]. Decide if you want an event reading order or the comprehensive (master) one. Let's be intense and try the master reading order. Here's [https://comicbookreadingorders.com/dc/dc-master-reading-order-part-1/ part 1]. # Choose some issues to read. CBRO comments on some of the issues in its reading orders, which can help you decide whether you want to read or skip them. # Begin searching for the issues on [https://www.comics.org/ Grand Comics Database] (GCD). Here's [https://www.comics.org/searchNew/?q=Action%20Comics%20%231%20%281938%29 an example of a search]. # Look for a result labeled "[ISSUE]" that matches the title, issue number, and title year (if included), and follow the issue's link. For example: [https://www.comics.org/issue/293/ Action Comics (DC, 1938 series) #1]. # There will be a section toward the top of the page with information that applies to the whole issue. The sections below that apply to each story in the issue. In the issue overview section, look for the list of reprints, if there is one. These are mostly collections (represented by a series title and number) that include that issue. The title should have the word "in" before it. If it has the word "from," then the issue you're looking at is the reprint of that story or issue. For example, at the time I'm writing this, the first reprint in the list for our example issue is [https://www.comics.org/issue/24740/#1233765 Superman from the Thirties to the Seventies (Crown Publishers, 1971 series)]. # For efficient reading, we're especially looking for volumes that also include other issues from the reading order. They should probably also be published in your country, indicated by the flag icon. If you don't want to put in a lot of effort coordinating volumes, you can just pick one and move on to the next step. If you don't mind the work, there are a couple of ways to do it: #* The hard way: View some promising collections for an issue and compare their contents to the issues in the reading order. You're looking for stories in the collection that say they're reprints "from" an issue in your reading order. For example, [https://www.comics.org/issue/59761/ Superman: The Action Comics Archives #1] has a section called "[Action Comics #1]." In that section the reprints list has one item, "from Action Comics (DC, 1938 series) #1 (June 1938)." Down the page in the section called "[Action Comics #6]" there's another reprinted issue from our reading order, Action Comics (DC, 1938 series) #6. #* The less hard way: Search for each issue and compare their lists of reprints. This method seems simpler, so I recommend this over the first one. You won't have to hunt through so many GCD pages looking for reprinted issues. For example, [https://www.comics.org/issue/293/ Action Comics (DC, 1938 series) #1] and [https://www.comics.org/issue/2894/ Action Comics #60] both list the collection [https://www.comics.org/issue/1540211/ Superman: The War Years 1938-1945]. Unfortunately, that collection only includes the cover from Action Comics #60 and not any of its stories, so you'd have to look somewhere else for the whole issue, or at least the relevant parts. [https://www.comics.org/issue/1658497/ Superman: The Golden Age Omnibus #3] contains the 12-page Superman-related story from that issue. # Once you've chosen one or more collections and you're ready to read, then buy or borrow them. # Repeat this procedure till you've finished your reading plan. == Conclusion == As you can see, compiling a complete list of DC event collections takes a lot of time. We can be grateful that others have done most of the work for us. If there's more work to be done, it might be the kind that can be largely automated. If you have programming skills, that could be a worthwhile project. [[Category:Comics]] [[Category:Procedures]] [[Category:Complete]] 48fb9381f5dcb858908b90551c0c6d35696fb2e3 14 159 422 2019-04-09T04:08:05Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the category. wikitext text/x-wiki [[Category:Genres]] 75fe0104216c967febe971952d7599328af69021 0 113 423 333 2019-04-09T04:14:33Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added an Example section with a link to the DC events reading order procedure. wikitext text/x-wiki Comics are an inviting art form for many reasons, but they're also an overwhelming one. There are just too many comics to know where to start or to easily make sense of the material. At least that's how it can look to a newcomer. This article is a beginner-to-beginner guide to getting started in reading comics. That is, I have a long way to go before I'd call myself an expert, but I'm far enough along that I have things to say. When I was starting my latest attempt to launch into the world of comics, I asked Google for some getting-started guides. It gave me some, and they were helpful, but they didn't entirely give me what I wanted. So I've done some of my own research and put together a guide that's closer to the map I'm looking for. In this guide I'll invite you to be an explorer. The world of comics is vast, and so is the world of comics discussion. My goal is to give you a way to think about these discussions and then give you starting points for finding them. It's up to you to chart your own path. This is a work in progress, so expect some updates! == Mapping the territory == Before we start navigating, it might be good to get an overall picture of the world we'll be traveling. Here's a good starting point: * [http://www.comicspectrum.com/comics.html Comics - Comic Spectrum] - These articles give brief overviews of different aspects of comics, from which are the major publishers to how to buy comics to what the deal is with manga and webcomics. The next sites cover large areas of the comics industry in detail. You can use them as references to search for specific information or wander through them aimlessly, clicking any links that catch your eye. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portal:Comics The Comics Portal - Wikipedia] * [http://animanga.wikia.com/wiki/Animanga_Wiki Animanga Wiki] * [https://dmoztools.net/Arts/Comics/ Arts > Comics - dmoztools.net] - The comics section of a general web directory, a large, organized collections of links. This site is only a mirror of the original DMOZ directory, which has been shut down, so more recent sites won't be included, but there's still plenty to explore. Even in the age of the web, books are still a good source of information. Here are some worthwhile reference books: * [https://www.amazon.com/DC-Comics-History-Daniel-Wallace/dp/1465433848/ DC Comics: A Visual History, Updated Edition] - This book highlights the major developments in DC Comics for each year the publisher has existed, heavily illustrated with comic covers and other art. It's a good place to find artists to follow, pick up on major characters and storylines, and place it all in the context of other developments in the comic industry and in world history. * [https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1465414436/ Marvel Year by Year, Updated and Expanded] - The Marvel version of the DC visual history. == Choosing destinations == Whenever you start on a journey, you'll want a destination in mind, or at least a purpose for your travels. For example: * Every few months comic-related hype blows up your Twitter feed, and you want to see what all the hubbub is about. * You've dabbled in comics and want to explore them more extensively. * You like comic fans and want to be able to talk with them. * You want to study the work of other comic creators to learn how to tell your own stories with pictures. * You just want to read some good visual stories. Your goals will guide your decisions along the way. Before going into the details, though, let's look more closely at some destinations you might be aiming for. === Keeping up with new comics === One of your goals might be to catch up on some current storylines in comics so you can keep up with them going forward. How will you keep up once you've caught up? Here's some advice on doing that: * [https://www.themarysue.com/how-to-buy-comics-a-beginners-guide/ How To Buy Comics: A Beginner’s Guide - The Mary Sue] * [http://comicsalliance.com/small-press-previews-indie-comics-website/ Small Press Previews: A New Way Of Keeping Up To Date With The Latest Indie Comics - Comics Alliance] Here are some places to find out about new comic releases: * [https://www.previewsworld.com/NewReleases New Releases - Previews World] * [http://freshcomics.us/ Fresh Comics] * [http://www.midtowncomics.com/ Midtown Comics] * [http://indiecomicsmagazine.com/ Indie Comics Magazine] * [http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/news/archive News Archive - Anime News Network] - Search the post titles for "releases." === Places to talk about comics === If one of your goals is to discuss comics with other fans, there's no shortage of places to do that. Here are some starting points for finding them: * [https://www.meetup.com/find/events/?keywords=comics Comics meetups near you - Meetup.com] - Places to talk to fellow comic fans in person. * [https://www.reddit.com/r/comics/ Comics - Reddit] * [https://www.reddit.com/r/manga/ Manga - Reddit] * [https://www.wishberry.in/blog/10-international-comic-blogs-that-keep-you-updated-with-the-comic-space/ 10 International Comic Blogs That Keep You Updated With The Comic Space - Wishberry] - Most blogs like these let you comment on the posts, and some even have forums so you can start your own discussions. * [http://www.theweeklypull.net/ The Weekly Pull] - The hub for a group of large comic-related YouTube channels, centered around their shared podcast. They sometimes have guests from other channels, such as [http://www.theweeklypull.net/the-weekly-pull-podcast-episode-22-wnerdsync-productions NerdSync], so you can get an idea of who else is out there. In addition to podcast episodes and YouTube videos, the site features articles and a forum. == Planning routes == Once you have an idea of your destination, or at least the kind of travel you want to experience, how will you get there? The approach I'm recommending is to pick one or more specific ways to organize your journey and then pick a strategy for choosing your stops along the way. Here are some other writers who recommend a similar approach: * [http://www.howtolovecomics.com/2013/09/12/how-do-i-get-into-comics-guide-for-those-new-to-comics/ How Do I Get Into Comics? - How to Love Comics] - A good set of general advice. * [http://lifehacker.com/how-to-get-started-reading-comics-that-have-been-runnin-1692145879 How to Get Started Reading Comics That Have Been Running For Decades - Lifehacker] * [http://www.comicbookherald.com/how-to-start-reading-comics/ How To Start Reading Comics In 2017: A Beginner’s Guide - Comic Book Herald] In my version of this scheme, the organizing factors you could choose are * sources (places to find comics), * stories (quality, stand-alone comic collections), * creators (writers and artists), * events (important stories from a character's life or a publisher's continuity), * and themes (topics or story elements). I'll go into more detail on each of these factors in the rest of this section. But first let's talk about some basic strategies for choosing comics from your chosen route. === Strategies for choosing comics === Any path you choose will probably include a lot of comics. There are a few patterns you could use to decide on which of those to read: * '''Serendipitous selecting''' - In this strategy you pick up any comics that appeal to you without worrying about the ones you leave on the shelf. Your selection can end up looking kind of random. Serendipity is especially helpful for the times when you're looking for possible new routes. When using this strategy, it helps if you aren't a completist. Otherwise you'll still worry about the comics you've left behind. * '''Exhaustive selecting''' - In this strategy you read every comic you can get your hands on in the route you've chosen. In some cases the route is short enough that this will be manageable. In other cases it'll be challenging or impossible, and that's a good time to consider the next strategy. * '''Ranked selecting''' - In this strategy you read only the important comics in your route. It'll take some research, advice, and thought to decide which comics are important to you, but it could save you a lot of extra reading time. Now let's look at some ways to find routes. === Source-oriented routes === In this method, you base your selection on whatever you can pick up from a particular source. Sources include libraries, brick-and-mortar stores, and online stores. You probably won't be able to read everything your source offers, so I'd say this method works best with a serendipitous strategy. It's a good way to sample comics when you're looking for a route from another category, such as finding a character to follow (that is, a story- or event-oriented route). * [http://bookriot.com/2016/06/20/6-ways-to-keep-up-with-comics-when-youre-broke/ 6 Ways to Keep up With Comics When You’re Broke - Book Riot] - This article describes some sources of cheap or free comics. ==== Free comics ==== * [http://www.worldcat.org/ WorldCat] - An online catalog of thousands of libraries worldwide. If you're only after good comics from your local library, take a trip there and look around. If you're looking for a specific comic, you can search this catalog and see which libraries near you have it. If none of them do, you can probably borrow it through your local library's [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interlibrary_loan interlibrary loan] service. * [https://www.hoopladigital.com/browse/comic/popular Comics - Hoopla] - Libraries subscribe to this service to offer you digital comics (along with ebooks, audiobooks, music, and movies). Check your library's website to see if they're signed up with Hoopla. * [https://www.comixology.com/free-comics Free Comics - comiXology] - Free digital comics from one of the major online retailers. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_Comic_Book_Day Free Comic Book Day - Wikipedia] - An annual event that offers a set of free promotional comics through your local comic stores. * [http://l-lists.com/en/lists/quobv1.html List of Webcomic Directories - L-Lists] - The sites on this list link to thousands of webcomics, most of them completely free. ==== Paid comics ==== * [http://www.freecomicbookday.com/storelocator Find a Shop - Free Comic Book Day] - A searchable directory of physical comic book stores. These are good places to get overwhelmed by comics and to subscribe to regular installments of your favorite titles. * [https://www.yelp.com/search?find_desc=Bookstores Bookstores near you - Yelp] - Bookstores sell comics too. One notable chain is [https://www.hpb.com/ Half Price Books], which happily buys and sells used comics and graphic novels. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_comic#Notable_digital_distributors Notable digital distributors - Digital comic - Wikipedia] - Places to buy digital comics online. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_comics_publishing_companies List of comics publishing companies - Wikipedia] - You may be able to order print or digital comics directly from your favorite publishers. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_manga_distributors List of manga distributors - Wikipedia] - Places to buy manga, in some cases the digital editions. === Story-oriented routes === With this method you're looking for high quality comics. You don't care if they're important to a larger storyline. It helps if these are stand-alone stories, but they don't have to be. You can find these by visiting some of the more selective comic sources, such as libraries, and reading whatever they've decided is worth offering. Here's one source of lists that are based on data: * [http://www.diamondcomics.com/Home/1/1/3/237 Industry Statistics - Diamond Comic Distributors, Inc.] - Diamond distributes comics from publishers to retailers. This page links to their monthly lists of top selling comics and graphic novels. These ranks are based on orders from retailers rather than purchases by customers, but they should give you a good idea of the significant titles you might want to read. You can also look for lists of good comics online through web searches such as these: * [https://www.google.com/search?q=best+comics+stories Best comics stories - Google] * [https://www.google.com/search?q=new+to+comics New to comics - Google] * [https://www.google.com/search?q=comics+getting+started Comics getting started - Google] * [https://www.google.com/search?q=best+stand+alone+comics Best stand alone comics - Google] * [https://www.google.com/search?q=literary+comics Literary comics - Google] * [https://www.google.com/search?q=best+indie+comics Best indie comics - Google] * [https://www.google.com/search?q=best+manga Best manga - Google] You'll find a lot of these lists. Here are a bunch to start with: * [http://twocatscomicbookstore.blogspot.com/p/new-to-reading-comic-books-heres-where.html New to Comics? Start Here! - All Things Geeky] * [http://mashable.com/2015/08/02/comics-for-new-fans/#U7pBRxbd9sqF 25 comic books for nerdy newbies to read first - Mashable] * [https://comicvine.gamespot.com/profile/johnkmccubbin91/lists/my-top-stories-and-story-arcs-of-all-time/44413/ My Top Stories and Story Arcs of All Time - Comic Vine] * [http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/lists/superhero-comic-books-100-best-934371 100 Greatest Superhero Comics - Hollywood Reporter] * [http://www.complex.com/pop-culture/2013/01/the-25-comic-books-you-need-to-read-before-you-die/ The 25 Comic Books You Need To Read Before You Die - Complex] * [https://forbiddenplanet.com/log/50-best-best-graphic-novels/ 50 Best Of The Best Graphic Novels - Forbidden Planet] * [http://www.listchallenges.com/top-100-comic-book-storylines Top 100 Comic Book Storylines - List Challenges] * [http://www.comicbookherald.com/the-best-comics-of-all-time/ Dave’s Faves: All The Best Comics I’ve Ever Read - Comic Book Herald] * [http://www.nerdophiles.com/2015/01/25/a-beginners-guide-to-literary-comics/ A Beginner’s Guide to Literary Comics - Nerdophiles] * [http://www.rollingstone.com/culture/lists/drawn-out-the-50-best-non-superhero-graphic-novels-20140505 Drawn Out: The 50 Best Non-Superhero Graphic Novels - Rolling Stone] * [https://www.buzzfeed.com/summeranne/60-comics-everyone-should-read?utm_term=.axBWP74x1R#.hqQM2PK43k 60 Comics Everyone Should Read - BuzzFeed] * [https://www.comixology.com/New-to-comiXology-Start-Here/page/502 New to Comics? Start Here! - comiXology] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_best-selling_manga List of best-selling manga - Wikipedia] * [https://www.theguardian.com/childrens-books-site/2014/feb/03/manga-top-ten-teens Manga comics: where to start - The Guardian] === Creator-oriented routes === In this method you pick one or more comic writers or artists to follow and read some or all of their works. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Comics_creators Category:Comics creators - Wikipedia] * [https://pjmedia.com/lifestyle/2014/6/25/the-10-greatest-comic-book-writers-of-all-time/ The 10 Greatest Comic Book Writers of All Time - PJ Media] * [http://www.goliath.com/comics/the-10-most-influential-comic-book-writers-of-all-time/ The 10 Most Influential Comic Book Writers Of All Time - Goliath] * [http://www.creativebloq.com/comics/comic-book-artists-712389 The 10 greatest comic book artists of all time - Creative Bloq] * [http://www.comicartfans.com/comicartistsmain.asp Comic Artists - Comicartfans] - A large database of artists with lists on the front page of top ranking entries. * [http://geekandsundry.com/keep-current-by-reading-this-one-bleeding-edge-comic-book/ Keep Current by Reading This One Bleeding Edge Comic Book - Geek & Sundry] === Event-oriented routes === Many stories in comics take place in the context of a larger storyline. You could view the life of a character or team as a single storyline, or an entire comic book series, or even a publisher's complete body of work. One type of route is to read through one or more of these story arcs. If you have the time, you could try to read through every issue of the arc, or you can find ways to narrow down the list to the most interesting or important parts of the story. The fact that the top two publishers treat so much of their material as one semi-cohesive set of stories is one reason people find comics so hard to start reading. The good news is that both DC and Marvel periodically publish major story arcs in the form of crossover events. These events can serve as a way to organize the overall storyline of the publisher's universe. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Publication_history_of_DC_Comics_crossover_events Publication history of DC Comics crossover events - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Publication_history_of_Marvel_Comics_crossover_events Publication history of Marvel Comics crossover events - Wikipedia] Some story arcs can be hard to follow because they're spread out over a long time period and draw from several comic titles. So a lot of people have taken the time to put together reading orders to guide you, either through every issue of the story or through what they consider the most important parts. Here are some sites that cover a lot of storylines, mostly from DC and Marvel: * [http://www.comicbookherald.com/ Comic Book Herald] * [http://comicbookreadingorders.com/ Comic Book Reading Orders] * [http://www.tradereadingorder.com/list/comics/ Comics - Trade Reading Order] * [http://www.readingorders.com/ Comic Reading Orders] * [http://www.dcindexes.com/ Mike's Amazing World of Comics] * [https://www.reddit.com/r/comicreadingorders/ Comic Reading Orders - Reddit] * [http://cmro.travis-starnes.com/ The Complete Marvel Reading Order] * [http://www.alltimelines.com/all-comic-timelines/ All Comic Timelines - All Timelines] - This site puts the comics from various universes in chronological rather than publication order. * [http://www.supermegamonkey.net/chronocomic/ Marvel Comics Chronology - SuperMegaMonkey] If you search the web yourself for reading orders, you'll also find some for more obscure storylines, such as this interesting project that explores short-lived publishers from the 1990s: * [http://www.theshareduniverse.com/tag/dead-universes/ Dead Universes - The Shared Universe] A lot of reading orders list individual comic issues, but these can be hard to get your hands on. Fortunately, publishers often release collections of related issues as trade paperbacks or hardcovers, and these are a lot easier to find. How will you know which collections have the issues you need? The database sites below will help. Search for an issue, and the issue's page will list other issues or collections where it's been reprinted: * [https://www.comics.org/ The Grand Comics Database] - The GCD lists reprints of the individual stories within an issue. * [http://comicbookdb.com/ Comic Book DB] - Trade paperback collections are labeled TPB, and hardcovers are labeled HC. === Theme-oriented routes === This last method is sort of a catch-all category for factors that cut across the other methods. These include story elements, genres, audiences, topics, and any other factor you can think of. Sometimes you'll find websites about comics on your chosen theme, but in a lot of cases, the best way to find relevant comics is a good old fashioned web search. Here are some examples: * [https://www.google.com/search?q=comics+about+cyborgs Comics about cyborgs - Google] - A story element, a character type. * [https://www.google.com/search?q=comics+set+in+chicago Comics set in Chicago - Google] - Another story element, a setting. * [https://www.google.com/search?q=slice+of+life+manga Slice of life manga - Google] - A genre. * [https://www.google.com/search?q=manga+about+revenge Manga about revenge - Google] - A topic. * [http://www.kidscomics.com/Home/1/1/60/1046 Kids Comics] - An audience. == Example == Here's a more detailed look at how you could put together [[DC Event Collection Reading Order|a plan for reading through DC's events]]. == Closing thoughts == In this guide I've tried to give you a broad set of starting points for planning your comic reading adventures. The next steps are up to you. Pick a goal, pick a method, do some research, chart a course, and have fun reading. Maybe even share your journey with others. And feel free to leave feedback on this guide in the comments below. == Planned updates == * Add examples. * Cover the different types of comics more evenly (superhero, licensed, literary, webcomics, manga, etc.). <disqus/> [[Category:Comics]] [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Developing]] f99b7f86ec00a9fefd2f4fa5e0384deae619ae29 441 423 2019-04-28T09:40:38Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added links to lists of experimental comics. wikitext text/x-wiki Comics are an inviting art form for many reasons, but they're also an overwhelming one. There are just too many comics to know where to start or to easily make sense of the material. At least that's how it can look to a newcomer. This article is a beginner-to-beginner guide to getting started in reading comics. That is, I have a long way to go before I'd call myself an expert, but I'm far enough along that I have things to say. When I was starting my latest attempt to launch into the world of comics, I asked Google for some getting-started guides. It gave me some, and they were helpful, but they didn't entirely give me what I wanted. So I've done some of my own research and put together a guide that's closer to the map I'm looking for. In this guide I'll invite you to be an explorer. The world of comics is vast, and so is the world of comics discussion. My goal is to give you a way to think about these discussions and then give you starting points for finding them. It's up to you to chart your own path. This is a work in progress, so expect some updates! == Mapping the territory == Before we start navigating, it might be good to get an overall picture of the world we'll be traveling. Here's a good starting point: * [http://www.comicspectrum.com/comics.html Comics - Comic Spectrum] - These articles give brief overviews of different aspects of comics, from which are the major publishers to how to buy comics to what the deal is with manga and webcomics. The next sites cover large areas of the comics industry in detail. You can use them as references to search for specific information or wander through them aimlessly, clicking any links that catch your eye. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portal:Comics The Comics Portal - Wikipedia] * [http://animanga.wikia.com/wiki/Animanga_Wiki Animanga Wiki] * [https://dmoztools.net/Arts/Comics/ Arts > Comics - dmoztools.net] - The comics section of a general web directory, a large, organized collections of links. This site is only a mirror of the original DMOZ directory, which has been shut down, so more recent sites won't be included, but there's still plenty to explore. Even in the age of the web, books are still a good source of information. Here are some worthwhile reference books: * [https://www.amazon.com/DC-Comics-History-Daniel-Wallace/dp/1465433848/ DC Comics: A Visual History, Updated Edition] - This book highlights the major developments in DC Comics for each year the publisher has existed, heavily illustrated with comic covers and other art. It's a good place to find artists to follow, pick up on major characters and storylines, and place it all in the context of other developments in the comic industry and in world history. * [https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1465414436/ Marvel Year by Year, Updated and Expanded] - The Marvel version of the DC visual history. == Choosing destinations == Whenever you start on a journey, you'll want a destination in mind, or at least a purpose for your travels. For example: * Every few months comic-related hype blows up your Twitter feed, and you want to see what all the hubbub is about. * You've dabbled in comics and want to explore them more extensively. * You like comic fans and want to be able to talk with them. * You want to study the work of other comic creators to learn how to tell your own stories with pictures. * You just want to read some good visual stories. Your goals will guide your decisions along the way. Before going into the details, though, let's look more closely at some destinations you might be aiming for. === Keeping up with new comics === One of your goals might be to catch up on some current storylines in comics so you can keep up with them going forward. How will you keep up once you've caught up? Here's some advice on doing that: * [https://www.themarysue.com/how-to-buy-comics-a-beginners-guide/ How To Buy Comics: A Beginner’s Guide - The Mary Sue] * [http://comicsalliance.com/small-press-previews-indie-comics-website/ Small Press Previews: A New Way Of Keeping Up To Date With The Latest Indie Comics - Comics Alliance] Here are some places to find out about new comic releases: * [https://www.previewsworld.com/NewReleases New Releases - Previews World] * [http://freshcomics.us/ Fresh Comics] * [http://www.midtowncomics.com/ Midtown Comics] * [http://indiecomicsmagazine.com/ Indie Comics Magazine] * [http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/news/archive News Archive - Anime News Network] - Search the post titles for "releases." === Places to talk about comics === If one of your goals is to discuss comics with other fans, there's no shortage of places to do that. Here are some starting points for finding them: * [https://www.meetup.com/find/events/?keywords=comics Comics meetups near you - Meetup.com] - Places to talk to fellow comic fans in person. * [https://www.reddit.com/r/comics/ Comics - Reddit] * [https://www.reddit.com/r/manga/ Manga - Reddit] * [https://www.wishberry.in/blog/10-international-comic-blogs-that-keep-you-updated-with-the-comic-space/ 10 International Comic Blogs That Keep You Updated With The Comic Space - Wishberry] - Most blogs like these let you comment on the posts, and some even have forums so you can start your own discussions. * [http://www.theweeklypull.net/ The Weekly Pull] - The hub for a group of large comic-related YouTube channels, centered around their shared podcast. They sometimes have guests from other channels, such as [http://www.theweeklypull.net/the-weekly-pull-podcast-episode-22-wnerdsync-productions NerdSync], so you can get an idea of who else is out there. In addition to podcast episodes and YouTube videos, the site features articles and a forum. == Planning routes == Once you have an idea of your destination, or at least the kind of travel you want to experience, how will you get there? The approach I'm recommending is to pick one or more specific ways to organize your journey and then pick a strategy for choosing your stops along the way. Here are some other writers who recommend a similar approach: * [http://www.howtolovecomics.com/2013/09/12/how-do-i-get-into-comics-guide-for-those-new-to-comics/ How Do I Get Into Comics? - How to Love Comics] - A good set of general advice. * [http://lifehacker.com/how-to-get-started-reading-comics-that-have-been-runnin-1692145879 How to Get Started Reading Comics That Have Been Running For Decades - Lifehacker] * [http://www.comicbookherald.com/how-to-start-reading-comics/ How To Start Reading Comics In 2017: A Beginner’s Guide - Comic Book Herald] In my version of this scheme, the organizing factors you could choose are * sources (places to find comics), * stories (quality, stand-alone comic collections), * creators (writers and artists), * events (important stories from a character's life or a publisher's continuity), * and themes (topics or story elements). I'll go into more detail on each of these factors in the rest of this section. But first let's talk about some basic strategies for choosing comics from your chosen route. === Strategies for choosing comics === Any path you choose will probably include a lot of comics. There are a few patterns you could use to decide on which of those to read: * '''Serendipitous selecting''' - In this strategy you pick up any comics that appeal to you without worrying about the ones you leave on the shelf. Your selection can end up looking kind of random. Serendipity is especially helpful for the times when you're looking for possible new routes. When using this strategy, it helps if you aren't a completist. Otherwise you'll still worry about the comics you've left behind. * '''Exhaustive selecting''' - In this strategy you read every comic you can get your hands on in the route you've chosen. In some cases the route is short enough that this will be manageable. In other cases it'll be challenging or impossible, and that's a good time to consider the next strategy. * '''Ranked selecting''' - In this strategy you read only the important comics in your route. It'll take some research, advice, and thought to decide which comics are important to you, but it could save you a lot of extra reading time. Now let's look at some ways to find routes. === Source-oriented routes === In this method, you base your selection on whatever you can pick up from a particular source. Sources include libraries, brick-and-mortar stores, and online stores. You probably won't be able to read everything your source offers, so I'd say this method works best with a serendipitous strategy. It's a good way to sample comics when you're looking for a route from another category, such as finding a character to follow (that is, a story- or event-oriented route). * [http://bookriot.com/2016/06/20/6-ways-to-keep-up-with-comics-when-youre-broke/ 6 Ways to Keep up With Comics When You’re Broke - Book Riot] - This article describes some sources of cheap or free comics. ==== Free comics ==== * [http://www.worldcat.org/ WorldCat] - An online catalog of thousands of libraries worldwide. If you're only after good comics from your local library, take a trip there and look around. If you're looking for a specific comic, you can search this catalog and see which libraries near you have it. If none of them do, you can probably borrow it through your local library's [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interlibrary_loan interlibrary loan] service. * [https://www.hoopladigital.com/browse/comic/popular Comics - Hoopla] - Libraries subscribe to this service to offer you digital comics (along with ebooks, audiobooks, music, and movies). Check your library's website to see if they're signed up with Hoopla. * [https://www.comixology.com/free-comics Free Comics - comiXology] - Free digital comics from one of the major online retailers. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_Comic_Book_Day Free Comic Book Day - Wikipedia] - An annual event that offers a set of free promotional comics through your local comic stores. * [http://l-lists.com/en/lists/quobv1.html List of Webcomic Directories - L-Lists] - The sites on this list link to thousands of webcomics, most of them completely free. ==== Paid comics ==== * [http://www.freecomicbookday.com/storelocator Find a Shop - Free Comic Book Day] - A searchable directory of physical comic book stores. These are good places to get overwhelmed by comics and to subscribe to regular installments of your favorite titles. * [https://www.yelp.com/search?find_desc=Bookstores Bookstores near you - Yelp] - Bookstores sell comics too. One notable chain is [https://www.hpb.com/ Half Price Books], which happily buys and sells used comics and graphic novels. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_comic#Notable_digital_distributors Notable digital distributors - Digital comic - Wikipedia] - Places to buy digital comics online. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_comics_publishing_companies List of comics publishing companies - Wikipedia] - You may be able to order print or digital comics directly from your favorite publishers. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_manga_distributors List of manga distributors - Wikipedia] - Places to buy manga, in some cases the digital editions. === Story-oriented routes === With this method you're looking for high quality comics. You don't care if they're important to a larger storyline. It helps if these are stand-alone stories, but they don't have to be. You can find these by visiting some of the more selective comic sources, such as libraries, and reading whatever they've decided is worth offering. Here's one source of lists that are based on data: * [http://www.diamondcomics.com/Home/1/1/3/237 Industry Statistics - Diamond Comic Distributors, Inc.] - Diamond distributes comics from publishers to retailers. This page links to their monthly lists of top selling comics and graphic novels. These ranks are based on orders from retailers rather than purchases by customers, but they should give you a good idea of the significant titles you might want to read. You can also look for lists of good comics online through web searches such as these: * [https://www.google.com/search?q=best+comics+stories Best comics stories - Google] * [https://www.google.com/search?q=new+to+comics New to comics - Google] * [https://www.google.com/search?q=comics+getting+started Comics getting started - Google] * [https://www.google.com/search?q=best+stand+alone+comics Best stand alone comics - Google] * [https://www.google.com/search?q=literary+comics Literary comics - Google] * [https://www.google.com/search?q=best+indie+comics Best indie comics - Google] * [https://www.google.com/search?q=best+manga Best manga - Google] You'll find a lot of these lists. Here are a bunch to start with: * [http://twocatscomicbookstore.blogspot.com/p/new-to-reading-comic-books-heres-where.html New to Comics? Start Here! - All Things Geeky] * [http://mashable.com/2015/08/02/comics-for-new-fans/#U7pBRxbd9sqF 25 comic books for nerdy newbies to read first - Mashable] * [https://comicvine.gamespot.com/profile/johnkmccubbin91/lists/my-top-stories-and-story-arcs-of-all-time/44413/ My Top Stories and Story Arcs of All Time - Comic Vine] * [http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/lists/superhero-comic-books-100-best-934371 100 Greatest Superhero Comics - Hollywood Reporter] * [http://www.complex.com/pop-culture/2013/01/the-25-comic-books-you-need-to-read-before-you-die/ The 25 Comic Books You Need To Read Before You Die - Complex] * [https://forbiddenplanet.com/log/50-best-best-graphic-novels/ 50 Best Of The Best Graphic Novels - Forbidden Planet] * [http://www.listchallenges.com/top-100-comic-book-storylines Top 100 Comic Book Storylines - List Challenges] * [http://www.comicbookherald.com/the-best-comics-of-all-time/ Dave’s Faves: All The Best Comics I’ve Ever Read - Comic Book Herald] * [http://www.nerdophiles.com/2015/01/25/a-beginners-guide-to-literary-comics/ A Beginner’s Guide to Literary Comics - Nerdophiles] * [http://www.rollingstone.com/culture/lists/drawn-out-the-50-best-non-superhero-graphic-novels-20140505 Drawn Out: The 50 Best Non-Superhero Graphic Novels - Rolling Stone] * [https://www.buzzfeed.com/summeranne/60-comics-everyone-should-read?utm_term=.axBWP74x1R#.hqQM2PK43k 60 Comics Everyone Should Read - BuzzFeed] * [https://www.comixology.com/New-to-comiXology-Start-Here/page/502 New to Comics? Start Here! - comiXology] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_best-selling_manga List of best-selling manga - Wikipedia] * [https://www.theguardian.com/childrens-books-site/2014/feb/03/manga-top-ten-teens Manga comics: where to start - The Guardian] === Creator-oriented routes === In this method you pick one or more comic writers or artists to follow and read some or all of their works. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Comics_creators Category:Comics creators - Wikipedia] * [https://pjmedia.com/lifestyle/2014/6/25/the-10-greatest-comic-book-writers-of-all-time/ The 10 Greatest Comic Book Writers of All Time - PJ Media] * [http://www.goliath.com/comics/the-10-most-influential-comic-book-writers-of-all-time/ The 10 Most Influential Comic Book Writers Of All Time - Goliath] * [http://www.creativebloq.com/comics/comic-book-artists-712389 The 10 greatest comic book artists of all time - Creative Bloq] * [http://www.comicartfans.com/comicartistsmain.asp Comic Artists - Comicartfans] - A large database of artists with lists on the front page of top ranking entries. * [http://geekandsundry.com/keep-current-by-reading-this-one-bleeding-edge-comic-book/ Keep Current by Reading This One Bleeding Edge Comic Book - Geek & Sundry] * Creators of experimental comics ** [[Experimental Literature Links#Experimental_comics|Experimental comics]] ** [[Experimental Literature Links#Comic-based_autobiography|Autobiographical comics]] ** [[Experimental Literature Links#Medium|More autobiographical comics]] === Event-oriented routes === Many stories in comics take place in the context of a larger storyline. You could view the life of a character or team as a single storyline, or an entire comic book series, or even a publisher's complete body of work. One type of route is to read through one or more of these story arcs. If you have the time, you could try to read through every issue of the arc, or you can find ways to narrow down the list to the most interesting or important parts of the story. The fact that the top two publishers treat so much of their material as one semi-cohesive set of stories is one reason people find comics so hard to start reading. The good news is that both DC and Marvel periodically publish major story arcs in the form of crossover events. These events can serve as a way to organize the overall storyline of the publisher's universe. * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Publication_history_of_DC_Comics_crossover_events Publication history of DC Comics crossover events - Wikipedia] * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Publication_history_of_Marvel_Comics_crossover_events Publication history of Marvel Comics crossover events - Wikipedia] Some story arcs can be hard to follow because they're spread out over a long time period and draw from several comic titles. So a lot of people have taken the time to put together reading orders to guide you, either through every issue of the story or through what they consider the most important parts. Here are some sites that cover a lot of storylines, mostly from DC and Marvel: * [http://www.comicbookherald.com/ Comic Book Herald] * [http://comicbookreadingorders.com/ Comic Book Reading Orders] * [http://www.tradereadingorder.com/list/comics/ Comics - Trade Reading Order] * [http://www.readingorders.com/ Comic Reading Orders] * [http://www.dcindexes.com/ Mike's Amazing World of Comics] * [https://www.reddit.com/r/comicreadingorders/ Comic Reading Orders - Reddit] * [http://cmro.travis-starnes.com/ The Complete Marvel Reading Order] * [http://www.alltimelines.com/all-comic-timelines/ All Comic Timelines - All Timelines] - This site puts the comics from various universes in chronological rather than publication order. * [http://www.supermegamonkey.net/chronocomic/ Marvel Comics Chronology - SuperMegaMonkey] If you search the web yourself for reading orders, you'll also find some for more obscure storylines, such as this interesting project that explores short-lived publishers from the 1990s: * [http://www.theshareduniverse.com/tag/dead-universes/ Dead Universes - The Shared Universe] A lot of reading orders list individual comic issues, but these can be hard to get your hands on. Fortunately, publishers often release collections of related issues as trade paperbacks or hardcovers, and these are a lot easier to find. How will you know which collections have the issues you need? The database sites below will help. Search for an issue, and the issue's page will list other issues or collections where it's been reprinted: * [https://www.comics.org/ The Grand Comics Database] - The GCD lists reprints of the individual stories within an issue. * [http://comicbookdb.com/ Comic Book DB] - Trade paperback collections are labeled TPB, and hardcovers are labeled HC. === Theme-oriented routes === This last method is sort of a catch-all category for factors that cut across the other methods. These include story elements, genres, audiences, topics, and any other factor you can think of. Sometimes you'll find websites about comics on your chosen theme, but in a lot of cases, the best way to find relevant comics is a good old fashioned web search. Here are some examples: * [https://www.google.com/search?q=comics+about+cyborgs Comics about cyborgs - Google] - A story element, a character type. * [https://www.google.com/search?q=comics+set+in+chicago Comics set in Chicago - Google] - Another story element, a setting. * [https://www.google.com/search?q=slice+of+life+manga Slice of life manga - Google] - A genre. * [https://www.google.com/search?q=manga+about+revenge Manga about revenge - Google] - A topic. * [http://www.kidscomics.com/Home/1/1/60/1046 Kids Comics] - An audience. == Example == Here's a more detailed look at how you could put together [[DC Event Collection Reading Order|a plan for reading through DC's events]]. == Closing thoughts == In this guide I've tried to give you a broad set of starting points for planning your comic reading adventures. The next steps are up to you. Pick a goal, pick a method, do some research, chart a course, and have fun reading. Maybe even share your journey with others. And feel free to leave feedback on this guide in the comments below. == Planned updates == * Add examples. * Cover the different types of comics more evenly (superhero, licensed, literary, webcomics, manga, etc.). <disqus/> [[Category:Comics]] [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Developing]] 9c31ef757ea014bf5026d1d56a529462044d2a5d 0 121 443 338 2019-08-16T02:52:26Z Andy Culbertson 1 v0.2.0: Reduced to a bullet point, summary format. Added rationales. Replaced my existing, haphazard method with the outline of a more principled one. wikitext text/x-wiki Version 0.2.0, 8/15/2019 == Introduction == === What is conceptual modeling? === * The process of describing a situation in a way that enables someone to fulfill a particular purpose. * It's not the concept modeling of architecture (making a physical model of a design), and it's broader than the conceptual modeling of software design. * Regardless of its specific procedure, logically it divides into two types of activities: ** Analysis: separating the subject matter into its components. ** Synthesis: reassembling the parts by identifying their relationships. === What is this article? === * A summary of my current thinking on a general approach to conceptual modeling. === Rationale === ==== Why am I developing a modeling approach? ==== * Modeling is a key tool in my life, and I want a more effective way to do it. Developing a method will help me use it more often and with a more thorough and consistent procedure. * Modeling should get more widespread use, and work on a general approach can serve as a foundation for its adoption. * It's relatively easy to find tools of analysis and modeling in specific domains, but it's hard to find work that ties it all together. ** Applying a single method to multiple domains means that each domain's conceptual modeling will involve less duplicated work than if they developed their techniques independently. ==== Why am I writing this article? ==== * A summary will help me direct my work and organize the presentation of my findings. The summary is a research agenda. ==== Why do we do conceptual modeling? ==== * To clarify thinking. * To learn information or a skill. * To create other content. * To build tools. * To manage activity. * To reach agreement. * To make decisions. * To solve problems. * In the case of this essay, our purpose is to have a general modeling procedure to apply. ==== Why should we improve it? ==== * Better models help us solve more problems and solve them better. * Faster modeling helps us create these better models sooner. === Interdisciplinarity === ==== What is it? ==== * The collaboration among multiple academic or professional disciplines to pursue the interdisciplinary field's goals. ==== Why should a conceptual modeling method use it? ==== * Different disciplines have methods and frameworks and viewpoints particular to themselves that can be generalized so that other disciplines can use them. ==== How can we use it? ==== * Investigate the potential contributions of various disciplines to modeling. * Collaborate with those disciplines, seeking input and dialoguing for new insights. * Model the modeling of various disciplines, and generalize the results. === Overview: How does conceptual modeling work? === * The modeler follows a process that involves querying internal and external sources in terms of particular conceptual frameworks, evaluating the findings, and encoding the resulting model to present it to the model's stakeholders. === Status === * As a summary, this article doesn't give all the practical advice we'd want. * As a summary, the article doesn't address every question, objection, or competing model. * As a work in progress, much of it is likely to change in the relatively near future. * As a work in progress, it has uneven coverage and gaps that future work will hopefully fill. * As a model of modeling, it's subject to evaluation. * Since I'm an outsider to most of these disciplines, my initial sources are introductory or popular-level treatments. * Since the article is primarily meant for my own use, it might not make complete sense to other people. == Process == === Workflow === ==== What is it? ==== * The large-scale procedure that moves the model from conception to completion. ==== Why do we need it? ==== * A consistent procedure enables more reliable planning and better results. ==== How is it done? ==== * An agile methodology is a good starting point. * Initialize the project. * Gather requirements. * Gather personnel and other resources. * Plan the work. * Research conceptual frameworks and domain knowledge. * Conduct modeling sessions. ** Modify existing frameworks, and create new ones as needed. * Test the results. * Iterate over this procedure to improve the model. * Present the final product. * Close the project. === Mental processes === ==== What is a mental process in conceptual modeling? ==== * A set of activities carried out in the mind to pursue a goal, in this case to become aware of the possible components and relationships of a model and to reason about them. ==== Why should we know about them? ==== * Modeling can't happen without mental processes. * The quality of mental processes vary and can be improved with knowledge and practice. ==== Querying ==== ===== What is it? ===== * Consciously directing the subconscious to deliver answers to explicit or implicit questions. ===== Why do we need it? ===== * It's the way we articulate information we already know but don't have in our immediate awareness. * Having no procedure means the information becomes conscious haphazardly rather than when we need it. ===== How does it work? ===== * The mind recalls information based on cues. * To ask questions you need a conceptual framework, even a simple and fragmentary one. Your subconscious is matching its perceptions and contents to patterns. * Make guesses about answers, and evaluate them based on the feelings and thoughts your subconscious reports back with. * The mind can index information in many ways, so be varied in your cues. * Externalize the information you surface to serve as further cues without burdening your working memory. ==== Reasoning ==== ===== What is it? ===== * The application of logic to information to draw inferences and evaluate claims. ===== Why do we need it? ===== * Reality apparently works in a consistent and logical fashion, and models that aren't regulated by logic have a higher chance of clashing with reality, thus failing or causing harm. ===== How is it done? ===== * Learn appropriate conceptual frameworks for logic: categorical, propositional, first-order, bayesian, informal fallacies, cognitive biases, etc. * Carry out the mental processes of modeling, applying the logical frameworks to the information and following the conclusions the applications indicate. === Productivity === ==== What is it? ==== * Practices engaged in to maximize the amount of work accomplished. ==== Why do we need it? ==== * Using time wisely is responsible. * Many projects will be under a time crunch. * Maximizing work gives you a competitive advantage, against the problems you're solving, if nothing else. ==== How is it done? ==== * Follow general productivity practices. * Follow nonlinear modeling. * Apply as many frameworks as applicable. * Build on previous work. === Sources === * Agile development * Design thinking * Engineering == Framework == === Construction === ==== What is it? ==== * Creating a new conceptual framework to use in creating a model. ==== Why do we need it? ==== * Models seem to be instantiations of more general frameworks. * Our minds need expectations to serve as cues for surfacing more information and patterns to recognize. * Models need many different shapes and features to account for all the situations we need to understand to solve all the kinds of problems we encounter. * New frameworks can be created based on preexisting components. ==== How is it done? ==== * The most manipulable models are based on a framework of parts and relationships. * Adapt existing frameworks. ** Components can be assembled from simpler particles and differentiated from more general categories. ** Components can be decomposed and then reshaped. * Abstract from existing models. === Sources === ==== What is it? ==== * Frameworks lie on a spectrum of generality, and different fields tend to generate frameworks in different places along the spectrum. * These are mainly sources on the more general end of the spectrum, plus some closer to the specific end. ==== Why do we need it? ==== * The more general fields give us fundamental frameworks and components that can be applied to a broad range of modeling situations. * The more specific fields give us models that can be applied directly to situations in those fields and to other fields by analogy. ==== How is it done? ==== * Explore likely fundamental fields: ** Linguistics ** Mathematics ** Software engineering ** Knowledge representation ** Knowledge organization ** Data visualization * Explore more specific fields. This list is a small sample: ** Physics ** Systems theory ** Intelligence analysis ** Business analysis ** Social science research == Presentation == === What is it? === * The representation and framing of the model in relation to its purpose for the project's stakeholders. === Why do we need it? === * The models we build are abstractions, but to communicate them and work with them effectively, we have to give them concrete representations. * Fulfilling the project's purpose will usually require communicating more than a bare statement of the model. The presenter will need to frame it, which may include introducing and applying the model. === How is it done? === * Identify the key communication factors. ** Purpose ** Audience ** Context ** Format * Compose the presentation. ** Transform the model into the needed format. ** Frame the model according to the project's purpose. * Conduct the presentation. * Evaluate the presentation. == Examples == From this site: * [[On Being an Agnostic Christian]] * [[A Framework and Agenda for Memory Improvement]] * [[Navigating the World of Comics]] * [[Math Relearning/Fundamentals]] * [[Math Relearning/Number Sense]] * [[Math Relearning/Math Student Simulator/Introduction]] - A discussion of learning by programming. * [[Book Weeding Criteria]] From other authors who seem to take a similar approach: * [https://www.amazon.com/Visualization-Analysis-Design-AK-Peters/dp/1466508914 Visualization Analysis and Design] by Tamara Munzner == Roadmap == Here, in general terms, are the improvements I have in mind for this essay. * Articulate and expand my metamodel. * Articulate the intuitions to follow. * Formalize a procedure. * Articulate a supporting model of the mind. * Expand the method to cover group processes. * Expand it to cover evaluation of claims. * Articulate the essential and distinctive features of my approach. * Expand my library of model patterns. * Expand my library of indirect questions. * Incorporate a programming approach. * Develop arguments for studying modeling. == Potential sources == Alexander, Christopher, and Christopher Alexander. ''The Process of Creating Life: An Essay on the Art of Building and the Nature of the Universe''. The Center for Environmental Structure Series, v. 10. Berkeley, CA: Center for Environmental Structure, 2002. Bernard, H. Russell, Amber Wutich, and Gery Wayne Ryan. ''Analyzing Qualitative Data: Systematic Approaches''. 2nd ed. Los Angeles: SAGE, 2017. Britt, David W. ''A Conceptual Introduction to Modeling: Qualitative and Quantitative Perspectives''. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, 1997. Checkland, Peter. ''Systems Thinking, Systems Practice: Includes a 30-Year Retrospective''. Chichester; New York: John Wiley, 1999. Cooper, Alan. ''About Face: The Essentials of Interaction Design''. 4th ed. Indianapolis, IN: John Wiley and Sons, 2014. Evans, Eric. ''Domain-Driven Design: Tackling Complexity in the Heart of Software''. Boston: Addison-Wesley, 2004. Flood, Robert L. ''Rethinking the Fifth Discipline: Learning within the Unknowable''. London; New York: Routledge, 1999. Halpin, T. A., and A. J. Morgan. ''Information Modeling and Relational Databases''. 2nd ed. Morgan Kaufmann Series in Data Management Systems. Burlington, MA: Elsevier/Morgan Kaufman Publishers, 2008. Herman, Amy. ''Visual Intelligence: Sharpen Your Perception, Change Your Life''. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2016. Heuer, Richards J., and Randolph H. Pherson. ''Structured Analytic Techniques for Intelligence Analysis''. 2nd ed. Washington, DC: CQ Press, 2015. Horton, Susan R. ''Thinking through Writing''. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1982. Huddleston, Rodney D., and Geoffrey K. Pullum. ''A Student’s Introduction to English Grammar''. Cambridge, UK; New York: Cambridge University Press, 2005. Lesh, Richard A., and Helen M. Doerr, eds. ''Beyond Constructivism: Models and Modeling Perspectives on Mathematics Problem Solving, Learning, and Teaching''. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, 2003. McDonald, Kent J. ''Beyond Requirements: Analysis with an Agile Mindset''. New York: Addison-Wesley, 2016. Michalko, Michael. ''Thinkertoys: A Handbook of Creative-Thinking Techniques''. 2nd ed. Berkeley, CA: Ten Speed Press, 2006. Munzner, Tamara. ''Visualization Analysis and Design''. A.K. Peters Visualization Series. Boca Raton: CRC Press, Taylor & Francis Group, CRC Press is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business, 2015. Osborne, Grant R. ''The Hermeneutical Spiral: A Comprehensive Introduction to Biblical Interpretation''. 2nd ed. Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2006. Porter, Bruce, Vladimir Lifschitz, and Frank Van Harmelen, eds. ''Handbook of Knowledge Representation''. 1st ed. Foundations of Artificial Intelligence. Amsterdam; Boston: Elsevier, 2008. Rosenfeld, Louis, Peter Morville, and Jorge Arango. ''Information Architecture: For the Web and Beyond''. 4th ed. Sebastopol, CA: O’Reilly Media, Inc, 2015. Saeed, John I. ''Semantics''. 4th ed. Introducing Linguistics 2. Chichester, West Sussex [England]; Malden, MA: Wiley Blackwell, 2016. Sterman, John. ''Business Dynamics: Systems Thinking and Modeling for a Complex World''. Boston: Irwin/McGraw-Hill, 2000. [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Developing]] [[Category:Philosophy]] 7a0ae4d20234e124354fbf1fce9b7ce8a3803663 0 160 444 2019-09-15T21:24:59Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the article. wikitext text/x-wiki This list is an overview of the institutional side of artificial intelligence, a catalog of the important people, organizations, events, publications, and projects in artificial intelligence research and application. This is a work in progress. Currently it's just the entries from Wikipedia's "[https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=List_of_artificial_intelligence_projects&oldid=912883365 List of artificial intelligence projects]" with some key data picked out. The reason I'm starting with the projects is that I want to the list to end up as a web, and the projects are convenient links between the organizations, people, and domain topics. The topics will be a lesser focus of the overall list, but they give the institutional items meaning. == Specialized projects == === Brain-inspired === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blue_Brain_Project Blue Brain Project], an attempt to create a synthetic brain by [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reverse_engineering reverse-engineering] the mammalian brain down to the molecular level. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brain_simulation *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reverse_engineering ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:New_user_landing_page&page=Brain+and+Mind+Institute *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C3%89cole_Polytechnique_F%C3%A9d%C3%A9rale_de_Lausanne *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_Markram *** https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:New_user_landing_page&page=Felix+Sch%C3%BCrmann *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sean_Hill_(scientist) ** Dates *** Start: 2005-05 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google_Brain Google Brain] A deep learning project part of [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google_X Google X] attempting to have intelligence similar or equal to human-level. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deep_learning ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeff_Dean_(computer_scientist) *** Greg Corrado *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andrew_Ng ** Dates *** Start: 2011 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_Brain_Project Human Brain Project] ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neuroscience *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bio-inspired_computing#Brain-inspired_Computing ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C3%89cole_Polytechnique_F%C3%A9d%C3%A9rale_de_Lausanne ** Dates *** Start: 2013-10-01 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Numenta#Open_Source_Community NuPIC], an open source implementation by [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Numenta Numenta] of its cortical learning algorithm. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hierarchical_temporal_memory ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Numenta ** Dates *** Start: 2013-06 === Cognitive architectures === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/4CAPS 4CAPS], developed at [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carnegie_Mellon_University Carnegie Mellon University] under [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marcel_Just Marcel A. Just] ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognitive_architecture ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marcel_Just *** Sashank Varma ** Dates * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ACT-R ACT-R], developed at Carnegie Mellon University under [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Robert_Anderson_(psychologist) John R. Anderson]. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognitive_architecture ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Robert_Anderson_(psychologist) *** Christian Lebiere ** Dates *** Start: 1998 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AIXI AIXI], Universal Artificial Intelligence developed by [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marcus_Hutter Marcus Hutter] at [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IDSIA IDSIA] and [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australian_National_University ANU]. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mathematical_logic#Formal_logical_systems *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solomonoff%27s_theory_of_inductive_inference *** sequential decision theory *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reinforcement_learning ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marcus_Hutter ** Dates *** Start: 2000 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CALO CALO], a DARPA-funded, 25-institution effort to integrate many artificial intelligence approaches (natural language processing, [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Speech_recognition speech recognition], [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Machine_vision machine vision], [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Probabilistic_logic probabilistic logic], [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Planning planning], [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reasoning reasoning], many forms of [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Machine_learning machine learning]) into an AI assistant that learns to help manage your office environment. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virtual_assistant ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SRI_International ** Dates *** Start: 2003-05 *** End: 2008 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CHREST CHREST], developed under [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fernand_Gobet Fernand Gobet] at [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brunel_University Brunel University] and Peter C. Lane at the [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/University_of_Hertfordshire University of Hertfordshire]. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognitive_architecture *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chunking_(psychology) ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fernand_Gobet *** Peter C. Lane ** Dates * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CLARION_(cognitive_architecture) CLARION], developed under [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ron_Sun Ron Sun] at [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rensselaer_Polytechnic_Institute Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute] and University of Missouri. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognitive_architecture *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Implicit_memory *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Explicit_knowledge ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ron_Sun ** Dates * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/JACK_Intelligent_Agents CoJACK], an [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ACT-R ACT-R] inspired extension to the JACK multi-agent system that adds a cognitive architecture to the agents for eliciting more realistic (human-like) behaviors in virtual environments. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multi-agent_system *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Belief-Desire-Intention_software_model ** Participants *** Agent Oriented Software Pty. Ltd. ** Dates *** Start: 1997 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copycat_(software) Copycat], by [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Douglas_Hofstadter Douglas Hofstadter] and [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Melanie_Mitchell Melanie Mitchell] at the [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indiana_University_(Bloomington) Indiana University]. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognitive_architecture *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Analogy *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parallel_terraced_scan ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Douglas_Hofstadter *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Melanie_Mitchell *** [http://www.cogsci.indiana.edu/ Center for Research on Concepts and Cognition] ** Dates *** Start: 1988 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DUAL_(cognitive_architecture) DUAL], developed at the [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Bulgarian_University New Bulgarian University] under [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boicho_Kokinov Boicho Kokinov]. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognitive_architecture *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Connectionism *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Computational_theory_of_mind *** decentralized representation *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emergent_algorithm ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boicho_Kokinov *** Alexander Petrov *** Georgi Petkov *** Ivan Vankov ** Dates * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FORR FORR] developed by Susan L. Epstein at [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_City_University_of_New_York The City University of New York]. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognitive_architecture *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Machine_learning *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Problem_solving *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bounded_rationality *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Satisficing ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/City_University_of_New_York ** Dates * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LIDA_(cognitive_architecture) IDA and LIDA], implementing [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_Workspace_Theory Global Workspace Theory], developed under [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stan_Franklin Stan Franklin] at the [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/University_of_Memphis University of Memphis]. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognitive_architecture *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognitive_neuroscience *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_Workspace_Theory ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stan_Franklin *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/University_of_Memphis ** Dates * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OpenCog OpenCog] Prime, developed using the OpenCog Framework. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Embodied_cognition *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emergence *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Graphical_user_interface ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ben_Goertzel ** Dates *** Start: 2008 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Procedural_Reasoning_System Procedural Reasoning System] (PRS), developed by [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Georgeff Michael Georgeff] and [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amy_L._Lansky Amy L. Lansky] at [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SRI_International SRI International]. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reasoning_system *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Belief%E2%80%93desire%E2%80%93intention_software_model ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Georgeff *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amy_L._Lansky *** François Félix Ingrand ** Dates * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psi-theory Psi-Theory] developed under [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dietrich_D%C3%B6rner Dietrich Dörner] at the [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Otto-Friedrich_University Otto-Friedrich University] in [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bamberg Bamberg], [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Germany Germany]. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognitive_architecture *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spreading_activation ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dietrich_D%C3%B6rner ** Dates * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/R-CAST R-CAST], developed at the [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pennsylvania_State_University Pennsylvania State University]. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decision_support_system *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Naturalistic_decision-making *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multi-agent_system ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Yen ** Dates * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soar_(cognitive_architecture) Soar], developed under [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allen_Newell Allen Newell] and [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_E._Laird John Laird] at [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carnegie_Mellon_University Carnegie Mellon University] and the [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/University_of_Michigan University of Michigan]. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognitive_architecture ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_E._Laird *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allen_Newell *** Paul Rosenbloom ** Dates *** Start: 1983 ----- * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Society_of_mind Society of mind] and its successor the [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emotion_machine Emotion machine] proposed by [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marvin_Minsky Marvin Minsky]. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognitive_architecture ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marvin_Minsky ** Dates *** Start: 1986 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subsumption_architecture Subsumption architectures], developed e.g. by [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rodney_Brooks Rodney Brooks] (though it could be argued whether they are <i>cognitive</i>). ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robotic_paradigm *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Behavior-based_robotics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Real-time_computing *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autonomous_robot *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Action_selection ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rodney_Brooks ** Dates === Games === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AlphaGo AlphaGo], software developed by [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google Google] that plays the Chinese board game Go. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Board_game *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Go_(game) ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DeepMind ** Dates *** Start: 2014 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinook_(draughts_player) Chinook], a computer program that plays [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/English_draughts English draughts]; the first to win the world champion title in the competition against humans. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/English_draughts ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jonathan_Schaeffer *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rob_Lake *** Paul Lu *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martin_Bryant_(programmer) *** Norman Treloar ** Dates *** Start: 1989 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deep_Blue_(chess_computer) Deep Blue], a chess-playing computer developed by [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM IBM] which beat [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Garry_Kasparov Garry Kasparov] in 1997. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Computer_chess ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Feng-hsiung_Hsu *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Anantharaman *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murray_Campbell ** Dates *** Start: 1985 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FreeHAL FreeHAL], a self-learning conversation simulator ([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chatterbot chatterbot]) which uses semantic nets to organize its knowledge to imitate a very close human behavior within conversations. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Distributed_computing *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chatterbot *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Semantic_network ** Participants ** Dates *** Start: 2008 *** End: 2012 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Halite_AI_Programming_Competition Halite], an artificial intelligence programming competition created by [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Two_Sigma Two Sigma]. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Competitive_programming *** battle ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Two_Sigma *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cornell_Tech *** Benjamin Spector *** Michael Truell ** Dates *** Start: 2016-11 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Libratus Libratus], a poker AI that beat world-class poker players in 2017, intended to be generalisable to other applications. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Texas_hold_%27em *** counterfactual regret minimization ** Participants *** Tuomas Sandholm *** Noam Brown ** Dates *** Start: 2017-01 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quick,_Draw! Quick, Draw!], an online game developed by [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google Google] that challenges players to draw a picture of an object or idea and then uses a [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neural_network neural network] to guess what the drawing is. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neural_network *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guessing#Guessing_games ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google *** Jonas Jongejan *** Henry Rowley *** Takashi Kawashima *** Jongmin Kim *** Ruben Thomson *** Nick Fox-Gieg ** Dates *** Start: 2016-11 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stockfish_(chess) Stockfish AI], an open source chess engine currently ranked the highest in many [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chess_engine#Ratings computer chess rankings]. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chess_engine *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alpha%E2%80%93beta_pruning ** Participants *** Marco Costalba *** Joona Kiiski *** Gary Linscott *** Tord Romstad ** Dates *** Start: 2008-11-02 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TD-Gammon TD-Gammon], a program that learned to play world-class [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Backgammon backgammon] partly by playing against itself ([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Temporal_difference_learning temporal difference learning] with [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Artificial_neural_network neural networks]). ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Backgammon *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Artificial_neural_network *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Temporal_difference_learning ** Participants *** Gerald Tesauro ** Dates *** Start: 1992 === Internet activism === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Serenata_de_Amor Serenata de Amor], project for the analysis of public expenditures and detect discrepancies. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet_activism ** Participants *** Irio Musskopf *** Ana Schwendler *** Pedro Vilanova "Tonny" *** Bruno Pazzim *** Filipe Linhares *** Jessica Temporal *** Yasodara Córdova "Yaso" *** Tatiana Balachova "Russa" ** Dates *** Start: 2016-09-07 === Knowledge and reasoning === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Braina Braina], an [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intelligent_personal_assistant intelligent personal assistant] application with a voice interface for [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_OS Windows OS]. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virtual_assistant *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natural-language_user_interface *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Speech_recognition ** Participants *** Brainasoft ** Dates * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cyc Cyc], an attempt to assemble an [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ontology_(information_science) ontology] and database of everyday knowledge, enabling [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commonsense_reasoning human-like reasoning]. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ontology_(information_science) *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knowledge_base *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commonsense_knowledge_(artificial_intelligence) *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knowledge_representation_and_reasoning *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inference_engine ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Douglas_Lenat ** Dates *** Start: 1984-07 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eurisko Eurisko], a language by [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Douglas_Lenat Douglas Lenat] for solving problems which consists of [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heuristic_algorithm heuristics], including some for how to use and change its heuristics. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Discovery_system *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heuristic ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Douglas_Lenat ** Dates *** Start: 1976 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google_Now Google Now], an intelligent personal assistant with a voice interface in [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google Google]'s [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Android_(operating_system) Android] and [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apple_Inc. Apple Inc.]'s [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IOS iOS], as well as [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google_Chrome Google Chrome] web browser on personal computers. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virtual_assistant ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google ** Dates *** Start: 2012-07-09 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holmes_(computer) Holmes] a new AI created by [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wipro Wipro]. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognitive_computing ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wipro *** Ramprasad K.R. (Rampi) ** Dates *** Start: 2016 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cortana Microsoft Cortana], an intelligent personal assistant with a voice interface in [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft Microsoft]'s various [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_10_editions Windows 10 editions]. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virtual_assistant ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft ** Dates *** Start: 2014-04-02 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mycin Mycin], an early medical expert system. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Backward_chaining *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Expert_system *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inference_engine *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diagnostic_robot ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_H._Shortliffe ** Dates * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_Mind_Common_Sense Open Mind Common Sense], a project based at the [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MIT_Media_Lab MIT Media Lab] to build a large common sense [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knowledge_base knowledge base] from online contributions. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commonsense_knowledge_(artificial_intelligence) ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MIT_Media_Lab *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marvin_Minsky *** Push Singh *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catherine_Havasi ** Dates *** Start: 1999-09 ----- * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/P.A.N. P.A.N.], a publicly available text analyzer. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natural_language_processing ** Participants *** Benjamin Bowes ** Dates *** Start: 2007 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siri Siri], an intelligent personal assistant and [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knowledge_Navigator knowledge navigator] with a voice-interface in [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apple_Inc. Apple Inc.]'s [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IOS iOS] and [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MacOS macOS]. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virtual_assistant *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natural-language_user_interface *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Speech_recognition *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Speech_synthesis *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Convolutional_neural_network *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Long_short-term_memory ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apple_Inc. ** Dates *** Start: 2011-10-12 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SNePS SNePS], simultaneously a [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Logic logic]-based, [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frame_language frame]-based, and [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Semantic_network network]-based knowledge representation, reasoning, and acting system. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knowledge_representation_and_reasoning *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognitive_architecture *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Semantic_network *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frame_language *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Logic ** Participants *** Stuart C. Shapiro ** Dates *** Start: 1968 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Viv_(software) Viv (software)], a new AI by the creators of [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siri Siri]. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virtual_assistant ** Participants *** Viv Labs, Inc. ** Dates *** Start: 2012 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wolfram_Alpha Wolfram Alpha], an online service that answers queries by computing the answer from structured data. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Question_answering *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Data_curation *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knowledge_base *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natural-language_understanding ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wolfram_Research ** Dates *** Start: 2009-05-18 === Motion and manipulation === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AIBO AIBO], the robot pet for the home, grew out of Sony's Computer Science Laboratory (CSL). ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robotic_pet ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toshitada_Doi ** Dates *** Start: 1999-05-11 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cog_(project) Cog], a robot developed by [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Massachusetts_Institute_of_Technology MIT] to study theories of [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognitive_science cognitive science] and artificial intelligence, now discontinued. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Humanoid_robot ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Massachusetts_Institute_of_Technology ** Dates *** Start: 1993 *** End: 2003 === Music === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Melomics Melomics], a bioinspired technology for music composition and synthesization of music, where computers develop their own style, rather than mimic musicians. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Algorithmic_composition *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evolutionary_music *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evolutionary_developmental_biology ** Participants *** Francisco Vico ** Dates *** Start: 2012-07 === Natural language processing === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AIML AIML], an [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/XML XML] dialect for creating [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natural_language natural language] software agents. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/XML *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natural_language ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Wallace_(scientist) ** Dates *** Start: 2001-07-16 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apache_Lucene Apache Lucene], a high-performance, full-featured text search engine library written entirely in Java. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Search_engine_(computing) ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doug_Cutting ** Dates *** Start: 1999 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OpenNLP Apache OpenNLP], a machine learning based toolkit for the processing of natural language text. It supports the most common NLP tasks, such as tokenization, sentence segmentation, part-of-speech tagging, named entity extraction, chunking and parsing. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Natural_language_processing_toolkits ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Apache_Software_Foundation ** Dates *** Start: 2004-04-22 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Artificial_Linguistic_Internet_Computer_Entity Artificial Linguistic Internet Computer Entity] (A.L.I.C.E.), an award-winning natural language processing [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chatterbot chatterbot]. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chatbot ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Wallace_(scientist) ** Dates *** Start: 1995-11-23 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cleverbot Cleverbot], successor to Jabberwacky, now with 170m lines of conversation, Deep Context, fuzziness and parallel processing. Cleverbot learns from around 2 million user interactions per month. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chatbot ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rollo_Carpenter ** Dates *** Start: 1997 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ELIZA ELIZA], a famous 1966 computer program by [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_Weizenbaum Joseph Weizenbaum], which parodied [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Person-centered_therapy person-centered therapy]. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chatbot ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_Weizenbaum ** Dates *** Start: 1964 *** End: 1966 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jabberwacky Jabberwacky], a chatterbot by [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rollo_Carpenter Rollo Carpenter], aiming to simulate natural human chat. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chatbot ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rollo_Carpenter ** Dates *** Start: 1981 *** End: 2008-10 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mycroft_(software) Mycroft], a free and open-source intelligent personal assistant that uses a natural language user interface. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voice_user_interface *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natural-language_user_interface ** Participants *** Ryan Sipes *** Joshua Montgomery ** Dates *** Start: 2016-04 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PARRY PARRY], another early chatterbot, written in 1972 by Kenneth Colby, attempting to simulate a paranoid schizophrenic. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chatbot ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kenneth_Colby ** Dates *** Start: 1972 *** End: 1972 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SHRDLU SHRDLU], an early natural language processing computer program developed by [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terry_Winograd Terry Winograd] at [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Massachusetts_Institute_of_Technology MIT] from 1968 to 1970. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natural-language_understanding *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blocks_world ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terry_Winograd ** Dates *** Start: 1968 *** End: 1970 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SYSTRAN SYSTRAN], a [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Machine_translation machine translation] technology by the company of the same name, used by [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yahoo! Yahoo!], [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AltaVista AltaVista] and [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google Google], among others. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Machine_translation ** Participants *** Peter Toma ** Dates *** Start; 1968 === Other === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1_the_Road 1 the Road], the first novel marketed by an AI. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Travel_novels *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Long_short-term_memory *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Recurrent_neural_network *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Creative_technology ** Participants *** Ross Goodwin ** Dates *** Start: 2017-03 *** End: 2018 ----- * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Synthetic_Environment_for_Analysis_and_Simulations Synthetic Environment for Analysis and Simulations] (SEAS), a model of the real world used by [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homeland_security Homeland security] and the [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Department_of_Defense United States Department of Defense] that uses [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simulation simulation] and AI to predict and evaluate future events and courses of action.<sup id="cite_ref-register_1-0" class="reference">[#cite_note-register-1 [1]]</sup> ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Simulation_software *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Synthetic_environment *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Multi-agent_systems *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:National_security ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Purdue_University *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alok_R._Chaturvedi ** Dates *** Start: 1994 == Multipurpose projects == === Software libraries === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apache_Mahout Apache Mahout], a library of scalable machine learning algorithms. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Machine_learning *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Collaborative_filtering *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cluster_analysis ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Apache_Software_Foundation ** Dates *** Start: 2009-04-07 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deeplearning4j Deeplearning4j], an open-source, distributed [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deep_learning deep learning] framework written for the JVM. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deep_learning *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Library_(computing) ** Participants *** Alex D. Black *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adam_Gibson_(computer_scientist) *** V. Kokorin *** Josh Patterson ** Dates *** Start: 2017 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keras Keras], a high level open-source software library for machine learning (works on top of other libraries). ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deep_learning *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Library_(computing) ** Participants *** François Chollet ** Dates *** Start: 2015-03-27 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Cognitive_Toolkit Microsoft Cognitive Toolkit] (previously known as CNTK), an open source toolkit for building [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Artificial_neural_network artificial neural networks]. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deep_learning *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Software_framework ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Research ** Dates *** Start: 2016-01-25 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OpenNN OpenNN], a comprehensive C++ library implementing neural networks. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neural_network *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Library_(computing) ** Participants *** Artelnics ** Dates *** Start: 2003 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PyTorch PyTorch], an open-source Tensor and Dynamic neural network in Python. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Library_(computing) *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deep_learning#Deep_neural_networks *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tensor ** Participants *** Adam Paszke *** Sam Gross *** Soumith Chintala *** Gregory Chanan ** Dates *** Start: 2016-10 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TensorFlow TensorFlow], an open-source software library for machine learning. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Library_(computing) *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dataflow_programming *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Differentiable_programming *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Machine_learning ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google_Brain ** Dates *** Start: 2015-11-09 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theano_(software) Theano], a Python library and optimizing compiler for manipulating and evaluating mathematical expressions, especially matrix-valued ones. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Library_(computing) *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Array_programming_languages *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Numerical_programming_languages ** Participants *** Montreal Institute for Learning Algorithms (MILA) ** Dates *** Start: 2007 === GUI frameworks === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neural_Designer Neural Designer], a commercial [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deep_learning deep learning] tool for [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Predictive_analytics predictive analytics]. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Analytics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Artificial_neural_network *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Graphical_user_interface *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Predictive_modelling ** Participants *** Artelnics ** Dates *** Start: 2015 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neuroph Neuroph], a Java neural network framework. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Artificial_neural_network *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Graphical_user_interface ** Participants *** Zoran Sevarac ** Dates *** Start: 2008-09 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RapidMiner RapidMiner], an environment for machine learning and [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Data_mining data mining], now developed commercially. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Graphical_user_interface *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Data_science *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Data_mining *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Machine_learning ** Participants *** Ralf Klinkenberg *** Ingo Mierswa *** Simon Fischer ** Dates *** Start: 2006 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weka_(machine_learning) Weka], a free implementation of many machine learning algorithms in Java. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Graphical_user_interface *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Machine_learning *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Data_analysis *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Predictive_modelling ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/University_of_Waikato ** Dates *** Start: 2018-09-04 === Cloud services === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Data_Applied Data Applied], a web based [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Data_mining data mining] environment. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Data_mining *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Business_intelligence *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Data_visualization ** Participants *** Dominic Pouzin ** Dates *** Start: 2009 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grok_(company) Grok], a service that ingests data streams and creates actionable predictions in real time. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hierarchical_temporal_memory ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeff_Hawkins *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donna_Dubinsky *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dileep_George ** Dates *** Start: 2005-02-04 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Watson_(computer) Watson], a pilot service by [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM IBM] to uncover and share data-driven insights, and to spur cognitive applications. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Question_answering *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natural_language ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Ferrucci ** Dates *** Start: 2005 [[Category:Artificial intelligence]] [[Category:Lists]] [[Category:Developing]] 086cc1ccec5540dfbdfd9b4e3d774735263bcabf 446 444 2019-12-27T19:45:43Z Andy Culbertson 1 Removed an extraneous horizontal rule. wikitext text/x-wiki This list is an overview of the institutional side of artificial intelligence, a catalog of the important people, organizations, events, publications, and projects in artificial intelligence research and application. This is a work in progress. Currently it's just the entries from Wikipedia's "[https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=List_of_artificial_intelligence_projects&oldid=912883365 List of artificial intelligence projects]" with some key data picked out. The reason I'm starting with the projects is that I want to the list to end up as a web, and the projects are convenient links between the organizations, people, and domain topics. The topics will be a lesser focus of the overall list, but they give the institutional items meaning. == Specialized projects == === Brain-inspired === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blue_Brain_Project Blue Brain Project], an attempt to create a synthetic brain by [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reverse_engineering reverse-engineering] the mammalian brain down to the molecular level. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brain_simulation *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reverse_engineering ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:New_user_landing_page&page=Brain+and+Mind+Institute *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C3%89cole_Polytechnique_F%C3%A9d%C3%A9rale_de_Lausanne *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_Markram *** https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:New_user_landing_page&page=Felix+Sch%C3%BCrmann *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sean_Hill_(scientist) ** Dates *** Start: 2005-05 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google_Brain Google Brain] A deep learning project part of [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google_X Google X] attempting to have intelligence similar or equal to human-level. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deep_learning ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeff_Dean_(computer_scientist) *** Greg Corrado *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andrew_Ng ** Dates *** Start: 2011 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_Brain_Project Human Brain Project] ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neuroscience *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bio-inspired_computing#Brain-inspired_Computing ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C3%89cole_Polytechnique_F%C3%A9d%C3%A9rale_de_Lausanne ** Dates *** Start: 2013-10-01 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Numenta#Open_Source_Community NuPIC], an open source implementation by [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Numenta Numenta] of its cortical learning algorithm. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hierarchical_temporal_memory ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Numenta ** Dates *** Start: 2013-06 === Cognitive architectures === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/4CAPS 4CAPS], developed at [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carnegie_Mellon_University Carnegie Mellon University] under [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marcel_Just Marcel A. Just] ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognitive_architecture ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marcel_Just *** Sashank Varma ** Dates * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ACT-R ACT-R], developed at Carnegie Mellon University under [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Robert_Anderson_(psychologist) John R. Anderson]. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognitive_architecture ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Robert_Anderson_(psychologist) *** Christian Lebiere ** Dates *** Start: 1998 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AIXI AIXI], Universal Artificial Intelligence developed by [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marcus_Hutter Marcus Hutter] at [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IDSIA IDSIA] and [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australian_National_University ANU]. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mathematical_logic#Formal_logical_systems *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solomonoff%27s_theory_of_inductive_inference *** sequential decision theory *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reinforcement_learning ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marcus_Hutter ** Dates *** Start: 2000 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CALO CALO], a DARPA-funded, 25-institution effort to integrate many artificial intelligence approaches (natural language processing, [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Speech_recognition speech recognition], [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Machine_vision machine vision], [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Probabilistic_logic probabilistic logic], [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Planning planning], [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reasoning reasoning], many forms of [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Machine_learning machine learning]) into an AI assistant that learns to help manage your office environment. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virtual_assistant ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SRI_International ** Dates *** Start: 2003-05 *** End: 2008 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CHREST CHREST], developed under [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fernand_Gobet Fernand Gobet] at [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brunel_University Brunel University] and Peter C. Lane at the [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/University_of_Hertfordshire University of Hertfordshire]. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognitive_architecture *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chunking_(psychology) ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fernand_Gobet *** Peter C. Lane ** Dates * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CLARION_(cognitive_architecture) CLARION], developed under [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ron_Sun Ron Sun] at [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rensselaer_Polytechnic_Institute Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute] and University of Missouri. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognitive_architecture *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Implicit_memory *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Explicit_knowledge ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ron_Sun ** Dates * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/JACK_Intelligent_Agents CoJACK], an [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ACT-R ACT-R] inspired extension to the JACK multi-agent system that adds a cognitive architecture to the agents for eliciting more realistic (human-like) behaviors in virtual environments. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multi-agent_system *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Belief-Desire-Intention_software_model ** Participants *** Agent Oriented Software Pty. Ltd. ** Dates *** Start: 1997 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copycat_(software) Copycat], by [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Douglas_Hofstadter Douglas Hofstadter] and [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Melanie_Mitchell Melanie Mitchell] at the [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indiana_University_(Bloomington) Indiana University]. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognitive_architecture *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Analogy *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parallel_terraced_scan ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Douglas_Hofstadter *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Melanie_Mitchell *** [http://www.cogsci.indiana.edu/ Center for Research on Concepts and Cognition] ** Dates *** Start: 1988 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DUAL_(cognitive_architecture) DUAL], developed at the [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Bulgarian_University New Bulgarian University] under [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boicho_Kokinov Boicho Kokinov]. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognitive_architecture *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Connectionism *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Computational_theory_of_mind *** decentralized representation *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emergent_algorithm ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boicho_Kokinov *** Alexander Petrov *** Georgi Petkov *** Ivan Vankov ** Dates * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FORR FORR] developed by Susan L. Epstein at [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_City_University_of_New_York The City University of New York]. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognitive_architecture *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Machine_learning *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Problem_solving *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bounded_rationality *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Satisficing ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/City_University_of_New_York ** Dates * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LIDA_(cognitive_architecture) IDA and LIDA], implementing [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_Workspace_Theory Global Workspace Theory], developed under [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stan_Franklin Stan Franklin] at the [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/University_of_Memphis University of Memphis]. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognitive_architecture *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognitive_neuroscience *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_Workspace_Theory ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stan_Franklin *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/University_of_Memphis ** Dates * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OpenCog OpenCog] Prime, developed using the OpenCog Framework. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Embodied_cognition *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emergence *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Graphical_user_interface ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ben_Goertzel ** Dates *** Start: 2008 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Procedural_Reasoning_System Procedural Reasoning System] (PRS), developed by [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Georgeff Michael Georgeff] and [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amy_L._Lansky Amy L. Lansky] at [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SRI_International SRI International]. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reasoning_system *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Belief%E2%80%93desire%E2%80%93intention_software_model ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Georgeff *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amy_L._Lansky *** François Félix Ingrand ** Dates * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psi-theory Psi-Theory] developed under [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dietrich_D%C3%B6rner Dietrich Dörner] at the [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Otto-Friedrich_University Otto-Friedrich University] in [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bamberg Bamberg], [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Germany Germany]. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognitive_architecture *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spreading_activation ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dietrich_D%C3%B6rner ** Dates * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/R-CAST R-CAST], developed at the [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pennsylvania_State_University Pennsylvania State University]. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decision_support_system *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Naturalistic_decision-making *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multi-agent_system ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Yen ** Dates * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soar_(cognitive_architecture) Soar], developed under [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allen_Newell Allen Newell] and [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_E._Laird John Laird] at [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carnegie_Mellon_University Carnegie Mellon University] and the [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/University_of_Michigan University of Michigan]. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognitive_architecture ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_E._Laird *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allen_Newell *** Paul Rosenbloom ** Dates *** Start: 1983 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Society_of_mind Society of mind] and its successor the [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emotion_machine Emotion machine] proposed by [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marvin_Minsky Marvin Minsky]. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognitive_architecture ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marvin_Minsky ** Dates *** Start: 1986 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subsumption_architecture Subsumption architectures], developed e.g. by [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rodney_Brooks Rodney Brooks] (though it could be argued whether they are <i>cognitive</i>). ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robotic_paradigm *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Behavior-based_robotics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Real-time_computing *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autonomous_robot *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Action_selection ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rodney_Brooks ** Dates === Games === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AlphaGo AlphaGo], software developed by [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google Google] that plays the Chinese board game Go. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Board_game *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Go_(game) ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DeepMind ** Dates *** Start: 2014 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinook_(draughts_player) Chinook], a computer program that plays [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/English_draughts English draughts]; the first to win the world champion title in the competition against humans. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/English_draughts ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jonathan_Schaeffer *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rob_Lake *** Paul Lu *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martin_Bryant_(programmer) *** Norman Treloar ** Dates *** Start: 1989 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deep_Blue_(chess_computer) Deep Blue], a chess-playing computer developed by [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM IBM] which beat [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Garry_Kasparov Garry Kasparov] in 1997. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Computer_chess ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Feng-hsiung_Hsu *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Anantharaman *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murray_Campbell ** Dates *** Start: 1985 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FreeHAL FreeHAL], a self-learning conversation simulator ([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chatterbot chatterbot]) which uses semantic nets to organize its knowledge to imitate a very close human behavior within conversations. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Distributed_computing *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chatterbot *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Semantic_network ** Participants ** Dates *** Start: 2008 *** End: 2012 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Halite_AI_Programming_Competition Halite], an artificial intelligence programming competition created by [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Two_Sigma Two Sigma]. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Competitive_programming *** battle ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Two_Sigma *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cornell_Tech *** Benjamin Spector *** Michael Truell ** Dates *** Start: 2016-11 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Libratus Libratus], a poker AI that beat world-class poker players in 2017, intended to be generalisable to other applications. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Texas_hold_%27em *** counterfactual regret minimization ** Participants *** Tuomas Sandholm *** Noam Brown ** Dates *** Start: 2017-01 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quick,_Draw! Quick, Draw!], an online game developed by [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google Google] that challenges players to draw a picture of an object or idea and then uses a [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neural_network neural network] to guess what the drawing is. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neural_network *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guessing#Guessing_games ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google *** Jonas Jongejan *** Henry Rowley *** Takashi Kawashima *** Jongmin Kim *** Ruben Thomson *** Nick Fox-Gieg ** Dates *** Start: 2016-11 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stockfish_(chess) Stockfish AI], an open source chess engine currently ranked the highest in many [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chess_engine#Ratings computer chess rankings]. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chess_engine *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alpha%E2%80%93beta_pruning ** Participants *** Marco Costalba *** Joona Kiiski *** Gary Linscott *** Tord Romstad ** Dates *** Start: 2008-11-02 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TD-Gammon TD-Gammon], a program that learned to play world-class [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Backgammon backgammon] partly by playing against itself ([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Temporal_difference_learning temporal difference learning] with [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Artificial_neural_network neural networks]). ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Backgammon *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Artificial_neural_network *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Temporal_difference_learning ** Participants *** Gerald Tesauro ** Dates *** Start: 1992 === Internet activism === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Serenata_de_Amor Serenata de Amor], project for the analysis of public expenditures and detect discrepancies. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet_activism ** Participants *** Irio Musskopf *** Ana Schwendler *** Pedro Vilanova "Tonny" *** Bruno Pazzim *** Filipe Linhares *** Jessica Temporal *** Yasodara Córdova "Yaso" *** Tatiana Balachova "Russa" ** Dates *** Start: 2016-09-07 === Knowledge and reasoning === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Braina Braina], an [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intelligent_personal_assistant intelligent personal assistant] application with a voice interface for [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_OS Windows OS]. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virtual_assistant *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natural-language_user_interface *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Speech_recognition ** Participants *** Brainasoft ** Dates * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cyc Cyc], an attempt to assemble an [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ontology_(information_science) ontology] and database of everyday knowledge, enabling [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commonsense_reasoning human-like reasoning]. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ontology_(information_science) *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knowledge_base *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commonsense_knowledge_(artificial_intelligence) *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knowledge_representation_and_reasoning *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inference_engine ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Douglas_Lenat ** Dates *** Start: 1984-07 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eurisko Eurisko], a language by [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Douglas_Lenat Douglas Lenat] for solving problems which consists of [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heuristic_algorithm heuristics], including some for how to use and change its heuristics. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Discovery_system *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heuristic ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Douglas_Lenat ** Dates *** Start: 1976 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google_Now Google Now], an intelligent personal assistant with a voice interface in [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google Google]'s [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Android_(operating_system) Android] and [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apple_Inc. Apple Inc.]'s [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IOS iOS], as well as [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google_Chrome Google Chrome] web browser on personal computers. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virtual_assistant ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google ** Dates *** Start: 2012-07-09 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holmes_(computer) Holmes] a new AI created by [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wipro Wipro]. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognitive_computing ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wipro *** Ramprasad K.R. (Rampi) ** Dates *** Start: 2016 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cortana Microsoft Cortana], an intelligent personal assistant with a voice interface in [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft Microsoft]'s various [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_10_editions Windows 10 editions]. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virtual_assistant ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft ** Dates *** Start: 2014-04-02 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mycin Mycin], an early medical expert system. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Backward_chaining *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Expert_system *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inference_engine *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diagnostic_robot ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_H._Shortliffe ** Dates * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_Mind_Common_Sense Open Mind Common Sense], a project based at the [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MIT_Media_Lab MIT Media Lab] to build a large common sense [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knowledge_base knowledge base] from online contributions. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commonsense_knowledge_(artificial_intelligence) ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MIT_Media_Lab *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marvin_Minsky *** Push Singh *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catherine_Havasi ** Dates *** Start: 1999-09 ----- * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/P.A.N. P.A.N.], a publicly available text analyzer. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natural_language_processing ** Participants *** Benjamin Bowes ** Dates *** Start: 2007 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siri Siri], an intelligent personal assistant and [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knowledge_Navigator knowledge navigator] with a voice-interface in [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apple_Inc. Apple Inc.]'s [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IOS iOS] and [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MacOS macOS]. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virtual_assistant *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natural-language_user_interface *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Speech_recognition *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Speech_synthesis *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Convolutional_neural_network *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Long_short-term_memory ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apple_Inc. ** Dates *** Start: 2011-10-12 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SNePS SNePS], simultaneously a [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Logic logic]-based, [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frame_language frame]-based, and [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Semantic_network network]-based knowledge representation, reasoning, and acting system. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knowledge_representation_and_reasoning *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognitive_architecture *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Semantic_network *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frame_language *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Logic ** Participants *** Stuart C. Shapiro ** Dates *** Start: 1968 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Viv_(software) Viv (software)], a new AI by the creators of [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siri Siri]. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virtual_assistant ** Participants *** Viv Labs, Inc. ** Dates *** Start: 2012 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wolfram_Alpha Wolfram Alpha], an online service that answers queries by computing the answer from structured data. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Question_answering *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Data_curation *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knowledge_base *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natural-language_understanding ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wolfram_Research ** Dates *** Start: 2009-05-18 === Motion and manipulation === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AIBO AIBO], the robot pet for the home, grew out of Sony's Computer Science Laboratory (CSL). ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robotic_pet ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toshitada_Doi ** Dates *** Start: 1999-05-11 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cog_(project) Cog], a robot developed by [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Massachusetts_Institute_of_Technology MIT] to study theories of [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognitive_science cognitive science] and artificial intelligence, now discontinued. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Humanoid_robot ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Massachusetts_Institute_of_Technology ** Dates *** Start: 1993 *** End: 2003 === Music === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Melomics Melomics], a bioinspired technology for music composition and synthesization of music, where computers develop their own style, rather than mimic musicians. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Algorithmic_composition *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evolutionary_music *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evolutionary_developmental_biology ** Participants *** Francisco Vico ** Dates *** Start: 2012-07 === Natural language processing === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AIML AIML], an [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/XML XML] dialect for creating [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natural_language natural language] software agents. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/XML *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natural_language ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Wallace_(scientist) ** Dates *** Start: 2001-07-16 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apache_Lucene Apache Lucene], a high-performance, full-featured text search engine library written entirely in Java. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Search_engine_(computing) ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doug_Cutting ** Dates *** Start: 1999 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OpenNLP Apache OpenNLP], a machine learning based toolkit for the processing of natural language text. It supports the most common NLP tasks, such as tokenization, sentence segmentation, part-of-speech tagging, named entity extraction, chunking and parsing. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Natural_language_processing_toolkits ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Apache_Software_Foundation ** Dates *** Start: 2004-04-22 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Artificial_Linguistic_Internet_Computer_Entity Artificial Linguistic Internet Computer Entity] (A.L.I.C.E.), an award-winning natural language processing [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chatterbot chatterbot]. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chatbot ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Wallace_(scientist) ** Dates *** Start: 1995-11-23 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cleverbot Cleverbot], successor to Jabberwacky, now with 170m lines of conversation, Deep Context, fuzziness and parallel processing. Cleverbot learns from around 2 million user interactions per month. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chatbot ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rollo_Carpenter ** Dates *** Start: 1997 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ELIZA ELIZA], a famous 1966 computer program by [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_Weizenbaum Joseph Weizenbaum], which parodied [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Person-centered_therapy person-centered therapy]. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chatbot ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_Weizenbaum ** Dates *** Start: 1964 *** End: 1966 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jabberwacky Jabberwacky], a chatterbot by [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rollo_Carpenter Rollo Carpenter], aiming to simulate natural human chat. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chatbot ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rollo_Carpenter ** Dates *** Start: 1981 *** End: 2008-10 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mycroft_(software) Mycroft], a free and open-source intelligent personal assistant that uses a natural language user interface. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voice_user_interface *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natural-language_user_interface ** Participants *** Ryan Sipes *** Joshua Montgomery ** Dates *** Start: 2016-04 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PARRY PARRY], another early chatterbot, written in 1972 by Kenneth Colby, attempting to simulate a paranoid schizophrenic. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chatbot ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kenneth_Colby ** Dates *** Start: 1972 *** End: 1972 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SHRDLU SHRDLU], an early natural language processing computer program developed by [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terry_Winograd Terry Winograd] at [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Massachusetts_Institute_of_Technology MIT] from 1968 to 1970. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natural-language_understanding *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blocks_world ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terry_Winograd ** Dates *** Start: 1968 *** End: 1970 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SYSTRAN SYSTRAN], a [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Machine_translation machine translation] technology by the company of the same name, used by [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yahoo! Yahoo!], [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AltaVista AltaVista] and [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google Google], among others. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Machine_translation ** Participants *** Peter Toma ** Dates *** Start; 1968 === Other === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1_the_Road 1 the Road], the first novel marketed by an AI. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Travel_novels *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Long_short-term_memory *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Recurrent_neural_network *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Creative_technology ** Participants *** Ross Goodwin ** Dates *** Start: 2017-03 *** End: 2018 ----- * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Synthetic_Environment_for_Analysis_and_Simulations Synthetic Environment for Analysis and Simulations] (SEAS), a model of the real world used by [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homeland_security Homeland security] and the [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Department_of_Defense United States Department of Defense] that uses [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simulation simulation] and AI to predict and evaluate future events and courses of action.<sup id="cite_ref-register_1-0" class="reference">[#cite_note-register-1 [1]]</sup> ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Simulation_software *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Synthetic_environment *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Multi-agent_systems *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:National_security ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Purdue_University *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alok_R._Chaturvedi ** Dates *** Start: 1994 == Multipurpose projects == === Software libraries === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apache_Mahout Apache Mahout], a library of scalable machine learning algorithms. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Machine_learning *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Collaborative_filtering *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cluster_analysis ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Apache_Software_Foundation ** Dates *** Start: 2009-04-07 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deeplearning4j Deeplearning4j], an open-source, distributed [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deep_learning deep learning] framework written for the JVM. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deep_learning *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Library_(computing) ** Participants *** Alex D. Black *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adam_Gibson_(computer_scientist) *** V. Kokorin *** Josh Patterson ** Dates *** Start: 2017 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keras Keras], a high level open-source software library for machine learning (works on top of other libraries). ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deep_learning *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Library_(computing) ** Participants *** François Chollet ** Dates *** Start: 2015-03-27 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Cognitive_Toolkit Microsoft Cognitive Toolkit] (previously known as CNTK), an open source toolkit for building [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Artificial_neural_network artificial neural networks]. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deep_learning *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Software_framework ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Research ** Dates *** Start: 2016-01-25 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OpenNN OpenNN], a comprehensive C++ library implementing neural networks. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neural_network *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Library_(computing) ** Participants *** Artelnics ** Dates *** Start: 2003 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PyTorch PyTorch], an open-source Tensor and Dynamic neural network in Python. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Library_(computing) *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deep_learning#Deep_neural_networks *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tensor ** Participants *** Adam Paszke *** Sam Gross *** Soumith Chintala *** Gregory Chanan ** Dates *** Start: 2016-10 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TensorFlow TensorFlow], an open-source software library for machine learning. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Library_(computing) *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dataflow_programming *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Differentiable_programming *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Machine_learning ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google_Brain ** Dates *** Start: 2015-11-09 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theano_(software) Theano], a Python library and optimizing compiler for manipulating and evaluating mathematical expressions, especially matrix-valued ones. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Library_(computing) *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Array_programming_languages *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Numerical_programming_languages ** Participants *** Montreal Institute for Learning Algorithms (MILA) ** Dates *** Start: 2007 === GUI frameworks === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neural_Designer Neural Designer], a commercial [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deep_learning deep learning] tool for [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Predictive_analytics predictive analytics]. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Analytics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Artificial_neural_network *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Graphical_user_interface *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Predictive_modelling ** Participants *** Artelnics ** Dates *** Start: 2015 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neuroph Neuroph], a Java neural network framework. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Artificial_neural_network *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Graphical_user_interface ** Participants *** Zoran Sevarac ** Dates *** Start: 2008-09 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RapidMiner RapidMiner], an environment for machine learning and [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Data_mining data mining], now developed commercially. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Graphical_user_interface *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Data_science *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Data_mining *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Machine_learning ** Participants *** Ralf Klinkenberg *** Ingo Mierswa *** Simon Fischer ** Dates *** Start: 2006 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weka_(machine_learning) Weka], a free implementation of many machine learning algorithms in Java. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Graphical_user_interface *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Machine_learning *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Data_analysis *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Predictive_modelling ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/University_of_Waikato ** Dates *** Start: 2018-09-04 === Cloud services === * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Data_Applied Data Applied], a web based [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Data_mining data mining] environment. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Data_mining *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Business_intelligence *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Data_visualization ** Participants *** Dominic Pouzin ** Dates *** Start: 2009 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grok_(company) Grok], a service that ingests data streams and creates actionable predictions in real time. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hierarchical_temporal_memory ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeff_Hawkins *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donna_Dubinsky *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dileep_George ** Dates *** Start: 2005-02-04 * [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Watson_(computer) Watson], a pilot service by [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM IBM] to uncover and share data-driven insights, and to spur cognitive applications. ** Topics *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Question_answering *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natural_language ** Participants *** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Ferrucci ** Dates *** Start: 2005 [[Category:Artificial intelligence]] [[Category:Lists]] [[Category:Developing]] e71f363ce950a1430c8dc886391c73058cca7291 14 161 445 2019-09-15T21:25:54Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the category. wikitext text/x-wiki [[Category:Programming]] aed2406a3a618eb93893d3cb5749d13c4a2192ac 0 48 447 122 2020-03-07T23:19:24Z Andy Culbertson 1 Changed the category to Learning wikitext text/x-wiki Version 0.1.0, 2012-03-29 === Motivation === My mind is like a murky lake. Along the shore are ropes leading into the water, and at the submerged end of each rope is a net. The ends I can see are questions life asks me that I need to answer from the contents of my mind, and the nets contain the answers I can provide. The ropes are of different lengths, and the nets are of different sizes. The big nets contain detailed and extensive answers, and the small ones contain little but ignorance. The short ropes lead to answers I know that I know and can pull to shore readily. The long ropes are the scary ones. Until the nets have emerged, I never truly know how long the ropes are or what will be at the end. Maybe the nets will have the answers I need; maybe they’ll be disappointingly, frighteningly lacking. Maybe the nets will reach the shore by the time I need the answers; maybe the ropes will be too long for the time I have to pull them. I don’t know how much information is in my mind to meet the needs of the moment or how long it will take to retrieve it. All this would be fine, except that most of the things I like to do—synthesizing and discussing ideas, programming, being a resource of information for people—require a memory that is clear and reliable, if I want to do them well. And I do. Plus, I like the sense of clarity, awareness, and familiarity I get from knowing things about the world around me. I’ve had this gripe against my mind for over a decade, and I’ve finally decided to do something about it. I’m studying memory improvement techniques. It’s turning out to be a much more complex topic than I expected, but at this point I’ve gotten far enough to shape my basic ideas on the subject and to form some goals. So to give myself a milestone and something to show for my work so far, I’m writing for you this summary. Since this is an interim report, I’ll continue to develop these ideas as the project progresses. The concepts, terms, organization, and agenda are all subject to change. === Sources === Where am I getting my information? Two kinds of sources interest me: reports of scientific research on memory and popular memory improvement literature. I look at the research because I want my techniques to be grounded in reality rather than marketing hype. And I look at the popular literature because it offers creative examples for applying the techniques, which I can then analyze and generalize to create a more expansive and flexible system. For this project I started on the research end of the spectrum with Kenneth Higbee’s ''Your Memory: How It Works and How to Improve It'' and some of Alan Baddeley’s much more recent ''Your Memory: A User’s Guide''. At some point I would also like to read ''Mnemonology'' by James Worthen and R. Reed Hunt, which I found while writing this essay, to see how my ideas about the principles behind mnemonics stack up against actual research. But in this summary I’ll mainly be citing Higbee and my own experience, because the material I’ve read in Baddeley has been more specialized and not as applicable to the topics I’m covering here. On the popular end, so far I’ve only dabbled in a few books and articles. === Overview === My project has a relatively narrow focus. Memory is a pervasive part of everything we do in everyday life, and there are several types of memory. But while it’s all important, I want to focus on ways to memorize information for long-term recall. I’m partly aiming for a computer programming approach to human memory. Programming is an excellent grid through which to examine many areas of life, especially areas that involve problem solving or designing systems that will perform tasks intelligently. It’s helpful for these purposes because it involves breaking down a domain into parts, relating them logically, and performing operations on them to achieve specific goals. It’s concrete and practical. Programming is especially good for dealing with human memory because computers have their own form of memory, and the tasks we need to perform with both types are largely the same. We need to store information, modify it, and retrieve it in various arrangements, though human memory certainly works differently from computer memory in some major ways. I’ll draw out these ideas as I go along. My overall approach is to view memory as an interconnected set of components that can nevertheless be treated modularly so they can be assembled to solve a large variety of problems. I divide my analysis of memory into three parts: the basic components that are involved storing and retrieving information in memory, the basic skills of memorization that use these components, and the ways we can apply these skills to various memory tasks. === Components of Memory === By the components of memory, I mean the basic structures we create with information in the mind and the basic operations we perform to store and retrieve it. Memory is a set of subsystems rather than a single structure in the brain {Higbee 2}, and each system handles a different type of information, such as visual or verbal {37-38}. It would be great if I could use the brain’s organization to lay out the principles of memory here. But I don’t know nearly enough about how memory is organized in the brain, and I’m not sure neuroscientists do either {Baddeley 11}. So I’ve attempted to come up with more of a functional framework for arranging the common memory principles and techniques. Most of psychology is about identifying the mind’s API, the things we do from the surface of the mind to achieve the effects we want, regardless of how the brain is doing things on the back end. Still, knowing the implementation can be useful, so I like to hear about the progress neuroscience is making on memory. To memorize information for recall, you’ll need to transfer it from '''short-term''' to '''long-term''' memory. Short-term memory lasts only a few seconds and can contain only around seven items at a time. If the information in short-term memory goes through an encoding process, it’s stored in long-term memory and can potentially be accessed for a lifetime {Higbee 19, 20, 23}. To make this transfer, you’ll need to put to work several factors. So far I’ve grouped them into three categories: description, significance, and maintenance. You’ll need to notice important characteristics and associations of the information, you’ll need to signal to yourself that the information is worth remembering, and you’ll need to keep your memory equipment in working order. The first two, which I’ll call the memorization components, relate to working with specific items of information, and the last relates to the overall operation of your brain’s memory systems. For this summary I’ll only discuss the memorization components, because I’ve done almost no research on the maintenance component, factors such as diet and rest. ==== Description ==== My view is that the mind '''stores''' information by indexing it according to its '''properties''' {50}, which amount to a description of the item. It '''retrieves''' information when it receives a reminder, which gives it one or more properties to search by. Memory researchers call the reminders '''cues''' {26}. A word, for example, is often recalled based on its first letter, its sound, or its meaning {30}. This is why you can often recall a word by reciting the alphabet, looking for the word’s first letter {100}. You can also see this property indexing at work when you remember the wrong word and find that it resembles the word you’re looking for in one or more of these ways. ===== Items ===== For the purposes of this project, an '''information item''' is any set of information you’re treating as a unit. It’s actually a stretchy concept. Our minds can almost always subdivide information into smaller pieces or group it into larger ones. Whatever you’re treating as a unit at the time is an item in that context. This expandability of information is a very important feature that makes it possible to create all kinds of useful associations for memory, as we’ll see later. Some information is easier to think of as a single, simple unit, such as the translation of a single English word into another language, and some is easier to think of as a group of smaller items, such as a grocery list or a whole chapter of a book. I’ll call the simple items '''unitary''' items and the groups '''collective''' items. Since pretty much any information can be subdivided, it’s technically all collective. But these categories are meant to help you in memorizing. Hence, the way you categorize any particular item is somewhat subjective and relative to your purpose for it at the time. I’ll explore the ways these categories can help you later in the essay. What kinds of information items are there? An item can be something more like an object or something more like a sentence, and really you could look at any item as one or the other. So you might memorize the flag of each country and treat each flag as an object, but in the back of your mind, you’re also memorizing a statement that goes something like, “The flag of Algeria looks like this.” ===== Properties ===== A property of an item of information is anything you can say about it. Really it’s just another piece of information that’s somehow related to the item you’re dealing with. In fact, I think of an item of information as being completely made of its properties. An information item is a set of information that someone has bundled into a package and maybe given a label, which is just another one of its properties. For the purposes of memory, there are at least a couple of ways to look at properties. You can think of a property as a handle for an information item that the mind can grab when it’s looking for the item. And you can also think of properties as parts of the item that you can then focus on as items in themselves. I also like to think of properties as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Resource_Description_Framework RDF] triples. That is, a property can be stated in terms of three parts: a subject, a predicate, and an object. For example, one property of tree bark is that it’s rough. That is, it has a texture of roughness. “Tree bark” is the subject, “has a texture of” is the predicate, and “roughness” is the object. Splitting up a property in this way can help you think about enhancing and organizing the material you’re studying, which I’ll cover below. I divide properties into a few somewhat fuzzy categories to help me get a handle on them. One division is between internal and external properties. An '''internal''' property is any characteristic that the item has on its own. I’ll call internal properties '''features'''. An '''external''' property is any connection it has with other information. I’ll call the external properties '''connections'''. If I’m looking at a tree, one of its internal properties is that it has green leaves. An external property might be another tree it reminds me of. Another division I make is between natural and incidental properties. '''Natural''' properties are related to the item’s meaning, and '''incidental''' properties are any other kind. For example, a natural internal property of the word ''horse'' would be its definition in a dictionary or an image of a horse. An incidental internal property would be the way the word looks in a particular font. A natural external property would be the fact that a jockey rides a horse. An incidental external property would be the fact that horse and helicopter start with the same letter. The fact that an item’s storable properties can stray so far from its typical meaning becomes very useful when you’re memorizing information that has very little significance to you or that has no logical structure, such as a list of random words. Memory researchers call these incidental external properties '''elaborations''' {Higbee 94}. We will see this feature of memory come into play when we discuss mnemonics. ===== Storage ===== I also divide memory storage activity into two categories, '''active''' and '''passive'''. These categories apply to both description and the other memorization component, significance. Even without consciously trying, your mind engages in memorizing all the time. For example, people tend to remember where they were when a national tragedy took place. It might not always be the memorizing you expect or need, but you can take advantage of this passive activity and use it to supplement your conscious memorizing. ===== Retrieval ===== As I mentioned above, the mind retrieves information when it receives a reminder, called a cue. A cue is anything that either reminds you there’s something you need to remember or simply reminds you of something you do remember. It’s like a question for you to answer or a sentence with a blank to fill in. It provides you with some of the properties of the information and leaves you to find the rest of the item. As with everything else, I divide retrieval of information into several categories. First, like storage, retrieval can happen passively or actively. I’ve observed that cues tend to happen in chains—one thing reminds you of another, which reminds you of another, and so on—and the chains tend to start with cues from your surroundings. The cues that bring up information from your mind without any effort from you are triggering '''passive''' retrieval. When the cues remind you of your need or desire to remember something and then you search your mind for the information, you give yourself a series of cues that could trigger your recall, and this search is a process of '''active''' retrieval. These cues can be either '''parallel''' or '''chained'''. That is, the cues may be independent of each other, or each cue may remind you of the next. It can also happen at different levels of consciousness. '''Explicit learning''' is retrieval with a conscious awareness that you’ve recalled something. '''Implicit learning''' is retrieval that happens unconsciously; you simply act on the information you’ve retrieved without being aware that you’ve retrieved anything {Baddeley 21}. And retrieval can happen more or less completely. '''Recall''' is the fullest level of retrieval, in which the whole item or set of information is brought to mind with only a starting cue. '''Recognition''' is less complete and more or less amounts to identifying the information you’re viewing as information you’ve seen before. Rate of '''relearning''' measures a subtle level of retrieval, in which you’re able to relearn information you’ve learned before in less time than you took to learn it at first. Your mind retains traces of the material from the first learning effort, so it doesn’t have to do as much work to learn it to the level of recall again {Higbee 26-27}. In this project, as I’ve said, I’ll be focusing on conscious storage for recall. Memory researchers have terms for several patterns of recall. When recall happens because it has been intentionally cued, they call it '''aided recall'''. Recall that happens in any order and without a specific external cue is termed '''free-recall''' {26}. Recall seems to be easier when it’s aided {100}, so it’s best to concentrate on memorizing specific properties of an item so they can reliably serve as cues. Most of my project will concern this strategy. When you recall items in a specific order, memory researchers call it '''sequential learning'''. When one item cues your recall of a second, they call it '''paired-associate learning''' {26}. Most of the memory techniques I’ve seen amount to different forms of aided recall using paired-associate learning. Even sequential learning can be reduced to a series of paired-associate tasks, where each item is the cue for the next in the list {133}. ===== Interference ===== A persistent problem for memory is what memory researchers call interference, the problem of confusing parts of something you’ve learned with parts of something else you learned before or after it {34}. This is different from the problem of strong emotions blocking your ability to learn or recall things, which I talk about in the “External emotional significance” section below. That could be seen as another type of interference, but memory researchers don’t call it that. To combat interference, each item you memorize needs to be unique in a memorable way. That is, it needs to have a unique set of properties. You can think of the items of information as being assigned unique addresses in your memory. The address is made of the item’s unique combination of properties. If two items aren’t meant to live at the same address, assign them different enough sets of properties that they’ll stay separate in your mind. Part of this memory improvement project will be to come up with ways to do that. ==== Significance ==== The second major aspect of memorization I identify is significance. For the mind to memorize something, it has to believe that it’s worth remembering. Here are some of the ways that can happen. Again, I’ve grouped them so they’re easier to remember. My categories for significance are familiarity, emotion, expression, timing, and interaction. Some of the categories from the description discussion apply to various aspects of significance as well—passive and active, internal and external. I’ll expand on them in the sections that follow. An item can gain significance as you discover its properties, such as other items that connect to it. For example, a man’s name may mean nothing to you and be quite forgettable until you learn he’s a brother you never knew you had. This ability of one item to elevate the significance of other items will be very important for the memory techniques I discuss later. ===== Familiarity ===== One obvious type of familiarity is '''knowledge'''. Information you’ve learned before is generally more significant to you than new information. This is important for two reasons. First, if you’ve already learned an item but you don’t remember it well, it will still be easier to learn than information you’ve never seen before {27}. Second, as we’ll see in the observation section, you can use more significant information, such as items you’ve already learned, to increase the significance of other information you’re learning {47}. A different type of familiarity that carries significance is '''sense'''. That is, information you can understand is usually more memorable than nonsense. I think of sense as a type of familiarity in that you understand a piece of information when it conforms to your existing, familiar patterns of thought as well as connecting with your prior knowledge. ===== Emotion ===== Emotion can lend great significance to information, making it easy to remember, though in some cases emotion can be a hindrance to memory. The emotion involved doesn’t need to be intense for it to help memory. In fact, it can be very slight. It just needs to be enough to make the material stand out as important in some way. Emotion that’s too intense may distort your understanding of the information anyway. ====== Internal emotional significance ====== In terms of emotion, I define '''internal significance''' as significance that is derived from the item’s properties. Internal emotional significance means that the item has properties that catch your attention. The information could be funny, surprising, fascinating, outrageous, impressive, disgusting, frightening, exciting, sensible, or touching, for example. Any property of the information—internal or external, natural or incidental, passive or active—can have significance that aids in remembering that information. Uniqueness, or novelty, while most important for separating similar information, also adds an element of significance to the information, if the item is unique in some way that feels significant {107}. It carries a sense of specialness: This item is worth paying attention to because it is one of a kind. On a subtler level, simply having a purpose can make an item more significant, even if it gets its purpose simply from being placed in a list or given a name. These features convey the sense that the item is supposed to be there. Internal emotional significance can be active or passive. Passive significance is reflected in the simple experience of emotionally reacting to the information you’re studying. The information is the type that is already important to you. Hence, I call this kind of significance '''reaction'''. Again, it doesn’t have to be a strong reaction, just a distinct one. A reaction doesn’t necessarily cement the details in your mind, so you may need to supplement your reaction with specific memorizing techniques, but it makes a difference. Taking the right '''attitude''' toward the material you’re learning is one example of active internal emotional significance. That is, you purposely see the information as significant. To do this, you take an interest in what you’re learning. You look for ways the information could be interesting or important or cause some other reaction in you, whether through the information’s features or connections, even though those ways aren’t obvious to you at first. ====== External emotional significance ====== I define external emotional significance as significance that the learner imposes on the information, whether actively or passively, because of the way the learner is feeling apart from the information itself. I haven’t explored this topic very far, and the books I’ve read don’t really cover it, so I’ll just mention it briefly. On the passive side, strong emotions, such as during a traumatic experience, can cement even random facts into your mind. In addition, events that happen directly in relation to the material you’re learning will often lend them significance. For example, the embarrassment of getting an answer wrong in front of other people makes the right information feel very important, and afterward it tends to stick in the mind! Similarly, the shift from confusion to understanding can give an item significance. Once an incomprehensible item makes sense, the feelings of relief and inspiration you get from finally understanding it can make it more significant. Necessity is another factor that can catch your attention. If the information is simple enough, knowing you need to know it can make it more memorable. Unless the necessity comes with a lot of stress, that is. Stress works against memory, which I discuss below. On the active side, you may be able to set an emotional tone for your study time via music, narrative, or some other form of art, and as you interpret the information by that mood, you may see new properties of it pop out as significant. But emotion also can hinder learning. In particular, stress works against both memorizing and recalling things {64-66}. I believe this is partly because stress and other strong emotions draw your attention away from what you’re learning and recalling, but I suspect there are other processes at work as well. My experience is that the mind can lock up under stress {Gladwell}. ===== Expression ===== The mind has several ways of taking in and processing information: visual, verbal, musical, narrative, kinesthetic. I’ll call them modes of expression. Some of these types of information are more memorable than others. It differs from person to person, but there are some trends. Visual information, for example, especially spatial, tends to be very easy for most people to remember {Higbee 37-39}. ===== Timing ===== I’ve encountered a few observations related to the timing of memory storage and retrieval relative to other things. I’ll probably try to generalize these later. You remember items in a list more or less easily depending on their position in the list {53}. You remember better things you learn just before sleeping and less well things you learn right after sleeping {44}. Most forgetting happens soon after learning. The rate slows down and levels off after that {35}. ===== Interaction ===== Your interaction with the material over time, even without any notable emotion, can lend the material significance. ====== Attention ====== Paying attention to the material you’re learning is one of the most basic and important ways of creating significance for it. Of course, you have to pay attention in order to notice things about the information and build up its properties in your mind {59}, but attention also clues your mind in that the information is important. This goes for any active part of memorization. ====== Repetition ====== I define '''repetition''' as repeated storage of an item in memory. Memory researchers know that spaced repetition is a key factor of learning {78-80}. I don’t know how it works out neurologically, but my interpretation is that being exposed to the same information repeatedly over a long period of time clues the mind in that it’s important. Many people think this type of repetition is what memorizing is. Reading over the information a few times is their only technique. But by itself, it’s really a very flimsy one, and we have many more resources at our disposal for planting information firmly in our minds {62}, which of course are the subject of this project. ====== Recitation ====== I define '''recitation''' as repeated retrieval of an item from memory. It seems to me that forcing yourself to recall information using spaced repetition is even more effective than simply exposing yourself to the information {83}. This is why flashcards are an effective study tool. === Memory skills === We can make use of these memorization components by exercising various skills. I don’t think I’ll have a real grasp on this section until I’ve experimented much more with different learning techniques. But I’ve grouped the skills I’ve found so far into several interrelated categories that loosely form a sequence: focusing, observing, selecting, enhancing, organizing, associating, rehearsing, and searching. The first of these is a general skill, the next several are storage skills, and the last is a retrieval skill. To memorize for long-term recall, you need to corral your attention, ask yourself questions about the information, pick out the information you need to know and the other information that will help you remember it, get the information into an easily memorizable form, arrange it all so you can easily link the information together, mentally form the connections, cement the connections over time, and then search your mind for the information when it’s time to recall it. In reality when studying various types of material for different purposes, you’ll mix these skills together rather than following them in a set sequence. ==== Focusing ==== Attention is a fundamental requirement both for active memorizing and for retrieval. So the first set of skills you’ll want to employ are those that focus the attention. The goal with these practices is to remove external and internal distractions. For external distractions, you’ll need to find a place and time that will keep you away from them. Find a quiet spot in the house, turn off the TV, go to the library, whatever circumstances you find the least distracting. You may have to observe yourself for a while and experiment with different setups. I like to sit in my car in a parking lot when I’m doing work that requires concentration. For internal distractions, you’ll need to settle or temporarily put aside disruptive thoughts and emotions. As I mentioned above, strong emotion, especially stress, can be a distraction from learning. So it pays to learn to relax and to remove stressors from your life. Relaxation techniques such as deep breathing exercises can go a long way to calm intrusive emotions. For thoughts that pull you away from the task at hand, it helps to write them down or tell them to someone, at least in summary form. That gives the part of your mind that’s concerned about them the assurance that you’ve given those thoughts some of the attention they deserve and that you’ll deal with them later, even if you haven’t completely resolved them now. And if you’re feeling worried about your memory’s performance when it’s time for recall, then the answer is to build your confidence. Your general confidence in your memory will grow as you practice the skills over time, especially when memorizing ''isn’t'' crucial. Then when you need to memorize something and the stakes are higher, studying to the extent that you overlearn the material will build your confidence that you know it, which will reduce your stress when it comes time to recall it {64-66}. Even if potential distractions are nearby, you may also find certain physical conditions for your study session that put you in a frame of mind for concentrating, such as playing certain kinds of music or simply sitting at a desk or in a room that over time you’ve associated with focused work {69}. In addition to removing distractions, you can help yourself focus by your attitude—gaining an interest in the material you’re learning. This has the added benefit of making the material more significant, which will make it easier to remember {70-71}. You can do a number of things to create interest while studying, which I’ll talk about below. But it can help to start the study session by reminding yourself of the reasons focus and interest are important. And if you can find reasons that are actually important to you personally and not simply reasons other people have for learning, that will be more convincing to you. ==== Observing ==== The rest of the skills relate to working with the specific information you’re memorizing. '''Observation''' is the skill of directing the attention to the specifics of what you’re learning, now that you’ve focused that attention. It’s the skill of noticing an item’s properties, both internal and external (its features and connections). These are the handles you’ll use to retrieve the information, and the main purpose of observation is to prepare the material you’re learning for planting in your mind via association and rehearsal. For this skill, keep in mind that I’m using the word ''item'' flexibly. An item can be anything from a single word to a whole book, to use a verbal example. An item can be subdivided into other items so you can concentrate on memorizing them separately, or it can be combined with other items to form a new whole, a process I’ll cover in the association section below. Before an item is subdivided, you can think of its sub-items as some of its properties. One good way to direct your attention is to ask yourself questions. A question is a type of cue. It gives you a set of properties and prompts you to find the item that matches them and to answer with a label that represents the item. The difference between an observation question and a recall cue is that when you’re observing, you’re looking for items in the material you’re studying as well as in your mind. Since observation plays a part in several of the other memorization skills, questions are a tool that will appear in several of the following sections. ==== Selecting ==== The most straightforward task related to observation is what I’ll call '''selection'''. This is the skill of identifying which information is worth noticing. Two other questions will help you discover which information that is. First, what do you need to know from this set of information? Or coming at it from the other side, what cues do you expect to receive for recalling the information? And second, what information will help you remember it? The answer to this one encompasses at least two types of information. One type is information that’s significant to you, since we can use that to raise the significance of less memorable information. The other type is information that may be in your mind at the time you need to remember the item, such as another item you’ve just recalled. This information can act as a cue if you’ve associated it with the item in question. These two types of information worth noticing are another example of an internal-external division. The cues (which tell you what you need to know) indicate what information is important to your circumstances (which are external to you), and significance indicates what information is important to your mind (which is internal to you). Of course, the same information may be important to both. I’ll call the cue-based information '''important''' information and the significance-based information '''memorable''' information. ===== Important information ===== Two main reasons for observing properties that are related to your expected cues are, first, to make sure you cover everything you need to learn and, second, to decrease your mental load by ruling out the things you don’t. A first natural question is what your expected cues ''are''. That is, what do you expect to encounter that will prompt you to recall this information? If the cues aren’t immediately obvious, try approaching the answer by asking yourself what context you’ll be in when you need to recall the information, such as an exam, a meeting, a party, or traveling. In an exam, the cues will be the test questions. In a meeting, they might be questions posed by the other attendees or simply the invitation to begin giving a presentation. At a party, they could be the greetings of the other guests, which would prompt you to recall their names and other information about them. While traveling, the cues might be landmarks, which would prompt you to recall the need to turn, stop, or look for the next landmark. Once you know the recall context and the types of cues you’ll encounter, you can imagine yourself in that context and begin to list the specific cues you expect to find. For example, who specifically will be at the party? What questions will likely be on the exam? What will the people in the meeting want to know? And once you have the specific cues, you can observe the responses to them that are available in the information you’re studying. ===== Memorable information ===== You will naturally react to much of the information you encounter. This information is already memorable to you, and you probably won’t have trouble remembering at least the gist. The skill is to notice these reactions when they happen so you can take advantage of them to add significance to the rest of the information. You can observe your reactions as you view each item for the first time, asking yourself how you’re reacting to this item, or you can review your reactions after you’ve seen all the material, asking yourself which items you recall reacting to. Observing your reactions is useful because if you can draw your attention to information that’s significant to you, you’re more likely to recall it when you’re looking for ways to make the other information more memorable. ==== Enhancing ==== For the material that doesn’t seem very memorable, you’ll need to associate it with other information that is memorable or with information that draws out its significant aspects. The actual association will come later. First you need to pick out the specific memorable information to associate the forgettable item with. Since this skill involves expanding on each item in various ways and since ''elaboration'' is already taken, I’m calling it '''enhancement'''. I call the items that will make the item in question more memorable '''helper''' items. When you’re looking for helper items, first tell yourself that there is something interesting about the information, even if you can’t see it yet. Then with that attitude in mind, do some more observing. Sharpen your observation of the information’s features and expand your awareness of its connections. You can do this by asking more questions: How does this information make sense? Understanding is typically an important first step in committing an item to memory. What interests other people about this information {72}? Assume they have a good reason! Why was this information included? Assume it has a real point! How does it relate to other items in the material? It may help to think in terms of relations like causation, implication, similarity, and contrast. What does the information remind you of that’s already familiar to you {53}? This question will be important again when you’re using the skill of translation, which I’ll describe in a later section. The answers to most of these questions don’t have to make sense. Certainly you should try to understand the material’s actual meaning. But the mind can invent connections that are significant without being logical {94}. Bizarre juxtapositions tend to be memorable, for example {107}. To use our terminology from earlier, an item’s properties can be natural or incidental, so feel free to take advantage of both. ===== Translating ===== One important type of enhancement is '''translation''', creating an item that you intentionally view as equivalent to the original item. You can think of translation in terms of the RDF triples I mentioned earlier. An item can be linked to its properties via different relationships. These are the predicates of the triples. The causation, implication, similarity, and contrast from the enhancement questions above are some possible relationships. Equivalence is another one. In this relationship, the property specifies another item, a '''substitute''' item, that stands for the one you’re studying {109}, which I’ll call the '''target''' item. In identifying this property, you’re translating the item you’re learning into the substitute item. If the substitute item is very memorable and it cues you to remember the original item, then it makes the original item easier to access in your memory. This is the idea behind many mnemonic techniques and systems. What kinds of items would you need a substitute for? Generally, any item that you expect not to be memorable, anything that seems boring or meaningless to you. More specifically, researchers have found that most people have a harder time remembering words than images, and abstract words such as ''timeless'' tend to be harder to remember than concrete words such as ''apple'' {38, 57}. People also find proper names hard to remember {192}, even though names are concrete in a way, since they usually represent people and physical objects. What kinds of substitutes are helpful? A substitute should have at least two characteristics. First, it should have some kind of connection to the target item that makes sense to you. That is, it should share some properties with the target item that are significant to you. For example, you could choose a substitute that sounds similar to the words of the target item, such as substituting ''celery'' for ''salary''. Or you could choose a substitute that symbolizes the target, such as imagining a set of balancing scales for the term ''justice'' {109}. It’s important for the connection to be meaningful. If you choose a completely arbitrary substitute with no meaningful connection, it will be hard to remember the connection, and the substitute won’t be able to act as a handle very well. Or if you memorize that meaningless connection well and then you run across a target item that the substitute would work much better for, you might confuse the new target with the old one when you’re using the substitute for recall. It’s not important for the connection to be meaningful to everyone, only to you, unless you want the substitute to make it easy for everyone to memorize the item. The second characteristic of a substitute is that it should represent the target item uniquely. If you choose a substitute that could be tied to a lot of different items, it might be hard to remember which item you need at the time. For example, if you’re memorizing the word ''frozen yogurt'' and you picture a bowl of it, you might accidentally recall the word ''ice cream'' if you don’t encode more carefully while you’re learning it {119}. The substitute isn’t meant to be a definition of the target item, only a cue. Its relationship to the target item can be purely incidental. It’s only a handle for pulling the information into your conscious mind. Once it’s there, you can put the substitute out of your mind for the moment and think about the target information normally. This approach lets the substitute do its job of adding significance to meaningless information while keeping the substitute from getting in the way of using the target information itself. The substitute item will often be in another mode of expression from the original item. It can be helpful to augment your learning by translating the information into the most memorable modes for you and even into multiple modes. Most mnemonic systems are based on translating verbal information into mental images {103}. And in addition to visualizing the information, you might also want to vocalize it, speaking the items out loud. I often struggle to find a substitute word as quickly as I need in order to memorize things on the fly. I would like to get better at this. It would help to memorize a lot of substitute words beforehand so I don’t have to be creative in the moment when I’m frantically trying to memorize the material in front of me. I want to write a program to create a dictionary of substitute words and phrases for names and common words. I also want to identify commonly used elements, such as days of the week and family relationships, that I can make a special effort to memorize. You can also take a poetic or musical approach, giving the material a rhythm, making it rhyme {111}, setting it to music, or all three. And if you can, perform this poetry or music for yourself out loud so that your mind can more fully encode the experience. Since most mnemonic systems take a visual approach and not everyone is visual {118}, I would like to find or develop a system along these auditory lines. The things I’d have to collect would be common rhyming words to translate harder words into, rhymes for commonly needed words, common poetic meters, and familiar melodies. The musical system could also use different aspects of music to encode things, like intervals, chords, keys, time signatures, and key signatures, if those things would be memorable. It would be good to see research about that. I would also like to explore a kinesthetic approach to memorization, though I’m not sure what it would look like, maybe creating actions that you associate with the information and arranging the actions into sequences to represent the relationships between the items. Sign language might be helpful here. ==== Organizing ==== The purpose of organizing is to bring together items that will help you remember more of the material. As I said in the selecting section, if you’re memorizing a set of information, you’ll often want each piece of information to remind you of other information in the set. You’ll also want more significant items to prop up the less significant ones. Thus, it helps to see them close together so you can easily associate them later. One type of organization is to group the items. If the items are related logically and you’re free to rearrange them, then you can group the information by category {51}. This gives you a chance to associate the category with all the items within it. Restating pairs of items as RDF triples could reveal categories you can group the information into, if the RDF idea helps you. Another type of organization is to arrange the items in a logical sequence, which lets you associate each item with the next in the sequence {133}. As you’re organizing, there are at least two other general questions to keep in mind. One is which item you should remember first when recalling a set of items {135}. And the other is how you’ll know when you’ve recalled everything you need from the set. To answer the second question, you can observe the total number of items in the group, or if they form a list, the last item in the list. Once you’ve recalled that number of items or that last item, you’ll know you’re done {133}. ==== Associating ==== '''Association''' is the skill of mentally assigning properties to an item. Or to say it another way, it’s cementing multiple items together in your mind. You can associate as many items as you want, but for simplicity we’ll assume it’s two. You can associate the information actively or take advantage of the passive associating your mind is already doing. ===== Active association ===== As I understand it, the way to associate two pieces of information is to create a new whole that incorporates both of them. The new whole, of course, is another item with its own set of properties. You’d think this would just give you more to study and take up more time. The goal, though, is to create associations that are memorable enough that you won’t need to spend much time studying them {166, 180}. There are several types of wholes you can form through association. If you’re visualizing the items, the new whole could be a scene in your imagination that features the two items interacting {104-105}. If the information is purely verbal, it could be a sentence or rhyme that incorporates them {111}. Another type of whole is a sequence of events that the mind groups together. I place classical and operant conditioning in this category. Pavlov rang a bell and then fed his canine subjects, so later when he rang the bell again, the dogs expected food. Simply grouping the items can tie them together, at least in short-term memory. If you’re memorizing a series of digits, such as a telephone number, then grouping them into chunks of two or three can keep them in your short-term memory longer. Memory researchers call this practice '''chunking''' {20}. Chunking can also let you create more complicated associations. You can chunk items together that you have associated with other items. For example, an '''acronym''' is a chunk of letters—a word—whose letters represent other words. Once you remember the word, you can break it down into its letters and remember the other words the acronym is associated with {98}. One effective visual way to establish associations in your mind is to group the information spatially. Group the items you’re associating into different regions of a page or some other surface. Along these lines, you could create a map that relates the items to each other in some way, using geography as a metaphor if the information isn’t geographical. Grouping the items physically is effective because the mind remembers at least basic spatial relationships very easily {150-152}. Another mode of expression that serves in association is storytelling. Humans are narrative beings. We naturally think in terms of coherent sequences of events, and we care about them, especially when they have to do with us. So one type of association that can add significance to the material you’re learning is telling a story that incorporates it {135}, especially a story that relates to your life. It doesn’t have to be realistic, just memorable. ===== Passive association ===== Even without consciously trying, your mind associates things all the time. You can take advantage of passive association by controlling the context in which you learn things. In particular, your mind associates things in your environment with things you’re doing. So if you’re studying for a test, it can help to study in the room you’ll take the test in. The features of the room may remind you of the information you studied there. The same goes for when you’re rehearsing for a performance {67-68}. And as usual, your mind isn’t picky about whether the associations make sense. Most of these associations will probably be for incidental rather than natural properties. Since interference is always a problem, it helps to memorize different pieces of information in different settings, whether different locations entirely different parts of the place in which you’ll be recalling the information {76-77}. That way, if you remember where you were when you learned that thing you’re trying to recall, there’s a chance something about that setting will cue your recall of the information. Making use of passive association is easiest to do with your external context—where you are—but it also includes your internal context—what state of mind you’re in. It also helps to try to learn the material in the same mental condition in which you’ll recall it (the same mood, for example). So if you’re going to be sober when you take a test, don’t be drunk while you’re studying for it {69}. ==== Rehearsing ==== Even the most memorable information will fade over time and become hard to recall if left alone. So in addition to enhancing and associating the information, you need to '''rehearse''' it. Rehearsal can take the form of both repetition and recitation, but recitation will cement the information in your mind more quickly. You can rehearse through recitation in a number of ways, such as using flashcards or having another person quiz you. But the basic procedure is to present yourself with a cue and then take a few seconds to try to recall the corresponding items. Then receive feedback on your result. If you were able to recall something, check the answer to see if you were right. If your recall was wrong or you couldn’t recall the item at all, use the feedback as a way to repeat your mental storage of the information, maybe looking for a new way to enhance it. Then cue yourself for the information again later. Feedback both lets you assess your knowledge and sustains your interest in the material {72-73}. Forgetting takes a certain shape over time. You forget most of what you learn right after you’ve seen it for the first time. After that the rate at which you forget the material slows down and levels off {35}. So your first study session should be a review of the material right after you first encounter it {89}. Learning also takes a certain shape over time. Your study sessions for the material should be frequent at first, but you can space them out more and more as your recall of the material becomes easier {89-90}. There are several algorithms for this kind of spaced repetition that can help you schedule your learning, such as the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leitner_system Leitner system]. ==== Searching ==== The mind stores information by indexing it by its properties. These properties are handles you can grab to retrieve the information as you search your mind for it based on those properties. So when you want to recall something and it’s not coming to mind right away, you can try to find it by suggesting properties to yourself that the information might have and seeing if the suggestion brings the information to the surface. Try to think of as many related types of information as you can, and one or more may trigger the memory. For example, if you enter a room and don’t remember why, look around the room in case your purpose was related to any of the objects in it, retrace your steps in case your previous locations gave you a reason to enter the room, and remember what you were talking or thinking about {Higbee 211}. Kenneth Higbee calls this the “think around it” technique {55-56}. === Applications === The components of memory I’ve discussed can be put together and applied to various problems that require memorization. Programmers sometimes write cookbooks that contain example code. The examples solve common problems in a particular language that don’t have immediately obvious solutions. Using the elements of memory in the above analysis as a rudimentary mental programming language, I’d like to do the same for common memory tasks. These applications can be built up in layers, with simpler applications becoming components in more complex ones. I’m organizing this section around tasks rather than the techniques that accomplish them, because each task can encompass a number of techniques. Since this essay is a summary and I haven’t thought very far about most of these applications, I’ll only cover them briefly here. ==== Holistic information ==== This category includes memorizing text, images, concepts, and music. With this type of information, it doesn’t work well to break it into a list of small components and then string them together with a series of associations, as in the mnemonic systems below. You have to recall it rapidly and fluidly, sometimes even nonlinearly, so it needs to be stored efficiently as a whole unit. You can think of it as assigning a single value, such as a string, to a variable. One good tool for rehearsing text is the [http://bencrowder.net/blog/2011/03/erasure/ erasure method], where several words are erased at random from the text before each repetition. This allows the surrounding words to serve as cues for a word that’s been erased. ==== Dates and times ==== One useful element to encode mnemonically is dates and times. This gives you a way to timestamp your memories, plans, and any other time-specific information. It would be an essential component of any mental task management system. The technique I have in mind would be to encode each component you needed (day, month, year, hour, minute, etc.), and then associate them all together. Then associate the whole clump with whatever information you want to timestamp. ==== Names and faces ==== Remembering names and faces is a very popular use for memory techniques {Higbee 194}. People are very important, but names by themselves are fairly meaningless, and faces can often look alike to the untrained eye. The techniques for remembering them are apparently the same from book to book. The idea is to find a visualizable substitute word for the name and associate it with a distinguishing feature of the face {194-198}. But I have my own spin on the details, and maybe some of the books take this approach too. It can be hard to recognize a distinguishing feature unless you know what the nondescript version would look like {Redman 1-2}, and it’s also harder to identify features when you don’t have a vocabulary for them {Higbee 191}. So I’d like to try using the techniques of caricature artists and, if I’m feeling really enthusiastic, the vocabulary of forensic artists {George chapter 1} to locate and name what’s unique about a person’s face. One benefit of having a technical vocabulary is that you can use substitute words for those terms and associate them with the substitute word for the person’s name. If you’re not very visual, this could be a helpful technique. ==== Experiences ==== There are a number of reasons you might want to remember your experiences in detail. For example, you might want to relive your good memories, which can happen more vividly if you remember more about them. It also gives you a better story to tell. If you’re giving eyewitness testimony, you can provide a better account. And if you’re learning a skill, remembering your mistakes and successes with the skill is important. Probably some of the important factors in remembering experiences are knowing in advance what kinds of things to observe in your experiences, having a reliable way to represent sequence relations to yourself (i.e., this event followed that event), and developing the habit of reviewing the experience right after it happens. ==== Complex sets of information ==== This is often a facet of studying for a school or certification exam, but complex information shows up other places too. Many people’s jobs involve knowing complex webs of facts and concepts. What are the best ways to organize and memorize these webs? ===== Mnemonic systems ===== A mnemonic (pronounced without the first m) is any method for aiding the memory, though most researchers define it more narrowly in terms of elaborations, aids that rely on what I’ve called incidental external properties. Kenneth Higbee helpfully distinguishes between single-purpose mnemonics, which he calls '''mnemonic techniques''' and general-purpose ones, which he calls '''mnemonic systems''' {Higbee 94-95}. An example of a single-purpose mnemonic is using the acronym HOMES to remember the Great Lakes: Huron, Ontario, Michigan, Erie, and Superior {98}. Much of this essay has dealt with the principles that seem to lie behind both types of mnemonics. In this section I’ll talk about mnemonic systems. Memory specialists describe a number of mnemonic systems you can use to memorize certain kinds of lists. Higbee includes five mnemonic systems in ''Your Memory'': Link, Story, Loci, Peg, and Phonetic. The Link system involves visualizing each item of a list and associating that item with the next item in the list {133}. The Story system involves creating a story that incorporates each item in sequence {135}. The Loci system involves memorizing a series of familiar locations, such as the rooms of your home, and then visually associating each item of a list with one of those locations {145}. The Peg system involves memorizing substitutes for a set of numbers or letters and then visually associating each list item with the corresponding number or letter substitute in sequence {157-161}. The Phonetic system involves memorizing a set of consonant sounds for each digit (0-9), translating any numbers you’re memorizing into the consonant sounds of their digits, adding vowel sounds to create words, and, if the numbers are meant to give order to a list, visually associating each list item with the word representing its number in the sequence {173-178}. One aspect of memorizing complex information is to mnemonically create data structures in your mind, the kinds of data structures that are fundamental to programming. Higbee’s five systems fall under the categories of linked lists (Link, Story) and arrays (Loci, Peg, Phonetic). But there are other data structures: stacks, queues, multidimensional arrays, hash tables, heaps, graphs, weighted graphs, and various trees (binary, red-black, 2-3-4) {Lafore}. We can find ways to organize and associate information to mentally build these and any others we need. The key to creating these mental data structures and inventing others is to break them down into sets of key-value pairs. To memorize the pairs, you associate the key with the value using the techniques from the association section above. Even a simple scalar variable is a variable name paired with the value assigned to it. The set of variables in a running program can be thought of as a hash table with the variable names as the keys. And you can think of an array as a hash table with the index numbers as the keys. If you’re using the data structure in a larger context and you might confuse its items with data from another structure, you could encode the keys using a different method or category (such as using animals for one variable’s keys and plants for another’s), or you could include the variable name with each key. So if you’re using a visual mnemonic technique, you’d create one image that incorporates your substitute images for the variable name, the key, and the value. This last technique treats the key as an address for the value. The value lives at key X within variable Y. You can extend this technique to account for data structures with several levels, such as trees or multidimensional arrays. This approach also treats the data structure like a database table with a primary key made up of several fields. In addition to creating the data structures themselves, it’s important to know basic algorithms for inserting, deleting, sorting, and searching for items in them, so I’d like to develop mental versions of those tasks too. ===== Rehearsal ===== Another aspect of memorizing complex information is to drill yourself, such as with with flashcards, which are an easy way to take advantage of spaced repetition. People normally use flashcards to study binary facts, such as sets of foreign vocabulary words. But as we’ve seen, key-value pairs can represent most types of information. This includes the points in an outline, the relationships in a concept map, or the cells in a table. So you could conceivably use flashcards to memorize these types of charts as well. I’d like to program a tool that will convert things like outlines and tables into flashcards. ==== Studying for an exam ==== My first motivation for learning about memory was to study more effectively for tests and not worry that I didn’t know the material. Studying effectively turns out to be a complex process of planning your study time and place, taking on the right attitude, organizing the material, and using effective memory techniques. Some type of chart would be helpful in making decisions about these steps. ==== Task management ==== My latest motivation for learning about memory has been to supplement the productivity system David Allen describes in his book ''Getting Things Done'' (often abbreviated GTD). Allen emphasizes recording your tasks in an external system, such as a planner, that is organized by context, because you can’t rely on your mind to remember everything you need to do when you’re in the right time and place for doing it {Allen 16, 21-23}. I think that the way GTD brings together the concepts of context, next actions, and horizons of focus is brilliant and very effective for helping to stay on top of one’s internal and external commitments. I also agree that an external system is easier to rely on than the mind. But is it really true that the mind is useless as a task manager? I think that using memory techniques creatively, it’s possible to do GTD mentally. For example, you could create a substitute item for each context and associate it with your list of next actions for that context, which you could memorize using the Link system. But at the very least, you can use memory techniques to remember tasks long enough to write them down later if you come up with them in the shower. === Next steps === My next step is to begin experimenting with memory techniques by memorizing things that are important to me. I’ll especially concentrate on finding substitute words and developing techniques for selecting, enhancing, and organizing. === References === “Leitner system.” Wikipedia. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leitner_system http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leitner_system]. “Resource Description Framework.” Wikipedia. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Resource_Description_Framework http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Resource_Description_Framework]. Allen, David. ''Getting Things Done''. New York: Penguin, 2001. Preview at [http://books.google.com/books?id=iykLVJAK49kC http://books.google.com/books?id=iykLVJAK49kC]. Baddeley, Alan. ''Your Memory: A User’s Guide''. New illustrated ed. Buffalo, NY: Firefly, 2004. Crowder, Ben. “Erasure.” BenCrowder.net. [http://bencrowder.net/blog/2011/03/erasure/ http://bencrowder.net/blog/2011/03/erasure/]. George, Robert M. ''Facial Geometry: Graphic Facial Analysis for Forensic Artists''. Springfield, IL: Charles C Thomas, 2007. Gladwell, Malcolm. “The Art of Failure.” New Yorker, August 21, 2000. [http://www.gladwell.com/2000/2000_08_21_a_choking.htm http://www.gladwell.com/2000/2000_08_21_a_choking.htm]. Higbee, Kenneth. ''Your Memory: How It Works and How to Improve It''. 2nd ed. New York: Prentice Hall, 1988. Preview at [http://books.google.com/books?id=N6FPQzBpheEC http://books.google.com/books?id=N6FPQzBpheEC]. Lafore, Robert. ''Data Structures and Algorithms in Java''. 2nd ed. Indianapolis, IN: Sams, 2003. Redman, Lenn. ''How to Draw Caricatures''. Chicago: Contemporary, 1984. Worthen, James B. and R. Reed Hunt. ''Mnemonology: Mnemonics for the 21st Century''. Essays in Cognitive Psychology. New York: Taylor &amp; Francis Group, Psychology Press, 2011. [[Category:Learning]] e1191b8063bc54a07722ee7b42ae72ca9b60a712 14 162 448 2020-03-07T23:19:59Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added the category. wikitext text/x-wiki [[Category:Social science]] 49de49372a42172a9a478a3f04ac469e7cfbcc05 6 163 451 2021-04-18T03:05:39Z Andy Culbertson 1 Thinkulum logo wikitext text/x-wiki == Summary == Thinkulum logo 205a91065ee6d2f8e31b784f6aa707e3bbec47f4 0 1 452 98 2023-01-16T20:15:45Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added a hidden Mastodon link for verification. wikitext text/x-wiki == Welcome == This is my public, personal wiki, a home for my essays and other projects. My blog is [http://www.thinkulum.net/blog here]. == Topics == {| class=&quot;wikitable&quot; width=&quot;100%&quot; |- style=&quot;vertical-align: top&quot; | * '''[[:Category:Religion|Religion]]''' * '''[[:Category:Philosophy|Philosophy]]''' * '''[[:Category:Social science|Social science]]''' * '''[[:Category:Arts|The arts]]''' | * '''[[:Category:STEM|STEM]]''' (science, technology, engineering, math) * '''[[:Category:Weirdness|Weirdness]]''' * '''[[:Category:Life maintenance|Life maintenance]]''' * '''[[:Category:Site|Site]]''' |} <!-- <a rel="me" href="https://sigmoid.social/@thinkulum">Mastodon</a> --!> 787d231df788962940d80af589a7c75c687d3cf9 0 106 453 403 2023-04-16T04:06:32Z Andy Culbertson 1 Made minor changes to the topics intro, updated the SWEBOK download link, and added chapter numbers and placeholder topics. wikitext text/x-wiki == Introduction == === Purpose === This project is a growing set of notes on various aspects of software development. Its purpose is to define a set of standard operating procedures for my programming projects. === Background === For most of my coding life, I have been the only user of my programs. I wrote them to aid my work or personal life, and only rarely did anyone else even see my code or watch it run. This wasn't on purpose. It just turned out that way. In my current job I do belong to a small development team, but our programs are still only for in-house use, so the only needs we have to consider are our own. This situation is starting to change. My programming projects are becoming more relevant to the outside world, and I want to share some of them as open source. This means I'm needing to reshape some of my programming practices and learn some areas of software development I've had the luxury of ignoring all these years. I haven't completely ignored these areas, though. I pick up on them here and there as I read about how other people code or as I see them in the software I use. Knowing that I'll probably need to know about them someday, I've kept a list. And now the time has come for me to fill in the details. I'm filling in the details here in this project for two reasons. First, as I learn, writing helps me clarify my thoughts and keep them flowing. And second, posting my writing might help other people. So if you're like me and you've programmed mainly for yourself--what I call private coding--and you're starting to share your work with others--public coding--then maybe what I've learned so far can grease some of your own planning. === Method === This project consists of my reading other developers' advice, examining their code, deciding what to adopt and how to adapt it to my needs and preferences, and creating templates, procedures, reference materials, and anything else that might help me code well for a public user base. To show how I'm implementing these ideas in my own code, I'll refer to [https://github.com/thinkulum my GitHub repositories] throughout the project, mainly my templates for [https://github.com/audreyr/cookiecutter cookiecutter], a Python app that creates project skeletons for any language, and my snippets for [https://www.sublimetext.com/ Sublime Text 2], the text editor I use. Snippets are templates Sublime inserts wherever you type the corresponding trigger strings. === Limitations === To give you an idea of my background, I've worked for the past 15 or so years in the publishing industry doing mostly text processing and some web development. The languages I'm most familiar with are Perl, Python, XSLT, and some JavaScript, with a smattering of PHP and VBA. I've spent almost all my time in Windows. I hope to branch out into at least Linux in the future, if only to expand my mind. This project will be oriented toward Python for now, but I imagine a lot of its suggestions apply to other languages too. At this point it also centers around desktop command-line programs, but I'm hoping to expand it into other interfaces and environments. === Feedback === Since this project is a place for me to learn, I welcome feedback, and I'm always open to arguments that my choices could be improved or suggestions for things I've missed. == Topics == As a way to organize my notes and make sure I don't miss anything important, I'll use the structure of IEEE's ''Guide to the Software Engineering Body of Knowledge'' (SWEBOK). It's a standard that overviews the entire field and forms the basis for creating things like curricula and certifications. You can [https://www.computer.org/education/bodies-of-knowledge/software-engineering/v3 download the PDF] for free. The items under the SWEBOK knowledge areas in the first level link to my notes on each topic. * Ch. 1: Software requirements ** Requirements * Ch. 2: Software design ** Design ** Architecture ** UX and UI * Ch. 3: Software construction ** [[/Code Style/]] ** [[/Project Structure/]] ** [[/Installation/]] ** [[/Metadata/]] ** [[/Command Line Interface/]] ** [[/Documentation/]] *** [[/Comments/]] *** [[/Literate Programming/]] *** [[/Docstrings/]] *** [[/Project Documentation/]] *** [[/READMEs/]] *** [[/Command Line Help/]] ** [[/Application Configuration/]] ** [[/Logging/]] ** [[/Test-First Programming/]] * Ch. 4: Software testing ** [[/Testing/]] * Ch. 5: Software maintenance ** [[/Refactoring/]] * Ch. 6: Software configuration management ** [[/Version Control/]] ** [[/Version Numbers/]] ** [[/Distribution/]] * Ch. 7: Software engineering management * Ch. 8: Software engineering process ** [[/Software Development Methodology/]] *** [[/Iterative and Incremental Development/]] * Ch. 9: Software engineering models and methods * Ch. 10: Software quality * Ch. 11: Software engineering professional practice ** [[/License/]] * Ch. 12: Software engineering economics * Ch. 13: Computing foundations * Ch. 14: Mathematical foundations * Ch. 15: Engineering foundations == [[/Sources/]] == See the article linked in the heading for a list of code examples and other sources I'm drawing from. <disqus/> [[Category:Programming]] [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Developing]] 19665458d422261ef641b2ecfc82078e85168623 454 453 2023-04-16T05:56:10Z Andy Culbertson 1 Reordered the SWEBOK knowledge areas. wikitext text/x-wiki == Introduction == === Purpose === This project is a growing set of notes on various aspects of software development. Its purpose is to define a set of standard operating procedures for my programming projects. === Background === For most of my coding life, I have been the only user of my programs. I wrote them to aid my work or personal life, and only rarely did anyone else even see my code or watch it run. This wasn't on purpose. It just turned out that way. In my current job I do belong to a small development team, but our programs are still only for in-house use, so the only needs we have to consider are our own. This situation is starting to change. My programming projects are becoming more relevant to the outside world, and I want to share some of them as open source. This means I'm needing to reshape some of my programming practices and learn some areas of software development I've had the luxury of ignoring all these years. I haven't completely ignored these areas, though. I pick up on them here and there as I read about how other people code or as I see them in the software I use. Knowing that I'll probably need to know about them someday, I've kept a list. And now the time has come for me to fill in the details. I'm filling in the details here in this project for two reasons. First, as I learn, writing helps me clarify my thoughts and keep them flowing. And second, posting my writing might help other people. So if you're like me and you've programmed mainly for yourself--what I call private coding--and you're starting to share your work with others--public coding--then maybe what I've learned so far can grease some of your own planning. === Method === This project consists of my reading other developers' advice, examining their code, deciding what to adopt and how to adapt it to my needs and preferences, and creating templates, procedures, reference materials, and anything else that might help me code well for a public user base. To show how I'm implementing these ideas in my own code, I'll refer to [https://github.com/thinkulum my GitHub repositories] throughout the project, mainly my templates for [https://github.com/audreyr/cookiecutter cookiecutter], a Python app that creates project skeletons for any language, and my snippets for [https://www.sublimetext.com/ Sublime Text 2], the text editor I use. Snippets are templates Sublime inserts wherever you type the corresponding trigger strings. === Limitations === To give you an idea of my background, I've worked for the past 15 or so years in the publishing industry doing mostly text processing and some web development. The languages I'm most familiar with are Perl, Python, XSLT, and some JavaScript, with a smattering of PHP and VBA. I've spent almost all my time in Windows. I hope to branch out into at least Linux in the future, if only to expand my mind. This project will be oriented toward Python for now, but I imagine a lot of its suggestions apply to other languages too. At this point it also centers around desktop command-line programs, but I'm hoping to expand it into other interfaces and environments. === Feedback === Since this project is a place for me to learn, I welcome feedback, and I'm always open to arguments that my choices could be improved or suggestions for things I've missed. == Topics == As a way to organize my notes and make sure I don't miss anything important, I'll use the structure of IEEE's ''Guide to the Software Engineering Body of Knowledge'' (SWEBOK). It's a standard that overviews the entire field and forms the basis for creating things like curricula and certifications. You can [https://www.computer.org/education/bodies-of-knowledge/software-engineering/v3 download the PDF] for free. The items under the SWEBOK knowledge areas in the first level link to my notes on each topic. I've sorted the knowledge areas to approximate my preferred order. * Ch. 7: Software engineering management * Ch. 8: Software engineering process ** [[/Software Development Methodology/]] *** [[/Iterative and Incremental Development/]] * Ch. 1: Software requirements ** Requirements * Ch. 2: Software design ** Design ** Architecture ** UX and UI * Ch. 9: Software engineering models and methods * Ch. 6: Software configuration management ** [[/Version Control/]] ** [[/Version Numbers/]] ** [[/Distribution/]] * Ch. 3: Software construction ** [[/Code Style/]] ** [[/Project Structure/]] ** [[/Installation/]] ** [[/Metadata/]] ** [[/Command Line Interface/]] ** [[/Documentation/]] *** [[/Comments/]] *** [[/Literate Programming/]] *** [[/Docstrings/]] *** [[/Project Documentation/]] *** [[/READMEs/]] *** [[/Command Line Help/]] ** [[/Application Configuration/]] ** [[/Logging/]] ** [[/Test-First Programming/]] * Ch. 10: Software quality * Ch. 4: Software testing ** [[/Testing/]] * Ch. 5: Software maintenance ** [[/Refactoring/]] * Ch. 11: Software engineering professional practice ** [[/License/]] * Ch. 12: Software engineering economics * Ch. 13: Computing foundations * Ch. 14: Mathematical foundations * Ch. 15: Engineering foundations == [[/Sources/]] == See the article linked in the heading for a list of code examples and other sources I'm drawing from. <disqus/> [[Category:Programming]] [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Developing]] 1d5e7a899c5a696fdd96af5bc7e03073d4c63453 455 454 2023-05-07T05:04:28Z Andy Culbertson 1 Condensed and updated the intro. Reordered the topic outline. wikitext text/x-wiki == Introduction == This is a collection of notes on software development. Its main purpose is to help me raise my development's level of professionalism. It also gives me a place to air an opinion or two. To give you an idea of my background, after some BASIC programming in my childhood and a break of many years for other interests, I returned to hobby programming just after undergrad and was able to make it my living several years later in 2006. That phase of my developer life started with Perl, and since then I've moved on to Python and XSLT. I've worked mainly in the area of text processing. JavaScript and PHP have played intermittent supporting roles for occasional web development or InDesign scripting. My projects have all been either solo or with a very small team. It's all been on Windows and mostly for the command line. == Topics == As a way to organize my notes and make sure I don't miss anything important, I'll use the structure of IEEE's ''Guide to the Software Engineering Body of Knowledge'' (SWEBOK). It's a standard that overviews the entire field and forms the basis for creating things like curricula and certifications. You can [https://www.computer.org/education/bodies-of-knowledge/software-engineering/v3 download the PDF] for free. The items under the SWEBOK knowledge areas in the first level link to my notes on each topic. I've sorted the knowledge areas to approximate my preferred order, though I'll address them more haphazardly. * Ch. 12: Software engineering economics * Ch. 11: Software engineering professional practice ** [[/License/]] * Ch. 14: Mathematical foundations * Ch. 13: Computing foundations * Ch. 15: Engineering foundations * Ch. 7: Software engineering management * Ch. 8: Software engineering process ** [[/Software Development Methodology/]] *** [[/Iterative and Incremental Development/]] * Ch. 1: Software requirements ** Requirements * Ch. 10: Software quality * Ch. 4: Software testing ** [[/Testing/]] * Ch. 2: Software design ** Design ** Architecture ** UX and UI * Ch. 9: Software engineering models and methods * Ch. 6: Software configuration management ** [[/Version Control/]] ** [[/Version Numbers/]] ** [[/Distribution/]] * Ch. 3: Software construction ** [[/Code Style/]] ** [[/Project Structure/]] ** [[/Installation/]] ** [[/Metadata/]] ** [[/Command Line Interface/]] ** [[/Documentation/]] *** [[/Comments/]] *** [[/Literate Programming/]] *** [[/Docstrings/]] *** [[/Project Documentation/]] *** [[/READMEs/]] *** [[/Command Line Help/]] ** [[/Application Configuration/]] ** [[/Logging/]] ** [[/Test-First Programming/]] * Ch. 5: Software maintenance ** [[/Refactoring/]] == [[/Sources/]] == See the article linked in the heading for a list of code examples and other sources I'm drawing from. <disqus/> [[Category:Programming]] [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Developing]] 371dd69d1d69624749a04890fef69ffad3ad674a 456 455 2023-05-09T15:49:46Z Andy Culbertson 1 In the topic outline, moved "Software engineering models and methods" to just after "Engineering foundations." wikitext text/x-wiki == Introduction == This is a collection of notes on software development. Its main purpose is to help me raise my development's level of professionalism. It also gives me a place to air an opinion or two. To give you an idea of my background, after some BASIC programming in my childhood and a break of many years for other interests, I returned to hobby programming just after undergrad and was able to make it my living several years later in 2006. That phase of my developer life started with Perl, and since then I've moved on to Python and XSLT. I've worked mainly in the area of text processing. JavaScript and PHP have played intermittent supporting roles for occasional web development or InDesign scripting. My projects have all been either solo or with a very small team. It's all been on Windows and mostly for the command line. == Topics == As a way to organize my notes and make sure I don't miss anything important, I'll use the structure of IEEE's ''Guide to the Software Engineering Body of Knowledge'' (SWEBOK). It's a standard that overviews the entire field and forms the basis for creating things like curricula and certifications. You can [https://www.computer.org/education/bodies-of-knowledge/software-engineering/v3 download the PDF] for free. The items under the SWEBOK knowledge areas in the first level link to my notes on each topic. I've sorted the knowledge areas to approximate my preferred order, though I'll address them more haphazardly. * Ch. 12: Software engineering economics * Ch. 11: Software engineering professional practice ** [[/License/]] * Ch. 14: Mathematical foundations * Ch. 13: Computing foundations * Ch. 15: Engineering foundations * Ch. 9: Software engineering models and methods * Ch. 7: Software engineering management * Ch. 8: Software engineering process ** [[/Software Development Methodology/]] *** [[/Iterative and Incremental Development/]] * Ch. 1: Software requirements ** Requirements * Ch. 10: Software quality * Ch. 4: Software testing ** [[/Testing/]] * Ch. 2: Software design ** Design ** Architecture ** UX and UI * Ch. 6: Software configuration management ** [[/Version Control/]] ** [[/Version Numbers/]] ** [[/Distribution/]] * Ch. 3: Software construction ** [[/Code Style/]] ** [[/Project Structure/]] ** [[/Installation/]] ** [[/Metadata/]] ** [[/Command Line Interface/]] ** [[/Documentation/]] *** [[/Comments/]] *** [[/Literate Programming/]] *** [[/Docstrings/]] *** [[/Project Documentation/]] *** [[/READMEs/]] *** [[/Command Line Help/]] ** [[/Application Configuration/]] ** [[/Logging/]] ** [[/Test-First Programming/]] * Ch. 5: Software maintenance ** [[/Refactoring/]] == [[/Sources/]] == See the article linked in the heading for a list of code examples and other sources I'm drawing from. <disqus/> [[Category:Programming]] [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Developing]] db93ac46551839a37fc1d39ecae57f0b2a3291e4 457 456 2023-05-09T15:54:02Z Andy Culbertson 1 Boldfaced the top-level topics in the outline for easier reading. wikitext text/x-wiki == Introduction == This is a collection of notes on software development. Its main purpose is to help me raise my development's level of professionalism. It also gives me a place to air an opinion or two. To give you an idea of my background, after some BASIC programming in my childhood and a break of many years for other interests, I returned to hobby programming just after undergrad and was able to make it my living several years later in 2006. That phase of my developer life started with Perl, and since then I've moved on to Python and XSLT. I've worked mainly in the area of text processing. JavaScript and PHP have played intermittent supporting roles for occasional web development or InDesign scripting. My projects have all been either solo or with a very small team. It's all been on Windows and mostly for the command line. == Topics == As a way to organize my notes and make sure I don't miss anything important, I'll use the structure of IEEE's ''Guide to the Software Engineering Body of Knowledge'' (SWEBOK). It's a standard that overviews the entire field and forms the basis for creating things like curricula and certifications. You can [https://www.computer.org/education/bodies-of-knowledge/software-engineering/v3 download the PDF] for free. The items under the SWEBOK knowledge areas in the first level link to my notes on each topic. I've sorted the knowledge areas to approximate my preferred order, though I'll address them more haphazardly. * '''Ch. 12: Software engineering economics''' * '''Ch. 11: Software engineering professional practice''' ** [[/License/]] * '''Ch. 14: Mathematical foundations''' * '''Ch. 13: Computing foundations''' * '''Ch. 15: Engineering foundations''' * '''Ch. 9: Software engineering models and methods''' * '''Ch. 7: Software engineering management''' * '''Ch. 8: Software engineering process''' ** [[/Software Development Methodology/]] *** [[/Iterative and Incremental Development/]] * '''Ch. 1: Software requirements''' ** Requirements * '''Ch. 10: Software quality''' * '''Ch. 4: Software testing''' ** [[/Testing/]] * '''Ch. 2: Software design''' ** Design ** Architecture ** UX and UI * '''Ch. 6: Software configuration management''' ** [[/Version Control/]] ** [[/Version Numbers/]] ** [[/Distribution/]] * '''Ch. 3: Software construction''' ** [[/Code Style/]] ** [[/Project Structure/]] ** [[/Installation/]] ** [[/Metadata/]] ** [[/Command Line Interface/]] ** [[/Documentation/]] *** [[/Comments/]] *** [[/Literate Programming/]] *** [[/Docstrings/]] *** [[/Project Documentation/]] *** [[/READMEs/]] *** [[/Command Line Help/]] ** [[/Application Configuration/]] ** [[/Logging/]] ** [[/Test-First Programming/]] * '''Ch. 5: Software maintenance''' ** [[/Refactoring/]] == [[/Sources/]] == See the article linked in the heading for a list of code examples and other sources I'm drawing from. <disqus/> [[Category:Programming]] [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Developing]] 39e9fe721c222d53fbd7998586c263a9477b350b 458 457 2023-05-10T05:32:50Z Andy Culbertson 1 Moved "Ch. 10: Software quality" and "Ch. 6: Software configuration management" to just after "Ch. 7: Software engineering management." wikitext text/x-wiki == Introduction == This is a collection of notes on software development. Its main purpose is to help me raise my development's level of professionalism. It also gives me a place to air an opinion or two. To give you an idea of my background, after some BASIC programming in my childhood and a break of many years for other interests, I returned to hobby programming just after undergrad and was able to make it my living several years later in 2006. That phase of my developer life started with Perl, and since then I've moved on to Python and XSLT. I've worked mainly in the area of text processing. JavaScript and PHP have played intermittent supporting roles for occasional web development or InDesign scripting. My projects have all been either solo or with a very small team. It's all been on Windows and mostly for the command line. == Topics == As a way to organize my notes and make sure I don't miss anything important, I'll use the structure of IEEE's ''Guide to the Software Engineering Body of Knowledge'' (SWEBOK). It's a standard that overviews the entire field and forms the basis for creating things like curricula and certifications. You can [https://www.computer.org/education/bodies-of-knowledge/software-engineering/v3 download the PDF] for free. The items under the SWEBOK knowledge areas in the first level link to my notes on each topic. I've sorted the knowledge areas to approximate my preferred order, though I'll address them more haphazardly. * '''Ch. 12: Software engineering economics''' * '''Ch. 11: Software engineering professional practice''' ** [[/License/]] * '''Ch. 14: Mathematical foundations''' * '''Ch. 13: Computing foundations''' * '''Ch. 15: Engineering foundations''' * '''Ch. 9: Software engineering models and methods''' * '''Ch. 7: Software engineering management''' * '''Ch. 10: Software quality''' * '''Ch. 6: Software configuration management''' ** [[/Version Control/]] ** [[/Version Numbers/]] ** [[/Distribution/]] * '''Ch. 8: Software engineering process''' ** [[/Software Development Methodology/]] *** [[/Iterative and Incremental Development/]] * '''Ch. 1: Software requirements''' ** Requirements * '''Ch. 4: Software testing''' ** [[/Testing/]] * '''Ch. 2: Software design''' ** Design ** Architecture ** UX and UI * '''Ch. 3: Software construction''' ** [[/Code Style/]] ** [[/Project Structure/]] ** [[/Installation/]] ** [[/Metadata/]] ** [[/Command Line Interface/]] ** [[/Documentation/]] *** [[/Comments/]] *** [[/Literate Programming/]] *** [[/Docstrings/]] *** [[/Project Documentation/]] *** [[/READMEs/]] *** [[/Command Line Help/]] ** [[/Application Configuration/]] ** [[/Logging/]] ** [[/Test-First Programming/]] * '''Ch. 5: Software maintenance''' ** [[/Refactoring/]] == [[/Sources/]] == See the article linked in the heading for a list of code examples and other sources I'm drawing from. <disqus/> [[Category:Programming]] [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Developing]] aae55689d72da56b78a2076d5f26b12c48e6b692 459 458 2023-05-10T15:32:56Z Andy Culbertson 1 Added "Introduction to the Guide" to the topic outline. wikitext text/x-wiki == Introduction == This is a collection of notes on software development. Its main purpose is to help me raise my development's level of professionalism. It also gives me a place to air an opinion or two. To give you an idea of my background, after some BASIC programming in my childhood and a break of many years for other interests, I returned to hobby programming just after undergrad and was able to make it my living several years later in 2006. That phase of my developer life started with Perl, and since then I've moved on to Python and XSLT. I've worked mainly in the area of text processing. JavaScript and PHP have played intermittent supporting roles for occasional web development or InDesign scripting. My projects have all been either solo or with a very small team. It's all been on Windows and mostly for the command line. == Topics == As a way to organize my notes and make sure I don't miss anything important, I'll use the structure of IEEE's ''Guide to the Software Engineering Body of Knowledge'' (SWEBOK). It's a standard that overviews the entire field and forms the basis for creating things like curricula and certifications. You can [https://www.computer.org/education/bodies-of-knowledge/software-engineering/v3 download the PDF] for free. The items under the SWEBOK knowledge areas in the first level link to my notes on each topic. I've sorted the knowledge areas to approximate my preferred order, though I'll address them more haphazardly. * '''Introduction to the Guide''' * '''Ch. 12: Software engineering economics''' * '''Ch. 11: Software engineering professional practice''' ** [[/License/]] * '''Ch. 14: Mathematical foundations''' * '''Ch. 13: Computing foundations''' * '''Ch. 15: Engineering foundations''' * '''Ch. 9: Software engineering models and methods''' * '''Ch. 7: Software engineering management''' * '''Ch. 10: Software quality''' * '''Ch. 6: Software configuration management''' ** [[/Version Control/]] ** [[/Version Numbers/]] ** [[/Distribution/]] * '''Ch. 8: Software engineering process''' ** [[/Software Development Methodology/]] *** [[/Iterative and Incremental Development/]] * '''Ch. 1: Software requirements''' ** Requirements * '''Ch. 4: Software testing''' ** [[/Testing/]] * '''Ch. 2: Software design''' ** Design ** Architecture ** UX and UI * '''Ch. 3: Software construction''' ** [[/Code Style/]] ** [[/Project Structure/]] ** [[/Installation/]] ** [[/Metadata/]] ** [[/Command Line Interface/]] ** [[/Documentation/]] *** [[/Comments/]] *** [[/Literate Programming/]] *** [[/Docstrings/]] *** [[/Project Documentation/]] *** [[/READMEs/]] *** [[/Command Line Help/]] ** [[/Application Configuration/]] ** [[/Logging/]] ** [[/Test-First Programming/]] * '''Ch. 5: Software maintenance''' ** [[/Refactoring/]] == [[/Sources/]] == See the article linked in the heading for a list of code examples and other sources I'm drawing from. <disqus/> [[Category:Programming]] [[Category:Essays]] [[Category:Developing]] 779e1c4b4539c1468f9deae6a57d19dc20e84b54